Somerset: Forage Focus – Improving grass silage and integrating home-grown pulses into the dairy ration

Home-grown forage is the cornerstone of dairy nutrition. Many variables play a part in making grass silage a success so it’s important to understand the basics and plan to take control of your quality no matter what the season throws at you.

As Dillington Farms continues to focus on sustainable feeding they would like to challenge bought-in feeds by better utilising the pulses already grown as part of their arable rotation.

For this on-farm meeting, we will be joined by independent silage expert Dr Dave Davies who will review the silage-making practices on the farm and answer any of your questions about silage-making. Dr Davies has also been involved in homegrown pulse trials with Innovate UK and will be joined by Michael Carpenter from Kalvin Cave, the commercial partner in the trials. Michael will give a research update and advise on harvesting options for pulses intended for animal feed.

About Dillington Farms

Dillington Estate, Knott Oak Dairy is on an 860-ha estate, managed by Ollie Blackburn, alongside his team of eight.

It is home to 310, fully housed, crossbred cows, on an all-year-round calving system, milking on a robotic system. Crossbreeding has played a huge part in allowing Dillington to achieve high milk yields, through combining a three-way cross of Holstein, Norwegian Red, and Fleckvieh.

Through the Strategic Dairy Farm programme, Ollie and his team are looking to continue their journey to being net zero, fine-tune their crossbreeding and improve the profitability of the farm, while achieving their environmental goals.

About the home-grown feed at Dillington

Dillington Farms is a mixed farming business with dairying at its heart. At 860 ha the farm grows cereals and forage crops with dry stock grazing permanent pastures and parkland.

Being a part of a mid-tier stewardship scheme has allowed Dillington Farms to be more environmentally focused with their day-to-day farming, including growing herbal leys on arable headlands and experimenting with legume whole crops.

This meeting will cover

• Review of current silage practices at Dillington Farm
• Understanding silage analyses
• Proactive and reactive decision-making at all stages of the silage-making process
• What options are available for homegrown proteins
• The impacts of replacing bought-in protein with pulses