A meeting planned for Torr Farm, Auchencairn, on Friday March 15 will focus on ways farmers can make the best use of the nutrients available in the manure and slurry their livestock produce.
The free event is organised jointly by consultants from Scotland's Rural College (SRUC) and Soil Association Scotland.
Torr Farm is one of the four Farming for a Better Climate Focus Farms in Scotland and organic farmers Ross and Lee Paton are old hands at explaining their experiences to visiting groups.
At the Muck event, Ross will be joined by SRUC expert Dr Bill Crooks in explaining how the PLANET nutrient management programme can be used to plan the proper use of resources over the season.
They will be backed up by composting expert Audrey Litterick of Earthcare Technical Ltd who will give tips on the proper care and management of what some regard as an animal waste product, but more now realise is a valuable home produced resource. At current fertiliser prices dairy slurry has a typical value of around £3.20 per cubic metre.
A representative from SEEPA will offer advice and a local contractor will demonstrate various items of slurry spreading kit.
For further information and to book a place telephone Sandra MacRae on 01387 261172 or email sandra.macraé@sac.co.uk
MARKET Round up
Aberdeen and Northern Marts sold 16 lots of Single Farm Payment Entitlements, comprising 407.67 units, for an average multiplier of 1.8 at the Thainstone Centre, Inverurie, on Friday.
Top bid on the day was £1060 per unit for 10 units with a Euro value of 623.14 per unit, which gave the top multiplier of 2.1.
Wallets Marts sold 335 store bullocks in Castle Douglas yesterday to a top of 262.2p per kg and an average of 226.5p, while 235 store heifers peaked at 239p and levelled at 208.5p.
In the rough ring 60 cows averaged 138.2p and 3 bulls levelled at 146.7p. Eight OTM heifers averaged 189.8p.
Harrison and Hetherington sold 11 prime heifers in Carlisle yesterday to a top of 237.5p and an average of 210.9p (+6.5p on the week), while 19 prime bullocks peaked at 246.5p and levelled at 210.6p (+9.4p). Thirty-one prime, beef-bred bulls sold to 243.5p and averaged 209.6p (+17.9p), and 26 prime, dairy-bred bulls peaked at 209.5p and levelled at 173.4p (+7.6p).
In the rough ring 118 beef cows averaged 155.2p (+9.1p), and 123 dairy cows levelled at 122.4p (+5.1p). Ten bulls averaged 156.3p (+1.2p).
The firm also sold 1585 prime hoggs to a top of £122 per head and 277.3p per kg to average 182p (+3.5p). The 116 cast sheep forward saw ewes sell to £110.5o for Texels and £26.50 for Swaledales.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article