Quality Meat Scotland launches new grassland campaign

Quality Meat Scotland launched its new grassland campaign at its grazing conference last week.

Introducing a range of expert speakers QMS chairman Jim McLaren said the new initiative was about the uptake of proven solutions rather than a search for new scientific breakthroughs.

“Grass is one of Scotland’s great assets. It is a protein source which humans cannot eat but used properly it is a very good source of cattle and sheep nutrition,” he said.

Perthshire farmer Michael Blanche is now also a QMS knowledge transfer specialist.

He said:  “I am obsessed about grass and its potential. A total mixed ration for feeding cattle can cost £150 a tonne dry matter whereas a tonne of grass dry matter with the same energy and slightly more protein costs only £30 a tonne dry matter.”

The QMS programme is to be rolled out shortly and will see six on-farm “grass stations” set up across the country and five grazing groups established, each of them farmer led.

“The objective is simply to increase the kilograms of meat produced per hectare through better utilisation of grass, “ said Mr Blanche.