Paula Hynes: The girl who doesn't hang about

Sunrise over the Hynes dairy herd

We had a birthday girl in the house this week as Becky turned 17. It's a milestone she had simply been waiting for as she already has her theory test passed and her provisional driving license. No doubt she will have a crack at her driving test as fast as possible. 

She never really was one to hang around and always preferred to get a move on. She was born on Friday 13. I remember saying to Pete at 8am that morning that I thought I might be going into labour; we timed the contractions, and during a quick phone call, my GP informed me that I’d want to get my skates on and get into CUH maternity.  

We arrived into the hospital at 9:30am and Becky was born at 11:30am. She hasn’t wasted a minute since either and a capable young woman to run the farm while myself take a short break. 

We will be ditching the wellies for a few days and heading to Paris to celebrate our wedding anniversary, 23 years married. 

We absolutely love Paris, and it is great value for money; even better that we are flying out from Cork airport, which is always so relaxing as we can be through security within 30 minutes of leaving our house, so we will land in Paris nice and relaxed.

It may seem like a luxury, but Pete hasn’t had a day off since November, and we haven’t been out together in months, which is not like us at all. The cows were housed for six months due to the horrendous weather, which made farming difficult.

There is always a sense of panic trying to get so much done before a holiday, with the weather playing havoc, the last few days were hectic as we were waiting for ground conditions to improve. Silage ground has received slurry and fertiliser is up to date. 

Hopefully, with high pressure building over Ireland, we will see a little heat and sunshine to drive grass growth and also allow tillage farmers to get on with the mammoth workload ahead to get spring crops planted. 

The grazing rotation is a little unorthodox for the cows at the moment. The ground has finally dried on the lower part of the farm, allowing them to back graze the first rotation while they graze the second rotation paddocks at night.

They will probably start the third rotation on some paddocks this week. I get confused myself thinking about it, but at least we have plenty of grass. 

The first rotation paddocks they are grazing are tricky ground conditions and we would probably do more harm if we mowed it and baled. The autumn in-calf heifers have also been drafted in as reinforcements to graze parts of it. 

All the spring-calving heifers remain closer to our view as they have all been served, and we will be watching for repeats, which we plan to AI again. 

We will start breeding cows once we come home from Paris, so the breeding charts are all ready for our Munster Bovine AI technician David Murphy. With a very limited number of cows receiving dairy semen, the vast majority of which will be sexed, it is easier to have breeding charts as I would imagine some days we will only be using beef semen.

Harvesting the sun

We had a meeting with Kevin Carey from Atlantic Energy Consultants this week, as they are putting in a TAMS application for us with a new tranche just opened. 

With so much roof space on the farm, the plan is to install a large-scale solar panel system to reduce our energy costs and hopefully export power back to the grid. Energy prices have been sky high since the war in Ukraine broke out, and Ireland is one of the most expensive countries in Europe for electricity. 

We live in a world which seems to be dominated by conflict. Indeed, tensions are high in the Middle East as well now, with Israel and Iran having a major standoff with each other. 

While we are a long way from any potential battle fronts, the reality is that an escalation in the tensions could have a major impact on energy prices, 40% of the world's current oil usage travels through The Straits of Hormuz, and a full-scale war could see the Iranians block the Straits at a moment's notice.

Wars drive certain global economies as more weapons must be produced. Energy prices, it would seem, will continually fluctuate, so it would seem a wise business move to take more control of that cost ourselves, and there is the added advantage that solar energy is more sustainable.

I also think it makes sense to use the roof space, as it always frustrates me to see fields full of solar panels when so many industrial roofs lay idle. I think they are an eyesore on fields, quite frankly. 

While many laugh at the level of emissions China produces, at least they had the common sense to ban any further construction of solar systems on fields.

Atlantic Energy Consultants offers a one-stop shop for farmers looking to apply for government-funded grants such as SEAI and TAMS. They are registered with DAFM and SEAI to provide a streamlined service.

The team understand the unique needs of the farming sector. 

As we chatted with Kevin, he understood all the high-power consumption parts of the farm and where best to potentially place panels, even before any site survey is conducted. The plan is to develop a cost-effective energy strategy as we continually modernize the farm. 

They take control of the whole process, liaising with DAFM throughout to simplify it for us. This also includes a free PV quotation, TAMS 3 solar application, installation and commission, project management, and grant claim on behalf of the farmer up to the final installation through their partner company, Fitzgerald Electrical.

They also offer a free SEAI energy audit for qualifying farmers. It will be a big project for us, but it will be so much easier using Atlantic Energy Consultants. They are constantly working on projects like this, so they will see the pitfalls before they ever arise.