Richard Williamson

Address: Mount Hevey, Hill of Down, Co. Meath

Farm Size: 73 ha all owned

Soil type: Rathowen soil series (Fine loamy drift with limestones) – Heavy soil with good grass growth potenitial

Farming system: Aberdeen Angus sired spring calving calf-to-beef production system

Farm plan: To develop a streamlined low labour requirement system that can deliver a gross margin close to €1,000/ha. As Richard has a full time job farm labour must be kept to a minimum. By using easy calving Aberdeen stock bulls this will help reduce calving difficulty and calf mortality. Focusing on increasing animal performance from grazed grass and increasing the cow herd to 100 spring calving cows calving in a compact period with a calving interval close to 365 days will help increase output and dilute production costs. Male calves are castrated less than 8 months of age and finished as steers at 22 months.

This farm will aim to demonstrate a profitable part-time grass based suckler calf to beef system with a relatively low labour requirement.