The Alltech Keenan company recently hosted an open day on Wednesday 20 June at Borris, Co Carlow.
Visitors at the Alltech Keenan Open Day - picture, Roger Jones
This is an annual event and was well attended by farmers interested in buying new or refurbished mixer wagons.
The Keenan mixer wagon is described as the market leader and there are an estimated 10,000 mixer wagons operating on the island of Ireland.
This is a growth market as farmers learn about the benefits of buffer feeding.
The volatile weather conditions over the last two years clearly show that we cannot depend on grass
So more livestock farmers & milk producers in particular are contracting with tillage farmers to supply them with barley, straw, maize silage, fodder beet etc.
To feed these crops to livestock in a balanced diet one needs a to use a mixer wagon and there are well over ten brands competing on the Irish market.
At the open day a number of leading Irish ag tech companies were also in attendance, including Herdwatch, Grasstec, Moocall, Maizetech and Samco.
Visitors were advised how these technologies and services can support and help improve day-to-day farming.
There was a full complement of Keenan machines on display ranging from 10 to 28 cubic metres.
This varied from the renowned paddle range to the more recent vertical assortment (tub mixers wagons) in addition to the all-new 177hp Keenan self-propelled machine on display.
And of course there were excellent finance packages available for interested customers.