Housing cattle 2026: the six checks before the shed fills

Before you house cattle this winter, six checks decide whether the shed earns its keep. Count the silage against the stock, using Teagasc's 1.4 tonnes a month per suckler cow. Check space, feed barrier and ventilation against Teagasc figures. Finish pneumonia vaccines three weeks ahead. Dose on evidence, not habit. And if you are in the Beef Welfare Scheme, keep the records that protect up to €35 a calf.

Checked 26 October 2026. Every figure below comes from a Teagasc, Animal Health Ireland or DAFM page fetched on that date. The Beef Welfare Scheme 2026 closed to applications on 23 September. The record rules apply to anyone already in it.

What are the six checks before housing cattle?

1. Silage against stock numbers. Tonnes in the yard against tonnes the stock will eat.
2. Space and feed barrier per head. Worked on the weight the animals will be in March, not today.
3. Ventilation. Inlets at least twice the outlets, and a smoke test to prove it.
4. Pneumonia vaccines. The course finished at least three weeks before the shed, not the week of.
5. Dosing. Worms on a faecal egg count, fluke on history, lice on the whole group.
6. Beef Welfare Scheme records. Weaning dates, meal start dates, receipts and dockets in one place.

Each one below carries the number you need and where it came from.

Does the silage cover the stock you are housing?

Teagasc's Grass Silage Stock Checker gives the monthly pit-silage need per animal. A dairy cow eats 1.6 tonnes a month. A suckler cow eats 1.4. Cattle under a year eat 0.7, and cattle over a year eat 1.3. A ewe eats 0.15. The checker suggests a 10 to 20% reserve on top for most farms.

Multiply each group by its figure and by the months you expect to feed. Then measure the pit and count the bales. The arithmetic, with a worked suckler example, is in our winter fodder budget. If the answer is short, the county-by-county shortage numbers show you are not alone, and what Teagasc is advising.

Quality matters as much as tonnes. Teagasc says to sample five to six weeks after ensiling, with a core sampler, across the pit or in a W pattern on the face. Silage at 72% DMD or better cuts the meal bill for weanlings and finishers. Silage at 66 to 70% DMD suits dry cows. Our silage test explainer turns the lab sheet into a meal figure.

How much space does each animal need on slats?

Overcrowding reduces thrive, and it creeps up as the winter goes on. Teagasc's winter housing advice gives the slatted figures. Cattle under 275 kg need 1.2 to 1.5 m² a head. Cattle at 275 kg and over need 2.0 to 2.5 m². Work it on the weight you expect at the end of housing, not the weight going in.

Finishing cattle need more. Teagasc's space allowance table runs from 2.2 m² at 550 kg to 2.9 m² at 800 kg on slats. It gives 2.7 m² as the minimum recommendation. Its research note is blunt: 2 m² is insufficient for finishing animals, and there is no advantage above 3 m². Suckler cows need 3 m² on slats, or 4 to 5 m² on straw. Add 1 m² for a spring-born calf at foot and 1.75 m² for an autumn-born one.

A 4.8 m by 5 m slatted pen is 24 m². At 2.5 m² that is nine stores, and at 2.7 m² it is eight finishers. Not ten.

Feed space is the other limit. Weanlings on meal or restricted silage need 400 to 500 mm a head so every animal can eat at once. On ad-lib silage, 225 to 300 mm can do. Stores need 100 mm more and suckler cows 200 mm more. A cow on concentrates needs 600 to 700 mm. Barriers along the back of pens, where possible, can greatly help to alleviate a shortage of feeding space.

Is the shed ventilated well enough?

Fresh air removes the bacteria, viruses and moisture that pneumonia needs. Teagasc's rule is simple: inlets at least double the outlets. Its ventilation guide adds that a continuous 0.3 m gap along the eaves, or a bigger ridge outlet, often fixes an old shed.

Walk into the shed on a still morning and look for the signs. Condensation on the roof or walls. Mould on timber. Stuffy air, damp hides, wet bedding. Animal Health Ireland adds two more: a strong smell of ammonia and plenty of cobwebs in the rafters. Both mean the air is not moving.

Then do the smoke test on a calm day. If the smoke rises and leaves through the ridge, the shed is fine. If it hangs at head height, the air is stagnant. If it blows straight across, you have a draught, and calves need draught-free air.

If the inlets are the problem, the fix is on the side walls, not the roof. Angle out the side cladding, take out a few rows of blocks, or fit vented sheeting or Yorkshire boarding. Teagasc gives the porosity of each: vented sheeting 11%, Yorkshire boarding 20%, gale breaker 35%, mesh 50%. For the outlet, multiply the opening length by the raised height and compare it with the DAFM S.101 building specification. Teagasc also says a shed wider than about 10 to 11 m will not ventilate as evenly.

When should pneumonia vaccines go in before housing?

Timing is the whole job. Animal Health Ireland's pneumonia vaccination factsheet says most vaccines protect from three weeks after the primary course is finished. Most of the injectable products need two doses, three or four weeks apart. An animal is not vaccinated until it has had the second one.

So work back from the housing date. Last dose three weeks before housing. First dose three to four weeks before that. Start a two-dose course today, 26 October, with a four-week gap, and protection arrives in mid-December. If the cattle go in on 10 November, that course is too late, and your vet may suggest an intranasal product that works faster. The AHI table lists onset of immunity for every licensed product, from a few days to four weeks.

Where pneumonia has been a problem before, Teagasc suggests boosters for RSV, PI3 and Mannheimia haemolytica two weeks before housing. Immunity from most respiratory vaccines lasts three or six months, so a three-month product given at housing has run out by February.

Two more AHI rules. Only vaccinate healthy, unstressed animals. And do not castrate, dehorn, wean, vaccinate, house, sell, transport or mix animals all in the same week. AHI also says to keep bought-in cattle away from the herd before mixing them. Its newsletter says at least three to five days; its checklist says a few weeks.

Vaccines cannot make up for a bad shed. AHI's own factsheet says they cannot compensate for poor ventilation and stressful conditions. The ventilation check comes first.

What should you dose for at housing?

Dose on evidence. Teagasc's housing parasite advice starts with a faecal egg count from 10 to 15 animals in each group. Results take two to three weeks, so sample now if you have not. Cattle need a worm dose when the count is over 250 eggs per gram.

Three catches. Lungworm does not show in a standard faecal egg count, so coughing at grass is your indicator. A faecal count does not reliably show inhibited stomach worm larvae at housing. Levamisole does not kill them either, so it is not a housing dose. And a faecal sample only shows mature liver fluke. A negative sample does not mean the animal is clean.

Fluke has three stages: early immature under six weeks, immature at six to 12 weeks, and mature over 12 weeks. Triclabendazole is the only active that treats all three. With any other product, Teagasc gives two options. Delay treatment until after housing so the fluke mature, or treat at housing and repeat 12 weeks later. Your Beef HealthCheck report from the factory, on the ICBF site, scores fluke on your own cattle.

Lice thrive once the shed fills. Most pour-ons kill lice but not eggs, so a heavy infestation needs a second treatment three to four weeks later. The lice lifecycle is two to three weeks, so Teagasc's dosing guide says to pick a product with persistency over three weeks. Treat the whole group at once, clip the backs for pour-on contact, and treat anything added later without delay.

Dose by weight, which is one more reason to weigh at housing. Check the withdrawal period on anything near finishing. Teagasc points to an AHI guide that lists the parasite products on the Irish market by class, with meat and milk withdrawals.

Beef Welfare Scheme 2026: which records protect the €35 a calf?

If you are in the Beef Welfare Scheme 2026, the meal-feeding action pays up to €35 a calf on a maximum of 45 calves. That is up to €1,575. Vaccination adds up to €15 a calf and faecal or forage testing up to €25, if you selected them. DAFM pays cleared cases from December 2026, which is on the farm payment calendar.

The rule is four weeks of meal before weaning and two weeks after. DAFM's terms and conditions recommend 1 kg a calf a day before weaning and 2 kg a day after. Teagasc's factsheet works that to 56 kg a calf, or 2.52 tonnes for 45 calves. The meal had to be bought between 14 October 2025 and 13 October 2026. That window has closed, so the receipts should already exist.

What DAFM can ask for, and what the record sheet in Annex 5 asks you to write down:

• The weaning date for each group of calves. Groups weaned on different dates get different entries.
• The date meal feeding commenced for each group.
• The feed used, the mineral supplementation, the rate and the quantity used or purchased.
• Receipts, invoices, feed labels and delivery dockets for every bag and every mineral.
• Sales documents for any calves sold, because the sale date proves the two weeks after weaning.
• For the vaccination action: date, number of animals, product and receipts, with proof you bought enough for a two-dose product.

Teagasc's reckoner sets the earliest sale at day 15 after weaning. A calf weaned on 20 October finished its meal on 3 November and can sell from 4 November. Teagasc uses day 15 so the record shows the two post-weaning weeks complete. If you mix two or more straights on farm, including in a mixer wagon, you must be registered with DAFM as a home mixer.

The penalties are the reason to keep the folder tidy. Teagasc says DAFM selects 5% of applicants for an administrative check. If meal feeding is not done, or the records are not produced when asked, the meal-feeding payment is lost. Any optional action is cut by 50% as well. If meal feeding was the only action, there is no payment and a 20% penalty on top. If you chose both optional actions and did neither, nothing is paid at all, even with the meal feeding done in full. DAFM's own worked example is a farmer on 45 calves and all three actions who does none of them: no payment, and €675 owed back.

Beef Schemes Section is on 057 867 4422 or bws@agriculture.gov.ie.

What does an AI tool actually do for any of this?

Less than the adverts suggest, and one thing that is genuinely useful.

The record-sheet job is the one worth the five minutes. Photograph every meal receipt, docket and vaccine invoice. Ask an AI assistant to list the date, supplier, product and quantity from each image in a table matching the Annex 5 columns. Then check every line against the paper before you copy it onto the sheet. It will misread a 6 as an 8 now and again. The paper is the evidence; the table is just the index.

For the dates, one prompt covers it. Give it your weaning dates. Ask for the meal start date 28 days before, the finish date 14 days after, and the earliest sale date on day 15. Ask it to show the arithmetic. Check the answer against the Teagasc reckoner table, which already lists weaning dates from 25 August to 20 October.

Frequently asked questions

Can I still join the Beef Welfare Scheme 2026? No. Applications closed at 5pm on 23 September 2026. The record rules above apply to farmers already accepted, and DAFM pays cleared cases from December 2026.

How much meal does the Beef Welfare Scheme need per calf? Teagasc's factsheet puts it at 56 kg per calf. That is 1 kg a day for 28 days before weaning and 2 kg a day for 14 days after. For 45 calves that is 2.52 tonnes, and the receipts must cover it.

How long before housing should cattle be vaccinated for pneumonia? Animal Health Ireland says most vaccines protect from three weeks after the primary course is finished. Most injectables need two doses three or four weeks apart. Count back six to seven weeks from the housing date for the first dose. Intranasal products act faster; the AHI table gives the onset for each.

Do I need to dose every animal at housing? Not automatically. Teagasc says to dose for worms when a faecal egg count is over 250 eggs per gram. Decide on fluke from farm history, faecal tests and Beef HealthCheck reports. Lungworm needs its own judgement because it does not show in the count.

The bottom line

Count the silage and size the pens on March weights. Test the air with smoke and finish the vaccines three weeks out. Dose on a faecal count, and put every Beef Welfare Scheme receipt in one folder. Six checks, each with a Teagasc, AHI or DAFM number behind it, and the shed is ready before the first animal walks in.