The national Beef herd stands at 936,773 cows as the population continues to decline. When we look at the last 5 years, we can see the number of beef cows in Ireland has declined year on year. From 2017 to 2021 the national beef herd has decreased by 128,837 cows.
Galway is still leading the way in terms of Beef cow population with a total of 95,167 beef cows, a decrease of 4,386 cows from 2020. This figure is over 20,000 higher than the beef cow population in county Mayo which is the second most highly populated county with a figure of 71,248. The third most highly populated county for beef cows is county Cork with a figure of 69,669 beef cows. Clare is followed closely by county Cork with 69,361 beef cows. The least populated county for beef cows is county Dublin with a population of just 3,603 beef cows. The second least populated county is county Louth with a population of 10,013 beef cows. County Carlow completes the bottom 3 counties for beef cow population with a figure of 14,115 beef cows.
