The Dairy Edge

This week’s Dairy Edge is from a recent Teagasc webinar entitled, ‘TB Update – Understanding the Recent Changes for Your Dairy Farm.’
 
TB continues to be a major challenge for the dairy sector, with herd incidence rising above 6% in 2024. There are now significant changes being introduced through the new TB Action Plan.
 
James Dunne hosted the webinar and was joined by Damien Barrett, Head of the Ruminant Animal Health Programme with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, and Joe Patton, Head of Dairy Knowledge Transfer with Teagasc. 
 
Together, they outlined the key policy changes, current TB trends, and what these developments mean in practical terms for dairy farmers, particularly around herd management, animal movement and biosecurity.
 
Link to webinar:
https://youtu.be/naefVhMC-ZU
 
Link to new TB action plan:
https://assets.gov.ie/static/documents/d4cfc18d/7784-DAFM_TB_Action_Plan_LR.pdf
 
For more episodes from the Dairy Edge podcast go to the show page at:
https://www.teagasc.ie/animals/dairy/the-dairy-edge-podcast/
 
The Dairy Edge is a co-production with LastCastMedia.com

For this week’s Grass10 grazing management update, John Maher has a few tips before the grazing season gets going and he gives a summary of the farmers’ contributions from Nutrient Management Week 2026.
 
Read more from this week’s Grass10 newsletter and subscribe for weekly updates at:
https://bit.ly/Grass10-20thJanuary
 
For more episodes from the Dairy Edge podcast go to the show page at:
https://www.teagasc.ie/animals/dairy/the-dairy-edge-podcast/
 
The Dairy Edge is a co-production with LastCastMedia.com

Setting up the fertiliser spreader correctly is important to ensure accurate and even placement of fertiliser. John Corbett from Grassland Agro joins John Maher for the final daily episode as part of Nutrient Management Week to discuss this important aspect of nutrient application and management.
 
Join us on the Dairy Edge each day of Nutrient Management Week for special episodes from farmers and experts and for more go to:
https://teagasc.ie/news--events/news/grass10-nutrient-management-week-2026/
 
For more episodes from the Dairy Edge podcast go to the show page at:
https://www.teagasc.ie/animals/dairy/the-dairy-edge-podcast/
 
The Dairy Edge is a co-production with LastCastMedia.com

For today’s episode as part of Nutrient Management Week, Grass10’s John Maher is joined by Mike Ahern who is farming near Ballyduff, Co. Waterford. 
 
Mike was the winner of the Nutrient Management category as well as the overall winner of that Grassland Farmer of the Year Competition in 2024 and he talks to John about the importance of driving growth with early fertiliser application on his farm as well as how to use GPS technology to minimise losses to ensure you get full value from the fertiliser allowances for your farm.
 
Join us on the Dairy Edge each day of Nutrient Management Week for special episodes from farmers and experts and for more go to:
https://teagasc.ie/news--events/news/grass10-nutrient-management-week-2026/
 
For more episodes from the Dairy Edge podcast go to the show page at:
https://www.teagasc.ie/animals/dairy/the-dairy-edge-podcast/
 
The Dairy Edge is a co-production with LastCastMedia.com

Continuing the daily episodes as part of Nutrient Management Week, today John Maher talks about timing of applications to maximise their return, the rates to apply to find the balance between driving growth and mitigating potential environmental losses and how getting soil fertility right improves the return from applied nutrients thus being an important factor in minimising potential nutrient loss also.
 
Plus he speaks to Mike Ahern who is farming near Ballyduff, Co. Waterford. Mike was the winner of the Nutrient Management category as well as the overall winner of that Grassland Farmer of the Year Competition in 2024.
Join us on the Dairy Edge each day of Nutrient Management Week for special episodes from farmers and experts and for more go to:
https://teagasc.ie/news--events/news/grass10-nutrient-management-week-2026/
For more episodes from the Dairy Edge podcast go to the show page at:
https://www.teagasc.ie/animals/dairy/the-dairy-edge-podcast/
 
The Dairy Edge is a co-production with LastCastMedia.com