News Archive
January 2010: Thinking ahead to Spring grass
Spring grass extends the grazing season and can have a major effect on the feeding costs and performance of livestock. This factsheet is a guide for the use of spring fertiliser for grazed pasture. The guide also applies to fields grazed prior to a later silage crop.
December 2009: GDC at the Winter Fair
The Grassland Development Centre PROSOIL project team were present on the IBERS stand at the 2009 Winter Fair, held at the Royal Welsh Showground in Builth Wells on November 30th and December 1st.
It was an ideal opportunity to meet up with our development farmers and many other interested parties to continue to build awareness of the project and the importance of soil health.
During the show, visitors to the stand were invited to enter a competition to win a luxury hamper of Welsh produce. As well as a variety of general questions on soil health, contestants were shown 3 soil samples and asked to assess them.
Many congratulations to our winner, Roy Price of Knighton. If you entered the competition and want to see all the correct answers, click Competition Answers
If you didn't enter the competition but want to test your knowledge, try these questions before clicking through to the answer sheet:
- Healthy worms are always pink - TRUE or FALSE?
- Aeration, because it opens up water and airways, is always beneficial - TRUE or FALSE?
- Soil compaction is a problem on most farms - TRUE or FALSE?
- Fungi are the heaviest proportion of living organism in topsoil - TRUE or FALSE?
- How many tonnes/acre of living creatures are there in typical grassland topsoil - 1.5, 2.5, or 4.0?
22 September 2009 - National Grassland Management Competition winner announced
December 08 - Winner of Winter Fair Forage Competition held at the RWS, Builth Wells was Ms Gail Brownset of Pencader.
19 September 2008 - National
Grassland Management Competition winner announced
The winner of the 2008 BGS National Grassland Management Competition, sponsored
by GrowHow UK and DLF-Trifolium, is a family-run beef and sheep farm on the
edge of the Snowdonia National Park. Emyr Jones and sons, Aled and Dylan,
farm 190ha (470 acres) at Rhiwaedog, Rhosygwaliau, Bala, in North Wales. They
are members of the Meirionydd Grassland Society and Emyr is deputy president
of the Farmers Union of Wales.

September 2008 - Tactics for safely managing slurry during current wet conditions
August 2008 - Sawfly alert - check grazing crops
January 2008 - 100% Organic Feed Regulation. Click link for news on minimising costs of feeding livestock.
2007
Competition Winners: GDC/IGER Stand, Winter Fair, November 2007
Congratulations to Mr Morgan, St Clears, on winning GDC's
Forage Competition. Mr Morgan will receive 5kg of clover seed.
Answers: Fodder Beet, Red Clover and Grazed Grass. For sight of questions,
please click here.
Land Use Survey Competition - The lucky winner of the Hamper
is Ms Shan Williams, Llanidloes. Many congratulations.
Autumn Grass Quality
Grass Focus
If you have a Grass Focus question for GDC - Tel: 01970 823058 or Email: heather.mccalman@bbsrc.ac.uk,/ chris.duller@bbsrc.ac.uk,/ charlie.morgan@bbsrc.ac.uk, / huw.powell@bbsrc.ac.uk
Press Releases
- July 2008 - RUGGED HILL FARM WITH SWARDS THAT RESEMBLE A BOWLING GREEN WINS GRASSLAND COMPETITION
- March 2008 - Results of Silage competition 2008 (FWGS)
Grass for Silage Weekly Results (May To June 2007)
Grass for Silage - Monitoring to Make Best Quality
Silage
IGER Grassland Development Centre, through
Farming Connect, will be sampling a range of grassland crops closed for silage
for up to three weeks before cutting, to monitor crop quality. From this weekly
update farmers can gauge how swards are progressing across Wales, to help
them make the best quality silage. Most early samples are from lowland dairy
farms but as the weeks progress, samples will come from beef/sheep farms and
from higher altitudes.
Producing a high quality, well fermented, stable silage is only possible if the grass at cutting time is of suitable quality. Quality targets include; high sugars for good fermentation, low nitrate levels to minimise ammonia that restricts fermentation, and high D value.
The updates include tips on cutting and sward recovery, clamp and bale management, and additive use, depending on the weather or other relevant factors and can be found here below on the IGER GDC web pages and DDC web pages.
For further information please contact Heather McCalman 01970 823026/01970823058 or one of the GDC team at IGER.
Week 1: 27 April 2007
Week 2: 4 May 2007
Week 3: 11 May 2007
Week 4: 18 May 2007
Week 5: 21 May 2007
Week 6: 1 June 2007
Week 7: 8 June 2007
Week 8: 11 June 2007
Week 9: 18 June 2007
REPORTS (Miscellaneous)
- Report of an Open Day held 1st June 07 at Camaes Farm (a HCC beef & sheep demo farm), Llangernyw, Llanrwst.
SPRING NEWS 2007
FWGS
2006 NEWS
WINTER FAIR 2006 - Royal Welsh Showground, Builth Wells.
Winner of GDC's competition - Mr Foord, Manor Farm, Llanvapley,
Abergavenny
July 2006: RESULTS OF FWGS GRASSLAND COMP '06
WEEKLY REPORTS:
GRASS
FOR SILAGE
(May To June 2006)
Please click on dates below for sight of weekly reports:-
12 June 2006 / 05 June 2006 / 29 May '06 / 22 May 2006 / 19 May 2006 / 12 May 2006
2005
'AUTUMN 2005 - GRASS QUALITY RESULTS' - please click here for the latest news.
"Willow, a worthwhile energy source", Farmers Guardian, p21, 2nd Septemer 2005
At
the Farming Connect WDA Agri Opportunities Open
Day on 1 September at Henblas Farm, Caersws IGER
Grassland Development Centre ran a competition for farmers
to test their knowledge on seeds mixtures. Click
here to have a go and see if you know the answers!
The lucky winner was James Jones, Brynarth, Beulah, who
will receive two tickets to the British Grassland Society
Winter Meeting in November.
IGER
Grassland Development Centre at the 2005 Royal Welsh Show
IGER again enjoyed seeing a lot of old friends and
many new visitors to our stand at the 2005 Show. At our
reception on Tuesday afternoon a good crowd of IGER
Associates joined us to hear Chris Pollock launch
IGER Innovations 2005 and Raymond Jones present
the new programme of work at our Uplands Research Farm
at Bronydd Mawr, entitled ' A new focus for upland research
at IGER' (click here to read more). The exhibit also featured material
from our plant breeding, nutrient management and
livestock production programmes. The new High Sugar grass
varieties, clover and livestock manure/slurry management information
presented was the subject of many discussions with
visitors.
Organic
Dairy meetings (click here for information in Welsh and English )
Organised by The Grassland and Organic Development Centres,
for Farming Connect, the meetings were held at the White
House Hotel, St. Asaph on Tuesday 26 th April and Nantyffin,
Llandisilio, Wednesday 27 th April. For more information
please contact : Heather
McCalman on 01970 823026/024 or your local FC Facilitator.
Click here to view recent articles by the GDC Team



