Incorporating biodiversity into a high performing dairy farm

Dairy farmer, Shane Fitzgerald, and Masters researcher, Aoife Leader, join Emma-Louise Coffey on this week’s Dairy Edge to highlight examples of farms achieving top performance in combination with high levels of biodiversity. Aoife is working with eleven dairy farms as part of the Teagasc/Glanbia joint programme to establish the features and level of biodiversity on each of the farms and has identified biodiversity KPIs including average field size, biodiversity score and biodiversity percentage. Firstly Shane gave some background to the farm: he is milking 210 cows alongside his father John, growing 13.5 tonne of grass with cows producing 480 kg MS. Shane identified many features of biodiversity including hedgerows, fenced watercourses and low input pasture to name a few and explains how biodiversity exists within a high performing dairy unit at minimal cost. Aoife explained that a lot of biodiversity exists on dairy farms and recommends that the first step for farmers is to maintain and retain existing biodiversity. For more information, Shane will be hosting a virtual farm walk and webinar on Thursday 1st October with more information here: https://www.teagasc.ie/news--events/daily/dairy/reducing-the-carbon-footprint-of-milk-production-virtual-farm-walk-and-webinar-from-portlaw-co-waterford.php For more episodes from the Dairy Edge podcast visit the show page at: https://www.teagasc.ie/animals/dairy/the-dairy-edge-podcast/