Grazing infrastructure upgrades to boost farm performance
Is there a way to improve grazing infrastructure to boost animal and financial performance while reducing labour demands? Nikki Kennedy, Teagasc Grass10 Advisor, looks at how simple upgrades can help farmers improve grass utilisation and grazing efficiency.
Big or small, there are always improvements that can be made on farm. In relation to grazing infrastructure, anything that allows a farmer to be more efficient, grazing the right grass at the right time, and increasing animal and financial performance is a huge positive. One common constraint we see on farms as to why farmers aren’t utilising grass in the most efficient way is not due to a lack of will or knowledge, their time is limited and this affects what they can achieve in their grazing system whilst balancing other essential farm jobs and life off-farm.
The Grass10 team recently visited a number of farmers across the country, spanning sheep, beef and dairy enterprises to see what new and novel technologies, along with the tried and tested, they have implemented to improve their grazing infrastructure.
Access to grazing particularly in the ‘shoulders’ of the year when ground conditions are challenging led Kerry dairy farmer William Dennehy to install a number of spur roadways on his farm. These are narrow roads, 3 feet wide, constructed for approximately €10/m. he credits these with enabling him to get grazing early, impressively on 20th February 2026 in very challenging conditions by limiting poaching and avoiding cows tracking over large grazing areas. As a result, William is able to produce higher volumes of milk with better constituents than if he was not grazing early in the spring.
Beef farmer Aidan Maguire similarly sees the importance of accessing grazing without causing excess damage in poorer conditions. On his farm he has utilised grass roadways, simply a second fence with multiple gaps that allows cattle to be moved in a controlled manner between any paddock that is selected. By keeping it a grass roadway, it is a very low-cost option and the area remains part of the paddock for grazing. Aidan or his son Luke can easily move any group on their own so there has been a big labour benefit.
Sheep farmer, Willie Fox, stated that one of the barriers to effective grassland management on sheep farms was the time required to set up temporary electric fences. To overcome this Willie designed a bracket to allow three separate polywires on one reel to cut down on time required. He said “you’ll put up 100m in a few minutes. It means you’ll do it, that’s the reality”.
Roscommon dairy farmer, and recent Pasture Progress Award winner, Tommie Devine recently undertook a major project installing an underpass on the farm. This means that he can now access all paddocks on the farm at any time, even in the busy spring time and on weekends when labour availability to cross the road previously limited access.
There are many more examples of infrastructure upgrades that can improve animal and financial performance as well as address labour constraints on farm.
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