Noel Hurley

Noel now milks close to 200 cows in Kildorrery, Co. Cork but this wasn’t always the case.

Originally from Kilbrittain in West Cork, Noel made the move to manage a farm in the early 1990s. Through hard work, leasing and land purchase he now owns his own farm.

Noel began grass measuring in 2015 after realising there was higher grass quality on farms that were measuring compared to those that were not.

He walked the farm 40 times in 2020 and the farm grew 15.7 T DM/ha. This level of grass growth was achieved by applying 200 Kg N/ha on the milking platform.

Spreading a lot of lime and MOP (muriate of Potash) in the years prior to this to fix soil fertility was key. This has led to huge savings on fertiliser on the farm.

In 2019, Noel’s cows produced 520 Kg MS per cow from 900kg meal. Noel is a member of a Grass10 grazing course and supplies milk to Dairygold Coop.