A Co. Laois farmer has said it is “now or never” for a time to plant his crop of spring barley for this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In his 20 years of farming, this is only the second time David Walsh-Kemmis has sown the crop in the month of April.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Two types of barley are grown on the malting barley farm; distilling barley, grown for Waterford distillery and brewing barley, used in Walsh-Kemmis’ own brewery, Ballykilcavan Brewery<\/a>, near Stradbally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Walsh-Kemmis told Agriland <\/em>that currently, the brewing barley “is a problem,” but he added “the distilling barley is a real problem at this stage. <\/p>\n\n\n\n “If you can sow that in February, great, but for us, realistically the first week in March is when we’d be aiming to get it in.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n He said this has meant that the farm is now running “four weeks late already<\/strong>” as weather conditions have made it impossible to sow the crop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Laois farmer said that “out of desperation more than anything else” an attempt was made this week to sow the crop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Half of a field was sown before rain began, and the drill began to block up with wet clay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Attempting to sow<\/h2>\n\n\n\n