Country-Wide August crops, 2017 by NZ Farmlife Media

Crops

2017

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August 2017

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

THE DEER FARMER 1

BE TB SMART

The simple steps for protecting your livelihood.

1. TB TESTING Regular testing helps stop the spread of TB.

How often you need to test depends on the risk associated with your farm and herd. This varies by species and area.

Find out what your testing requirements are by searching DCA map at ospri.co.nz

If youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re in a movement control area, pre-movement testing is required within 60 days prior to stock moving. You do not need to pre-movement test stock going directly to slaughter.

2. ASD FORMS Keep ASD forms for the entire life of an animal or for one year after it leaves your property.

Complete animal status declaration (ASD) forms for all movements of cattle and deer.

Exception: Bobby calves

Remember to record all your stock movements with NAIT.

3. PURCHASE WISELY ! When purchasing animals, check the herd status and last TB test date on the animal status declaration (ASD) form.

TBfree is an OSPRI programme

Make sure you only buy or lease bulls that have been pre-movement tested. This is free under the TBfree programmeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s service bull testing scheme.

ospri.co.nz

0800 482 463 Country-Wide Crops August 2017

EDITOR’S NOTE

Have soil, will grow

find it somewhat ironic that I have ended up editing our annual crops special of Country-Wide. Agronomy and plant science were subjects I avoided like the plague at university. I recall being asked to leave a plant science lab class on more than one occasion for “disturbing the peace and being inattentive”. Where I could name every single animal science lecturer I had while I was at Lincoln, I couldn’t do the same for my plant science/crops papers. However, as an ag journalist I have developed an appreciation for this area of farming. Anything that grows from the ground, be it pasture or crop, is the driving force behind New Zealand farming. As I have been reminded so many times while editing this magazine, NZ farmers are often at the forefront of innovation. From re-grassing and cropping on hill country, to dealing with pests and environmental issues, we have farmers working with scientists to find solutions which fit their farms. As in Joe Stafford ’s cartoon (p5), NZ farmers are like our triumphant America’s Cup team, clever, skilled and know how to use new technology to catch the winds of success. A prime example of this can be read on page 76 where Hawke’s Bay farmer Simon White is making waves with his hemp

seed oil. Although a fledgling industry, Simon and business partner Isaac have figured out how to sustainably integrate it into Simon’s farming system and make a name for themselves in the food market. We have coverage from the FAR Conference held in July with insights into Argentina’s no-till practices and the effect it has had on the sustainability of cropping (p65). We also delve into the pesky problem of pests and disease in crops (p83). Alongside the great cropping content, we have our usual mix of Country-Wide content and Young Country features this year’s Young Farmer of the Year, Nigel Woodhead. Congratulations Nigel. This issue ends (for now) my role as acting editor. Terry will be back on board for the September edition. Much like Hamish Clarke’s first attempts at aerial cropping and regrassing (p73), I have learned a lot over the past few months from sitting in the editor’s chair. Most prominent was patience, which will no doubt come in handy in the coming months as I settle into married life.

Cheyenne Stein

Got any feedback? Contact the editor direct: terry.brosnahan@nzfarmlife.co.nz or call 03 471 5272.

NEXT ISSUE Country-Wide September includes: • THE RISE AND RISE OF RAMULARIA: A look into the cost of ramularia and the worldwide research to figure out what can be done to reduce its impact. • PRIME CUTS: How Georgie Moleta started her own homekill business at the age of 21. • GROWING BLACK FARMERS: Another tale from Jackie Harrigan’s trip to South Africa about Buhle Farmers’ academy which helps grow the capability of emerging black farmers. • EXPANDING THE BUSINESS: Buying extra land, bringing family in, diversifying? What you need to consider and tips from farmers who’ve been there, done that.

Wairere lambs are fast finishing When Brian Coogan changed to Wairere Romney on his Taihape farm five years ago, he was lambing at 140% with half the lambs going prime at weaning, averaging 17.5kg. Lambing this year was 150%, with 85% POM at an average of 19.2kg. All hoggets are mated and are consistently lambing above 90%; this season 60% went POM at 18.2kg average. The overall average, including hogget lambs, will be over 19kg this year, with 80% of all lambs gone at weaning.

“These sheep have performed well.”

www.wairererams.co.nz | 0800 924 7373 Country-Wide Crops August 2017

More: p28

BOUNDARIES A win for the Young Farmer from Remote.

How Kirsty Hill managed success from adversity.

HOME BLOCK Alex Menzies gets a world view.

Half a century ticks by for Andrew Bendall.

Roger Barton fixes a council problem.

NOTEBOOK

What’s on when and who’s doing what.

Chanelle O’Sullivan has reasons to celebrate.

FACTS 15

Sheep and beef face mixed fortunes.

BUSINESS Hemp seed to get okay for food.

Sausages led the way for Broadleaf in US.

Nuffield scholar urges initiative.

DEER FARMER

Contents

Simply deer for Tuatahi Partnership.

How the Beckers manage Johne’s.

LIVESTOCK High octane forages drive farm profit.

The Chitticks make a business of calf-rearing.

A lot of bull at The Point.

Finding the tipping point on lambing.

Stock check: Matching feed to profit.

37 38

A tool for performance flocks.

Sub Editor: Andy Maciver, ph 06 280 3166, andy.maciver@nzfarmlife.co.nz

Country-Wide is published by NZ Farm Life Media PO Box 218, Feilding 4740 General enquiries: Toll free 0800 2AG SUB (0800 224 782) www.nzfarmlife.co.nz Editor: Terry Brosnahan, ph 03 471 5272; mob 027 249 0200; terry.brosnahan@nzfarmlife.co.nz Managing Editor: Tony Leggett, ph 06 280 3162 mob 0274 746 093, tony.leggett@nzfarmlife.co.nz Deer Farmer Editor: Lynda Gray, ph 03 448 6222, lyndagray@xtra.co.nz

Reporters Andrew Swallow ph 021 745 183 Anne Calcinai ph 07 894 5069; Lynda Gray ph 03 448 6222; Gerard Hall ph 03 409 8386; Jackie Harrigan ph 06 280 3165; Robert Pattison ph +64 27 889 8444; Marie Taylor ph 06 836 7018; Sandra Taylor, ph 021 1518685; Tim McVeagh 06 3294797; James Hoban 027 2511986; Russell Priest 06 328 9852; Jo Cuttance 03 976 5599; Amanda Bowes 0274 998 421; Cheyenne Stein, 06 280 3168. Account Managers: Warren McDonald, National Sales Manager, ph 06 323 0143 John McMaster, Auckland/Northland, ph 0274 443 143 Janine Gray, Waikato and Bay of Plenty, ph 0274 746 094 Donna Hirst, Lower North Island & international, ph 06 323 0739

Shirley Howard, real estate, ph 06 323 0760 Debbie Brown, classifieds & employment, ph 06 323 0765 Nigel Ramsden, Livestock, ph 06 323 0761 David Paterson, South Island, ph 03 382 6143 Designer: Joanne Hannam Production Planning: ph 06 280 3167 Subscriptions: nzfarmlife.co.nz/shop ph 0800 224 782 or subs@nzfarmlife.co.nz Printed by PMP Print, Riccarton, Christchurch ISSN 2537-8759 (Print)

ISSN 2537-8767(Online)

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Country-Wide Crops August 2017

HILL COUNTRY Lessons in the hills of Te Mara.

Potential hostility for crops.

Focus on fertility with all-grass system.

ARABLE Hemp: The good oil on a new crop.

More: p76

Nitrogen’s path to the waterways.

Government ignores forestry in mitigation equation.

Weeding plantain and clover problems.

On the hunt for moths.

Brave new world of biopesticides.

Biosecurity starts at home.

YOUNG COUNTRY 48

Winning young farmer returns to Remote. Farm ownership: From fish to farm.

Breeding a hip problem with Huntaways.

SPECIAL REPORT – CROPS 54

The GM debate: Bruno Chambers looks to the market.

Call for resilient cropping strategies.

NZ has parallels to UK nutrient update. Growers look to firming prices.

Innovations on show at Cereals Event.

Beet buckets prove versatile tools.

88 91

SOLUTIONS

Growing with Gibberillic acid. Optimised enhances seed.

92 93

ESTATE 95

Options aplenty at Totaranui.

Primed for production at Moa Flat.

96 97

FARMING IN FOCUS More photos from this month’s Country-Wide.

What is ME and why is it important? Cost-effective feed.

Cropping land in demand.

The GM debate: Murray Lane sees the benefits.

PLANT AND MACHINERY

Kirstin Mills keeps us in the picture.

How N, P and K work on pasture.

TECHNOLOGY

Alan Royal checks his smartphone.

Be aware of pasture pest signs.

When fencing goes beyond reasonable cost.

CROP PROTECTION

ENVIRONMENT Benefits of a grass strip.

Spring slug warning.

SOILS

Shaping the land to improve drainage.

Argentine cropping quadruples with no-till.

Lime trial reveals spreading issue.

FORAGE Pest mind-set shift is needed. IPM the way forward.

69 70

Plantain: Herbs for the hills.

Challenges of fodder beet.

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More: p48

BOUNDARIES | YOUNG FARMERS

A win for the man from Remote

ard work and great support from his wife Leanne made Nigel Woodhead a convincing winner of the 2017 FMG Young Farmer of

the Year. “It’s awesome,” the sheep and beef farmer from an Otago farm called Remote says. The Otago/Southland representative was confident in his practical skills but worked to improve other areas before competition. This included reading every paper and magazine he could to gain a thorough understanding of the rural sector both in New Zealand and internationally. Nigel also spent time on a deer farm, talked to Silver Fern Farm directors to learn about the meat industry and sought out other mentors. He and Leanne

were also constantly on the lookout for potential quiz questions. For young farmers who wanted to emulate his success, Nigel says they need to realise they are their number one asset. They need to put in the same amount of energy looking after themselves, as they do into the farm. They need to constantly work on self-development, including education, as well as looking after themselves physically and mentally. Nigel is keen to become a mentor to others as he acknowledges the help he received from farmers and other industry members was invaluable. He says it would be great if he could help someone get to the grand final but just seeing someone learning and being happy would be rewarding. • See Return to Remote, Young Country P48

Farmers cross the ditch to ride

Going for gold The Becker name is synonymous in Otago with the winter sport of curling and at one stage it was an allconsuming Sean in curling club tartan. passion for Sean who has competed at World Champ and Olympic levels. “Curling used to be my number one priority but now it’s work, then family and curling is at number three.” The Maniototo farmer was a New Zealand representative for several years, and along with his sister Bridget were the World Mixed Doubles silver medallists in 2010. Nowadays training is limited to once or twice a week at the Naseby indoor rink, the only dedicated curling facility in the southern hemisphere, and a 20 minute drive away from the Beckers’ home. “It’s very much a team sport and I enjoy helping others achieve their goals.” Having said that Sean has his own competitive goal, the next being selection for the Sydney Pacific Asian Champs in November. • See Managing Johne’s P25

Nigel Woodhead shows his winning ways at the FMG Young Farmer of the Year finals at Manfeild, Feilding, in July.

Anne Hughes

farm to sell to help cover their costs. The other NZ competitors planned to lease Four Ruapehu farmers horses from Australian riders. have crossed the ditch Ashley was excited at the to compete against opportunity to see Australian Australia in their own farmland and put herself and national endurance her horse to the test over riding event. new country. Ruatiti farming couple “It’s just you and your Ash and Ashley Cole, horse, taking both yours’ Owhango farmer Mark and your horses’ bodies to Tylee and Taumarunui extremes. farm manager Ross Hill “I’m terrified what my travelled to Wirrina Ruapehu farmer Ash Cole riding Zee Boy Rodney at this year’s New horse is going to do when it Cove, South Australia to Zealand Endurance Championships. sees a kangaroo.” ride in the Tom Quilty Photo: Wild Spirit Photography A huge amount of training Gold Cup Australian is required, for both horse national endurance and rider. championships in early “It’s important to ride to the conditions July. and to how your horse feels and that takes a Starting at midnight, riders had 24 hours lot of self-control.” to complete the 160km event. The couple, regular competitors on the Te Awamutu property manager Nadine NZ endurance riding circuit, planned to stay Barker was also representing New Zealand on after the Tom Quilty race for an even with her farming teammates. In total, NZ longer ride in late August. sent a team of about 16 – including riders, The week-long Shahzada Memorial team manager, farrier and support crew for Endurance Ride is a 400km event at St horses and riders. Albans, New South Wales. Ashley Cole says it required a huge “It’s such a great sport, especially for amount of organising and expense to get us country people because we don’t often the team to Australia. get to be competitive and it’s a great way She and husband Ashley were to have a look at other people’s farms,” transporting their own horses to Australia Ashley says. for the event – mustering goats on their

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BOUNDARIES | MANAGING

Kirsty Hill and Gary Holden keep busy with running their stock finishing operation and a number of other businesses in Hawke’s Bay.

From adversity to success Russell Priest Sixteen years ago Kirsty Hill’s husband David suddenly died, leaving her with three young children, a farm and an orchard to run. The orchard has gone, but the children have grown into young adults and the farm, Waiwhenua, is a top lamb, bull and

deer finishing operation with a velveting business too. Her father Lindsay Smith started as the manager of Waiwhenua in 1960. He later bought the farm and in the early 1970s introduced the first kiwifruit vines to Hawke’s Bay. At the age of 25 Kirsty returned to work on the farm in the mid-1980s with an

agricultural economics and marketing degree. Under her dad’s guidance she ran and expanded the orchard in size, growing other fruit as well as kiwifruit. Lindsay retired and sold the farm to Kirsty and David who were a great team. Kirsty ran the orchard and strategic planning while David was a top stockman. They ran breeding ewes, cows and hinds with some lamb and deer finishing. After David’s death a stock manager was employed while she managed her young family and the orchard. Several years latter David’s best friend, Gary Holden, entered her personal life. He managed the livestock while Kirsty concentrated on strategic planning and the overall management. Kirsty had also developed a homestay, and a bed and breakfast. Hail storms, compliance and labour shortages led to the orchard closing in 2010. Kirsty and Gary have developed a camping business on the banks of the Tutaekuri River. They also have an on-line sewing business producing products such as dog and calf covers. • More on Waiwhenua p28

Awards and pioneer lauded If there was only one New Zealand sheep farming event to be marked on the calendar, it would have to be the annual sheep industry awards. By running the awards, Beef & Lamb NZ give levypayers a great networking opportunity, bringing top breeders, farmers, scientists and other industry people into one room for one night. This year it was in Invercargill and the industry excellence award went to retired Hawke’s Bay Romney breeder Tony Parker. Tony (86) was a pioneer of using scientific breeding methods. His Wairunga stud was part of the first index selection for sheep in NZ which was launched in 1961. He and his wife Robin were criticised and ostracised by breeders and the breed societies which were subjectively selecting on appearance and breed type. For a full list of winners go to: www.beeflambnz.com/news-events/ media-releases/2017/july/sheep-industrysleaders-recognised

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HOMEBLOCK | COLUMN

The team from left: Lewis Marchant, Alex Menzies, James Beattie, Rachel Durie and Damy Oyedele.

Riding through farmland in the Viñales Valley, Cuba.

A focus on global food security

Alex Menzies

Lincoln University student

here has the year gone? Not only is it already August, but in a couple of months I will be walking out of my last exam, and that’s it, three years done and dusted. As they say, “time flies when you’re having fun” and I’d be lying if I said Lincoln hasn’t been exactly that. This year has been the height of excitement, fun and a little stress as only uni seems to provide. The beginning of semester one came and went, with orientation week kicking off the year well as only it can. From fresher to fourth year and even those masters students, there is always an event of some kind not to be missed. Come April, many of us headed off on various field tours around the country. Being third year BCom (Ag), this led us to Southland where we visited a variety of different farms from dairy and hill country to organic systems and sheep milking. It wouldn’t be a Lincoln tour without some kind of hiccup, the most notable this year being when the bus got entirely bellied crossing a ford, adding some extra excitement and enthusiasm, especially from the boys, who decided their strength may be the solution. To no

avail, thank goodness for tractors is all I can say. All-in-all, a successful tour, with fantastic and accommodating farmers and billets as always. Come June, with four other Lincoln students accompanied by two lecturers, we took off to Miami to attend the International Food and Agribusiness Management Association (IFAMA) Conference. This has definitely been the pinnacle of the year to date. The focus is Global Food Security, 2050 and includes the annual student case study competition. In this, our team of five competed against other university teams from around the world to solve a relevant agribusiness case study. A strongly contested competition unfortunately saw us surpassed by our Aussie neighbours from the University of New England, who took out the title. Nevertheless, it was fantastic to be a part of and hopefully with some experience under our belt we will get them back next year. The conference itself also provided for a number of interesting presentations, specifically on global sustainability and the Chinese agricultural outlook. A statement that stuck with many was that we must produce as much as we have in the last 8000 years, in the next 40 years – something to ponder. We all gained a lot from the opportunity to attend the conference, meeting many industry leaders and academics. Further to this trip, the group travelled

At the conference from left: James Beattie, Guy Trafford, Sue Trafford, Alex Menzies, Rachel Durie and Lewis Marchant.

to Cuba to get an insight into their farming and agricultural practices, as well as tour around the country to gauge a sense of their culture and country as a whole. We visited the Agricultural University of Havana. With the help of a very patient translator, we gave a presentation to the Cuban academics and students on New Zealand agriculture and how it has developed, while they presented to us the Cuban system. Land ownership, government control and organic farming was of particular interest to us as it varies from our own. However, it was interesting to draw some similarities between two, what would appear, vastly different systems. Cuba is a wonderful place to explore, from the Old Havana, to beautiful white beaches with clear water and amazing valleys filled with farms and small villages, not to mention the hand-rolled cigars and ridiculously cheap rum. Definitely a place worth visiting if you ever get the chance. Back to Lincoln, and the students association (LUSA) has been working hard to further improve the university experience. This has seen the return of RAM magazine, perhaps a little more PC than the original version, it still provides for a great monthly read and a chuckle here and there. Both the Graduation Ball and Winter Ball went off with a bang, with preparation for Garden Party 2017 under way. And here we are in August, when decisions around where to go next is looming for many third and fourth-year students specifically. For most, the job hunt is well and truly under way and everyone is frantically prepping their CVs. For others, the prospect of travel is on the horizon and some are simply focused on completing the year. It’s a strange yet exciting time for us all and it’s going to be great to see who is doing what come graduation next April.

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HOMEBLOCK | COLUMN

Half a century ticks by Headwater ram hoggets grazing swedes and lucerne balage.

Andrew Bendall Central Otago

Change to decimal currency, formation of the New Zealand Romney Development Group (NZRDG) and Waigroup Angus, I was born – just a few things to begin in 1967. The New Zealand Romney Development Group at its opening in 1967.

The year saw the start and formation of two (world firsts, I believe) performance breeding groups – Waigroup Angus with geneticist T S Chang and four Wairarapa farmers and the NZRDG with Professor Al Rae of Massey along with a range of Romney breeders throughout the country. So it was with great pleasure to read that Tony Parker, a foundation member of the NZRDG who farmed the central flock on his Hawke’s Bay farm, is a finalist in the Beef & Lamb Industry Awards for significant contribution to the sheep industry. Well done Tony. Waigroup members and all Angus Bull breeders have celebrated this year with record bull sales with great clearance of

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bulls and average prices. It always amazes me farmers readiness to spend between $6000-$10,000 on a commercial bull yet think a ram should be less than $1000, but that’s another story on its own. Of less significance was the starting of my 50th year in the middle of our winter routine of shifting breaks and feeding out to bulls, steers, heifers, ewes and Headwater ram hoggets on swedes and fodder beet. However, we did sneak into Wanaka for a drink and dinner at the Wanaka Gourmet Kitchen where I had the Te Mana Lamb, a whole shoulder slow-cooked. Beautiful!! A quick update on the farm front: fodder beet crops did well after going in three weeks later than planned, but we have yielded 28.2 tonnes/ha and in a normal Central Otago winter actually get to utilise most of that. Swede crops were less successful at 11.7t/ ha partially because we opted not to spray for weeds in late January due to having several vineyards in close proximity resulting in lower yield and a spectacular fat hen crop. This is now proving very frustrating shifting electric fences among the dry, stalky fat hen. It will require a new plan for next year. Our Raphnobrassica (pictured last column), a radish kale cross that went in before Christmas, grew exceptionally well as things do when you don’t really need the summer feed in the end. However we got two late summer grazings off it with ram hoggets and calves and then shut it up for winter, with a total tonnage of being near or around 15-16t/ha in six months Other agronomy news: new grassing went well with Shogun, Weka, Tuscan a great performance mix proving its

worth under our system. Rye corn has been sown as part of the development of some river flats. It will provide some spring feed and then will be made into supplements for next winter. Tabu Italian rye grass has also been used to stitch up some paddocks to create some spring supplements as well. Stock are all doing well, feed covers became a little tight late autumn as the processors where taking cull cows over bulls, so the end result was that most classes of stock started their crops slightly earlier than budgeted. Finding rising two year cattle proved a little challenging until you had come to terms with what you were having to pay. However 200 good cattle were sourced and have gone on to beet at 450kg, with the aim of having the best of these gone off beet on a great schedule. The R1 bulls which were contracted at 100kg back in November have started the beet in better condition than bought calves the previous winter so again hoping to push these along with adlib beet and balage Our dairy grazers also on beet are doing well and hope to have them doing .5-.7kg/day so I don’t have as big a job chasing down 290kg in the beginning of October prior to mating. Scanning of ewes is just completed, with 191% including 12% triplets. These are on swedes that’s when I can contain the buggers who have learnt that the irrigator wheel crossings are not electric – not ideal for feed budgeting purposes. With the ewe hoggets due to be scanned the second week of July, they were mated at 48kg so will cull anything not in lamb. Headwater ram hoggets are also on swedes in one mob of 1750 largely due to wanting to keep them separated from other stock, but it’s also a good test of who can handle competitive mobs with weights done monthly. Will that’s a wrap for now, I had a short rant prepared on negotiations and debates on the worth of buying known genetics of 100kg Friesian bulls over unknown but again that’s another story. Happy wintering.

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HOMEBLOCK | COLUMN

Time to fix a soggy road

Roger Barton Wairarapa

Apparently the devil makes work for idle hands (and minds). Recently I have had another hip replacement. Near to six weeks of relative idleness has meant a number of conversations with the abovementioned devil. He told me that my gravel road is under-spec and the level of potholes and inattention to any logical maintenance plan by South Wairarapa District Council demanded action over and above the ordinary. We had a hugely wet autumn and there has been water aplenty flowing along and over the road. The subsurface has become much softer than it should have and the level of potholes and subsequent damage has meant the road condition has probably bcome the worst it has ever been in our 36 years of travelling over it. There have been two close accidents on what is a flat and straight piece of road. A number of conversations have occurred with councillors and one staff member in particular. The councillors are generally sympathetic and acknowledge maintenance has been under par. On the other hand the staff member has been defensive and certainly earned the title of a local bureaucrat. I have had the temerity to undertake “unauthorised work on road reserve” and for my sins could be subject to

prosecution by the South Wairarapa District Council, according to said bureaucrat. So what have I done to deserve such a stern reprimand? Well naughty Roger has used the bucket on the front end loader of the tractor to create additional drainage to enable water sitting on the edge of the road to escape into a drainage channel and stop said water from getting into the subsurface of the roading material thereby softening the road and leading to an extraordinary amount of unnecessary damage. I am left wondering why I pay well over $10,000 a year in rates, including some to the Greater Wellington Regional Council, but I can’t get very basic maintenance done to my road. I’m not after any bells and whistles, just the basics. Councils seem so busy funding all sorts of other whims that they are patently ignoring the mainstream ratepayer. Apparently these days it’s all about looking after the tourist and the opportunities that may arise from this spend. We certainly know tourism is important to South Wairarapa and profoundly so to New Zealand but somehow there needs to be a balance between routine work expected by the great unwashed (unwitting ratepayers) and those who wish to make their income from attracting tourists to the region. Many years ago I had a delightful debate with a regional councillor about the level of subsidies apportioned to tourism. He wanted me to understand the tourist might be eating some of my lamb. Little did he understand that someone touring through the Wairarapa would be unlikely to eat more of my lamb because they were in the Wairarapa for a night as opposed to Napier, for example. In reality most of my lamb goes to

Roger Barton has had the temerity to undertake ‘unauthorised work on road reserve’.

the United States where I actually have money invested through Lean Meats who market under the Atkins Ranch brand. Imagine the derision I would be subject to if at the council’s annual plan submission process I was to ask for some money to assist with marketing my Romney rams into the Taumaranui/ King Country area. I have never quite understood why the value of money attracting tourists seems to have a higher value than other potential investments. But for some reason we keep allocating large dollops of ratepayer’s money into tourist ventures. I see the local cycle trail now needs money for promotion of the said trail. I was led to believe it was so successful that it marketed itself. Apparently not. I’m nearing the end of my six weeks of idleness and there will be some who will be keen that it finishes soon. Unfortunately this dog doesn’t put a bone down lightly. Well-chewed it will be and some will remember that if you don’t give value for money then you need to be reminded of what the key purpose of an entity’s purpose is. For most rural ratepayers a road adequately maintained is the one and only thing we really want.. Why is that so hard?

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HOMEBLOCK | COLUMN Farming Mums NZ has been an exception on social media, Chanelle O’Sullivan says.

Reasons to celebrate

Chanelle O’Sullivan Temuka, South Canterbury

It’s been an extremely eventful (mental) month since I wrote my first column. To start with, Ashburton and Hamilton were visited for a workshop called Girl on Fire, run by myself and the Agri Woman’s Development Trust team. We presented to 60 women at each beautiful venue with the key themes of Confidence, Connections and Contributions. The days went faultlessly with Lindy Nelson doing the bulk of the presenting and holding the room captivated throughout. We had a stunning cake to celebrate four years of Farming Mums NZ and both days were totally funded by the incredibly generous CRS Software. I am amazed and thankful for their support and the hard work of the AWDT

crew to bring it together. It was really quite surreal getting the opportunity to meet many women who I have been talking to for up to four years. It’s been quite the rollercoaster over the years and we also celebrated hitting 9200 members last month! We all know that social media often filters out the crappy bits while displaying the great things with good lighting and filters. Farming Mums NZ has been an exception here. We hear, feel and talk about everything. With great highs like births, awards, marriages, land purchases and goal-reaching has also come too many deaths, too much depression and heartfelt cries for help. We could never have dreamed of the topics and situations our outstanding admin team has taken on over the past four years. We’ve called the police, crisis teams and Women’s Refuge. We’ve organised visits and catch ups and lost plenty of sleep from worry or talking someone through a personal crisis. I often look back and think how much FMNZ has done for so many who have followed along, but also for me personally. It’s really made me believe in “what goes around comes around”. The opportunities that have come my way over the past few years have been mindblowing. Everything I do now has come either directly or indirectly from FMNZ

and even though the ride has been crazy – it’s been life-changing. Now speaking of life-changing, two years ago I thought it would be cool to make a FMNZ cookbook. You know, just one of those simple school fundraiser types to make a bit of money for charity and create a project that brings us all together. Think again – it took 18 months of hard work from designers, photographers, home cooks, project co-ordinators and many women from our group to bring it together and far out. It did not disappoint. The result was incredible. Our designer, Nicola Satherley went above and beyond, creating a full-colour 113page masterpiece. I can’t even explain how incredible it turned out and I couldn’t be more proud of the team who made it happen after many temptations to pull the pin. Last October we opened pre-orders for 500. We didn’t want to print too many and be stuck with them as we didn’t have any cash to throw around aside from the $4000 generous dollars from Worksafe to kick it off. It turns out 500 books was a little bit of an undersell. By mid-May we had sold 2500 FMNZ Cookbooks, 1000 of which were (generously) sent by my parents and 1500 by myself, spread wall-to-wall in my lounge. I’m not going to lie – I’m bloody happy to be taking a break from them.

We’ve called the police, crisis teams and Women’s Refuge. We’ve organised visits and catch ups and lost plenty of sleep from worry or talking someone through a personal crisis.

Last week I transferred the first half of $25,000 to St John Ambulance. It has been quite a ride but not one I would change for the world. Meanwhile, farming doesn’t wait. Dave’s now full swing into an operations manager position for a local cropping outfit and he’s really really enjoying it. (Happy husband, happy wife). He’s come into the job in the quiet season which helps and we foresee a busy year ahead with potatoes starting to go in around August. For the past few weeks they have been lifting huge orange and purple carrots that get turned into juice. As I write this, the road between Twizel to Tekapo is closed with snow and we are trying every trick in the book to ramp up the fire’s ability to heat. Hello winter.

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NOTEBOOK Morgan Easton, sharemilking two properties in the Waitaki Valley, North Otago, was the 2017 winner of the Zanda McDonald Award.

In Zanda’s footsteps Taste test The 22nd annual Beef and Lamb Excellence Awards is the opportunity for chefs and restaurants to join their peers acclaimed for their excellence in New Zealand beef and lamb cuisine. Applications open on August 1 for the awards which acknowledge the skills, expertise and talent of the outstanding chefs nationwide, who deliver great New Zealand beef and lamb dishes to their customers.

More? www.nzexcellenceawards.co.nz/ food-service

Environment focus

The search is on for talented young agri-leaders from Australia and New Zealand to apply for the 2018 Zanda McDonald Award, regarded as one of Australasia’s most prestigious badges of honour for young leaders in primary industry. The award comes with a prize package of more than $50,000. Now in its fourth year, it is run by the Platinum Primary Producers (PPP) Group – a network of more than 130 of influential agri-business people. McDonald was prominent in the Australian beef and livestock industry and a foundation member of the PPP Group. He died in 2013, aged 41, following an accident on his Queensland property. More? www.pppgroup.org Facebook: www.facebook.com/zandaaward

Management conference Nuffield 2018 The New Zealand Institute of Primary Industry Management conference is being held at the Lincoln Events Centre, Lincoln, on August 7-8. The programme includes disruption technologies and innovations likely to impact on NZ’s primary industry; farm environmental plans on the farming community; the latest research on mitigation strategies for nitrogen loss through animal breeding and plant science, plus the application of design thinking to create better engagement with farmers.

More? www.nzipim.co.nz

National ambassadors for the Balance Farm Environment Awards 2017, Peter and Nicola Carver.

Entries open for the Ballance Farm Environment Awards 2018 on August 1. The awards promote profitable sustainable farming practices, including environmental awareness, business practices, and social and community responsibility.

More? www.nzfeatrust.org.nz

Agri Summit The Agri-Industry Summit being held at the Napier Conference Centre, August 10-11, features a diverse range of presentations from leaders, practitioners and advisers from a broad spectrum of primary industry and related organisations. This year’s theme is Future Thinking – Maximising the Agri Opportunity.

More? www.wolterskluwer.co.nz

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Enterprising women Entries close for the Enterprising Rural Women Awards 2017 on August 31. The awards showcase the entrepreneurship and success of rural businesswomen in rural locations and contributing to their local economy and community.

More? www.ruralwomen.org.nz

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FACTS

Mixed fortunes for sheep and beef AGRIHQ ANALYST

arkets have been positive for New Zealand lamb farmers over the past few weeks. Competitive pressure has pushed slaughter prices to their second highest level for this point in the year, though scheduled closures at processing plants are preventing any major week-on-week increases. The South Island is particularly firm, essentially tracking in line with the North Island when there’d typically be a discount of 15-20c/kg. It’s widely anticipated that slaughter prices will rise to $7.00/kg before the end of the season. Store markets have improved too, buoyed by slightly better onfarm conditions and short-term confidence in slaughter prices. The North Island market lifted 30c/kg in the month before the time of writing, while the South Island was 20c/kg firmer. In-lamb ewes are selling to a decent, but not spectacular market given how high lamb slaughter prices are. More South Island farmers are rebuilding numbers, meaning ewes are making a $15-$20/head premium over their North Island counterparts.

NZ$/kg

Reece Brick

7.5

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6.5 5.5 4.5 11-Apr

11-Jun 11-Aug 11-Oct 5-yr Ave Last Year This Year

Overseas lamb markets have deteriorated a little. The United Kingdom, China and the Middle East have all become somewhat disinterested in NZ product.

The United Kingdom, China and the Middle East have all become somewhat disinterested in NZ product.

Solid domestic production is softening the former, while seasonally low consumption is causing inventories to build in the latter two markets.

Lamb forequarter

8.0

NZ$/kg

7.0 6.0 5.0 4.0 11-Apr

Continental Europe and the United States are proving resilient, though there is resistance to further price increases. The strength of the NZD:USD is tightening margins for beef processors, and they’re now attempting to drive prices down before the new kill season begins. Export prime is under the largest pressure, but firm local trade prices are softening any decreases to date. Slaughter numbers are relatively low, but production capacity is set to stay similarly low until the end of the bobby calf slaughter period. Interest in store cattle is climbing after bottoming out in early June. Cold and wet on-farm conditions is putting a cap on interest, but there’s still enough about to leave farmers optimistic for the upcoming spring cattle fairs. US imported beef prices are holding up much better than anticipated. A lack of supply from NZ and Australia has been key to prices exceeding earlier expectations. The firmness of the US domestic beef has also had a significant say, holding strong despite a larger than usual cattle kill. The US announced a temporary ban on Brazilian beef following repeated inspection failures and has also begun selling beef into China again for the first time in 14 years.

11-Jun 11-Aug 11-Oct 5-yr Ave Last Year This Year

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BUSINESS | HEMP

Hemp seed to get food tick Rebecca Harper Plans to legalise hemp seed as a food for human consumption in New Zealand could be a game-changer for the hemp industry in this country, and producers are excited about the opportunities. Midlands Seed director and managing director of Midlands Nutritional Oils, Andrew Davidson, says although hemp is a boutique industry, more hemp is grown here than many people realise. Midlands has been involved in the hemp industry since the first licences

were issued by the Ministry of Health (MOH) in 2001 and has worked to develop markets in NZ and offshore for hemp seed oil and other products, like flour. Seed is produced by Midlands Seed and supplied to Midlands Nutritional Oil, which processes it into oil and meal and supplies it to consumers. This means the company has a vertically integrated supply chain and full traceability of its products. “Hemp is one of many crops produced by Midlands. Our focus is on creating

good returns for our growers. We have identified hemp as one crop that is complementary to other crops we are producing with our farmer Andrew Davidson suppliers,” Davidson says. Midlands has its own brand of hemp seed oil and hemp seed capsules, New Hemisphere, available in NZ but will be able to diversify its local product offering, thanks to the proposed law changes. Only 25% of the seed is able to be used to create products for human consumption in NZ, the balance is sold as meal for animal feed, but that is set to change. “We have been preparing for this (law change) for a number of years. What we are delighted about is the ability to sell a locally grown product to our local market – previously that was out of the equation for us.”

HOW WILL THE LAW CHANGE?

Hemp vs marijuana – what’s the difference? Hemp and marijuana plants may look identical, but there is a key difference – the level of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which is the psychoactive component. The two plants are varieties of the same species (Cannabis sativa) but hemp contains little to no THC, while marijuana contains high levels. THC is regulated in New Zealand by existing drug laws.

On April 28, 2017, trans-Tasman ministers approved a change to the Australia New Zealand Food Standards Code. The change will allow the use of hemp seed as a food for human consumption. Because of hemp’s connection with drug and medicines legislation, the Government has to change some laws before that can happen. Changes will be needed to regulations under the Food Act 2014, Misuse of Drugs Act 1975 and Medicines Act 1981.

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August 2017

BUSINESS | AWARDS

How sausages led the way

The humble New Zealand venison sausage can be credited with getting Mark and Annie Mitchell’s specialty United States meat business off the ground. “It got us in the starting blocks but hasn’t taken us to the finishing line,” Mark says. In 1988 the couple, with their two pre-schoolers, decided to up-sticks from Tauranga to Los Angeles and sell their venison sausages. The gourmet sausages were selling well throughout NZ in several supermarket chains but the two tonnes a week output was about the total potential which started the Mitchells looking for offshore opportunity. The US looked promising, based on a positive response from two years’ attendance at the Chicago national restaurant show, so the Mitchells made the move. They set up Broadleaf, named after NZ native evergreen trees, in the back bedroom of their LA home and used their Toyota Camry station wagon for distribution. They imported five tonnes

of venison trim to make sausages but had no customers. “We had product but no customers. We had to go to food shows, visit people, cold call, advertise in a few processing magazines. We started from nothing.” What soon became apparent was that the American appetite for gourmet sausages wasn’t huge, although venison did hold some appeal. “We still make sausage today and sell a lot but it wasn’t what the customers really wanted. They wanted more steak and loin cuts; the US is predominately a middle-cut market. “We mainly sell this Venison sausage at Foodservice. These wholesale for US $4.99 per pound, about NZ $14 per Kg. The Mitchells’ pathway to the American specialty meat market was paved by deer. Mark’s family farmed deer near Alexandra, then Mark and Annie moved north to farm deer near the Kaimai ranges. They were supplier shareholders in Summit Deer Products and to supplement income, when interest rates sky-rocketed, worked at the plant. Diversification into meat processing started when venison exporters came to the plant with shoulder and leg cuts they couldn’t sell. The Mitchells bought some and developed the venison sausage. They then bought a Tauranga processing butchery business. In the almost 30 years they’ve grown and become a 5400-tonne meat product

The process of changing the regulations to allow the manufacture, sale and purchase of hemp seeds (and food made from hemp seeds) will take up to 12 to 18 months. Davidson says under the industrial hemp regulations, established in 2006, anyone who produces or processes hemp must apply for a licence from the ministry and that will not change. The ministry has an approved cultivars list for varieties of hemp selected for their low tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), yield and disease resistance. Crops are sampled and tested for THC to ensure compliance. “We have been able to sell hemp seed oil but no other parts of the hemp seed for human consumption. The new law will allow us to sell oil and other parts,

which creates opportunities for other products,” he says. Legalisation provides a significant opportunity in terms of farmgate returns and revenue to be generated in the food processing industry. “Aside from that, there’s benefit to the consumer in having access to a really nutritious product.” Davidson says there is a bright future for the hemp industry, if viable markets are established locally and offshore. He sees hemp as a comparable crop to linseed and pulses, which are widely grown throughout NZ, predominantly in Canterbury. Hemp seed oil is already available in NZ and is known for its Omega profile. “New products will be hemp seed protein, which has a well-regarded amino

Lynda Gray

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business with 350 wholesaler customers throughout the country. Broadleaf is one of the largest importers of NZ venison and Cervena, and recently added NZ AngusPure to the range. “We think it will complement well the venison. It’s a good clean green story and will be targeted at the same customers.” Those target markets were millennials and baby-boomers, consumer groups that looked for easy-to-prepare and healthy products produced ethically and in environmentally responsible farming systems. Mitchell was one of three US-based recipients of the Deer Farmer-sponsored Deer Industry Award. Broadleaf along with Rich Flocchini, and Dale Beier had played a key role in growing the US market. Their recognition was timely given the latest export volume statistics showing for the first time ever that the US had surpassed Germany, and was now the largest market for NZ venison. Mitchell describes the US as a “matured” market for venison. Broadleaf had important Cervena since it was launched and Mitchell said that although it had taken time to get the product recognised by chefs and the food service industry, it was now regarded as a consistent quality product. “A chef doesn’t want to have any quality issues and that’s where Cervena has been good.”

lyndagray@xtra.co.nz

acid profile and is sought after as an alternative to soy and whey proteins, and hulled hemp seed, which contains both the protein and the essential fatty acid benefits. Using these three ingredients, there’s a whole raft of downstream products, similar to tofu or other comparable soy products.” • See Good oil on a new crop p76

BUSINESS | IMAGE

First Light shines for deer returns Lynda Gray Moerangi-Oraukura (MO) stations is the largest breeder supplying First Light Venison. The Central Plateau station joined the First Light venison producer group a decade ago, looking for some security against fluctuating deer returns. General manager Barry Pope says First Light Venison offers price certainty in its supply contracts. “We wanted the surety of First Light. When the venison schedule was fluctuating up and down, that’s when we joined,” Barry says. Selling all of their weaner deer, excluding replacements, to finishers within the First Light group helps keep winter stock numbers down and allows the team at MO to focus on deer breeding. Weaner deer are sold to two finishing farms in the Manawatu and Hawke’s Bay. Deer are finished on these two properties and killed back through First Light for export to the United Kingdom. Barry says both parties know in advance how much they will be paid for their product. “The finishers know what they’re getting at the end and what they have to pay for our fawns.”

The team after completing the day’s weaning (from left) casual employee Eugene McLeod, finishing farmer Duncan Holden, head shepherd Pat Ryan, deer transport owner/operator Robert Stephenson, farm manager Cody Marshall, shepherd generals Jacob Martinovich and Travis Addenbrooke.

As part of the producer pool, MO are also First Light shareholders and receive an annual pool payment. There are certain requirements to supply First Light venison and Barry says that makes a close relationship between the breeder and finisher vital. “We have to tick quite a few boxes, but it’s nothing we shouldn’t be doing anyway, just a bit more paperwork.” Working closely with their finishing clients also helps improve breeding. Electronic identification helps trace the performance of individual fawns. Feedback from finishers is taken into account when making breeding decisions, helping improve production, resulting

in fewer foot problems and fewer fawn losses. “We’ve gone from five per cent losses of fawns after they’ve left the farm to under one per cent,” Barry says. Newly weaned hinds are transported from MO to the finishing farm. The cost of any deaths within the first 24 hours of leaving the breeding farm are MO’s responsibility. Hawke’s Bay farmer and First Light venison finisher Duncan Holden was at MO this year for the weaning fawns destined for his property. Duncan says the system works well and he benefits from a close relationship with the breeding farm. He enjoyed being a part of weaning, observing the condition and quality of the deer first hand, before seeing them loaded on to the truck and headed back to his farm. Hinds and fawns are fed lucerne silage in the two to three weeks leading up to weaning. This ensures the fawns are used to supplement feed when they arrive at the finishing farms. The finishers pay for the extra feeding, which makes their job easier, as they focus on the next stage in the process, finishing the deer for the First Light venison programme.

Farmers must take initiative New Zealand must adopt a more ambitious vision, with an agricultural narrative people really trust. Nuffield scholar Sam Lang says failure to do so could result in farmers’ actions being dictated by urban politics and put the commodity producer at risk of extinction. In his personal insights report from his year as a Nuffield scholar, Lang discusses regulatory constraints, incentives and national marketing opportunities. He says New Zealand’s dependence on international markets, combined with the fact that rural New Zealand is politically outmatched by urban society, makes our agricultural narrative increasingly important. Lang says climate change could be the biggest challenge and opportunity for farmers in the 21st century. Innovative farm systems and technologies that reduce greenhouse gases are rare, despite the rapidly increasing prominence of climate change in the global arena. “While silver bullet technologies are being pursued by many, including New Zealand, ultimately this challenge will

require farm system transformation beyond the scope of technology alone,” Lang says. “For example, even if nitrification inhibitors come back online to reduce N2O emissions, there are still significant emissions in producing, transporting and applying urea”. He says total emissions is what counts and new business opportunities abound. Carbon-neutral (or better) branding of our agricultural exports can only add value. “Our perhaps unique opportunity is to act as an ‘incubation nation’ for a climate friendly agricultural state with an integrated effort across our farms, sectors, supply chains, research and innovation institutions, policy makers and politicians.” New Zealand could have the opportunity to differentiate itself through farm system transformation, developing tools and technology to enable this shift. He says the focus and investment should be on expanding our knowledge of what’s possible. “All farmers are being asked to manage their complex and dynamic natural

resources to a much higher standard in general.” He says farmers wishing Sam Lang. to transition to more regenerative farm systems will also have to meet the steep learning curve required to grow crops or manage livestock health without the use of chemicals and cultivation. “To help prepare for tomorrow’s farming systems our education and training programmes must reflect where we appear to be heading.” Lang says this is already happening to an extent, but wonders if topics such as ecology/ecosystem management or natural resource economics should become a core component of agricultural degrees and diplomas. • Formerly an advisor to the Environmental Protection Authority, Sam Lang now works on a Central Hawke’s Bay hill country sheep and beef farm.

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August 2017

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DEER AN EASY FIT Moerangi-Oraukura station says deer make good financial sense on the large central North Island farm. p22

DEER | ONFARM A B11 terminal sire stag on Moerangi-Oraukura stations.

Simply deer on MO stations Anne Hughes Deer are an easy fit for a large central North Island farm. Add to that a guaranteed price supply programme and deer breeding on Moerangi-Oraukura (MO) stations makes good financial sense too. Barry Pope is general manager of Tuatahi, a partnership running three Maori-owned blocks. When Barry joined the business 18 years ago, it was farming just a small number of breeding hinds. “We decided we either needed to be in or out of deer.” Deer fit the growth curve and offered diversification from sheep and cattle. MO were originally run as two separate farms, so already had two deer sheds and a central laneway system dividing what were once separate properties. This allows the deer to be farmed in two blocks – running hinds mated to a terminal sire on one side and maternal on the other. The deer sheds were expanded and hind numbers have slowly been lifting ever since. Until nine years ago MO was buying

Moerangi-Oraukura stations farm manager Cody Marshall.

in all replacement hinds from a nearby farm. When they were no longer available, the farm started breeding its own replacements. For the past two years, these replacements have left the farm as weaners to be grown out on Tongariro – another block under Tuatahi management, near Turangi. Having fewer young mouths to feed

through winter and spring enables MO to carry more in-fawn hinds. Weaner hinds are sold to Tongariro and are bought back at market price as yearlings, mated to two-year-old Red stags. They return just after the rut and weaning. About 800 of the heaviest Red hinds are drafted off at weaning as potential replacements and about 600 are usually bought back the next year. Barry says the herd will probably peak at around 3500 hinds. The deer unit is still expanding, with another 200ha earmarked for deer fencing. “It looks like venison prices will be high for the foreseeable future. That makes it easier trying to sell spending on deer fencing and expansion to a board, or bank, or anyone. “There is very little work in the deer system, so we can run a lot more stock per labour unit. It’s a very simple system for us.” Deer account for just 20% of their total workload, with sheep and cattle requiring the most labour. Deer leach less nitrogen than cattle. So, increasing breeding hind numbers instead of cows helps lift numbers

Figures stack up

Hinds, fawns and a stag in the yards at weaning.

Moerangi-Oraukura stations runs a low cost system. Deer offer the advantage of low labour input, a low nitrogen discharge and make a good match with the pasture growth curve. The figures also stack up – with an economic farm surplus from deer of $549/ha, compared with the whole farm surplus of $418/ha Deer contribute 27% of total farm income. Gross deer income: $1119/ha Total costs on deer unit: $570/ha Fertiliser costs on deer unit: $400/ha Animal health costs for deer: $54/ha Wages on the deer unit are estimated at about $29,283 annually The farms have 2000 shareholders, represented by two committees of management. The Tuatahi board of directors meets quarterly and with the committees quarterly. The board includes one member from each of the Maori incorporations and one independent.

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August 2017

Farm facts • • • • • •

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Moerangi-Oraukura stations 3400ha (2700ha effective) Two farms now run as one West of Lake Taupo between Taumarunui and Turangi Managed by Tuatahi Partnership Tuatahi is a combination of three locally owned Maori incorporations Mostly medium hill country ORAUKURA with 300ha of flat to easy land Deer units currently 700ha 65 deer paddocks (from a total of 200) 3000 mixed-age hinds 350 rising two-year-old in-fawn hinds Deer coming into the 97 sire stags yards for weaning. Sheep:cattle:deer ratio: 50:22:28 Calving 500 mixed-age cows and twoyear heifers Mating 9500 ewes plus 3500 hoggets Average annual rainfall 1600mm 590-745m ASL Mostly yellow-brown pumice soils Farming in Lake Taupo Catchment under a nitrogen cap Tuatahi Partnership general manager Barry Pope. Farm manager Cody Marshall, plus four staff

without exceeding the nitrogen cap, set for farms within the Lake Taupo catchment. Deer are fed mostly grass, with lucerne silage and maize in winter and the occasional winter crop. Barry says more crops might be needed as deer numbers lift. Swedes are grown when required as part of the regrassing programme on the deer block, to be followed by a shortrotation ryegrass. Barry says the stags do well wintering on swedes and it is a great crop for maintaining hind condition. Lucerne is grown on 109ha of the sheep and beef block, providing grazing for lambs as well as supplement for other stock.

Lucerne is an expensive feed, Barry says, costing $322/ha to make lucerne silage, but the crop has many uses. It is also carted and fed out to cows being wintered on part of the farm that is outside the Lake Taupo catchment. As the deer area expands, it will be easier to take land out of production to grow crops and re-grass and also to bring in larger mobs of sheep and cattle for pasture maintenance. Cows and calves are set stocked in the deer unit after calving and rams are used to eat ragwort. Stags run with hinds from March until

Breeding hinds after weaning.

weaning at one stag per 50 hinds, which are mated in mobs of about 200. About 800 hinds go to a terminal sire – this selection is made on any hinds they don’t like the look of or know the breeding of – a remnant from when replacements were being bought in. The change to post-rut weaning during the first two weeks of May is helping achieve higher weaning weights. It has also improved survival of newly weaned fawns being transported to finishing farms. Cull hinds are sent for slaughter straight after weaning. Winters are tough so it helps to get numbers down as early as possible,

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Running through the yards at weaning.

Young stags newly weaned.

Hinds and fawns in the yards for weaning.

ideally by the end of May. Stags are wintered on saved grass and fed lucerne silage and maize daily to help regain condition after mating. If there is a winter crop in, stags can be wintered on that instead, with no feeding out required. Hinds are rotated in mobs and fed silage if feed gets short. Spring growth starts about late October, just in time to meet the growing feed demands of hinds as they get closer to fawning. Stags and hinds are bought back into the yards for annual TB testing in August. Hinds come in again in early spring for

a copper bullet before being set stocked (about seven hinds/ha) for fawning. Deer are blood-tested for copper levels every few years to measure how much they need. A month before weaning hinds and fawns are brought into the yards to tag fawns, give them their first yersiniosis vaccination and seven-in-one vaccine. This is a good time to gather fawn tallies and sample weights before weaning. It is also a good chance to conditionscore hinds. Adult deer are generally not drenched unless condition indicates a need.

Lifting fawning targets

Head shepherd Pat Ryan during a wet morning in the deer yards.

Moerangi-Oraukura (MO) stations is targeting a higher fawning percentage and heavier weaning weights to lift the financial performance of its deer breeding business. General manager Barry Pope says achieving these targets should make a significant difference to their bottom line. Hinds are not pregnancy scanned – Barry says it wasn’t adding value. He says one reason for the lower than targeted fawning percentage may be the high number of young deer being mated, as they build numbers up through breeding. The shift from buying in to breeding their own replacements means it has taken some time for their chosen genetics to start showing through. Fawning is improving. This year the maternal mob weaned 90% (hinds mated to fawns weaned) and terminal-mated hinds weaned 86%. “If we can get into the 90s we’d be happy with that. “Deer might not make as much, but their costs are much lower.” The biggest costs in the deer system are the TB testing and copper bullet – about $6 in total per hind. Barry says their target of an 80kg

average weaning weight is an ambitious goal that can only be achieved with better pasture management. Some lines of weaner stags averaged 79.5kg this year and the replacement hinds averaged 65kg. For the first time, some of the weaners (terminal sire-crosses) exceeded 100kg at weaning. “It’s around pasture management in early summer and making sure we don’t lose quality of feed to maintain hind condition right through.” Genetics are also helping progress the deer breeding programme. Barry believes in figures and says targeting estimated breeding values (EBVs) for high weaning weights is having the desired flow-on effect. Hinds are also heavier at weaning, averaging 115kg this year, compared to 90-100kg previously. MO buys B11 terminal sires, and some maternals, from Peel Forest Estate. Barry says the B11 influence in the stabilised cross injects hybrid vigour into the fawns and leaves a white mark on their rear end for easy identification. Their maternal sires are Red stags sourced mostly from Wilkins Farming and Deer Improvement.

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August 2017

DEER | ONFARM

Farm facts

Cass and Sean Becker have managed their way out of Johne’s

Managing Johne’s Lynda Gray Sean and Cassie Becker were gobsmacked when Johne’s was confirmed in their weaner mob in mid-July 2011. The 480 weaners, trucked about 10km from the Tiroiti breeding block to Kokonga for wintering, looked fine for the first three or four weeks given the bone-dry summer and autumn. But then things started going pear-shaped with a handful starting to lose condition and some starting to scour. When three died and another couple had to be euthanised the Beckers called in the local vet who, after taking blood samples, confirmed Johne’s. It was a shock given that both Cassie and Sean’s families had farmed deer in the area for more than 35 years and never been affected by the insidious wasting bacterial disease. But Sean says that in retrospect the triggers were there: drought conditions which had led to grain feeding over late summer and autumn, the stress of weaning plus transport and then turnout on to relatively lush autumn-saved grass. The early signs of the disease were hard to pick up, he says, because at that stage there were no deer yards at the finishing

block to run the deer in for close up inspection. Their initial plan of attack was to destock the fattening block in the hope that the disease-causing Mycobacterium avium paratuberculosis (MAP) bacteria in the soil and faecal waste would die out, and also to cull suspect hinds. When neither tack worked the Beckers called in Johne’s expert and vet Mandy Bell who helped them come up with a management plan hinging largely on better feeding. “We could see that feeding was the easiest way to keep above the disease and we looked particularly at how, what and where we were feeding,” Sean says. Advantage feeders were a key component of the plan. They spent $8800 on two 1800 litre, and two 3800 litre feeders to keep the whole barley and deer nuts up off the ground and free of the possible disease-causing MAP bacteria. Another preventative MAP-spreading measure was the regular cleaning of water troughs and draining of some wallows to prevent

Average carcase weight for young deer

56 54 52 50 48 46 44 42 40 2007/08 2008/09 2009/10 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15 2015/16 2016/17

Season

Source: DeerPRO

The graph clearly shows the production fallout from Johne’s with much reduced carcase weights in the years of high lesion rates, indicated by the red bubbles.

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deer drinking from them. Annual blood testing of up to 20% of the hinds was recommended, but all deer were screened in 2014 which turned up 44 weaner and 23 mixed-age hind positive reactors. All were slaughtered along with a handful of other suspect animals. “What surprised us was that all the positive hinds were big and healthy. They were super shedders.”

Bromar Lick Feeder

How Johne’s affected the Becker’s venison production

• Sean and Cassie Becker • Sheep, cattle and deer breeding on 4000ha (3300ha effective) of dryland ranging from 450m-1400m asl. Rainfall 450mm. Farm split in four blocks in Kyeburn/Hyde areas of Maniototo: • Kokonga: 450ha flat to rolling hill country for fattening young stock. • Pigroot: 2000ha hill block for lambing ewes and wintering cows. • Lismore: 420ha of summer country. • Tiroiti: 1130ha mid-altitude hill hind breeding country Cassie’s family, the Andrews, have farmed in the area since 1926. Cassie and Sean run the farm with 3.5 FTE including help from Cassie’s dad David. Stock wintered • Sheep (Corriedale-Romney) • 9800 ewes • 2500 hoggets Cattle (mostly Angus-Hereford) • 90 breeding cows • 160 MS weaners • 250 R2 steers Deer (Red) • 715 MA hinds • 50 R2 hinds • 560 weaners

The Bromar Lick Feeder was designed in Australia by farmers for farmers. It is a proven method of ad lib feeding to animals. The wastage of the supplement is negligible and the animals have the liberty of feeding at will. Weight gains and increased velvet production have been proven. By using these feeders the labour input is heavily reduced as the large Bromar one and half cubic metre bin means that the feed will last approximately three days depending on the rate of feeding desired and number of animals being fed. A purpose built tipping trailer is now available for purchase to transport the feeder from paddock to paddock. The trailer can take the full feeder to where you want it and then the empty one can be easily loaded back onto the trailer and taken back and refilled. The option of having non detachable wheels on each feeder is also possible. Now is the time when these feeders come into their own - maintaining winter weights and nutritional status, preparing for your velvetting demands and making your life easier. The feeders are also ideal for that pre-tup boost. Inspections are welcome and the feeders can be viewed in use on the agents deer farm. These sturdy feeders come fully assembled and are available in sheep or cattle/ deer height. To place orders or if you have any enquires phone 03 615 7097 / 027 204 8850

Managing Johne’s

Fodder beet was grown and fed to weaners over winter for the first time last year and added about another 6kgs of liveweight and brought forward the kill date average by six weeks.

Since then all R2 replacement hinds have been tested and there’s been a zero tolerance for underperforming hinds. The estimated financial fallout from Johne’s over almost seven years is around $152,500. At the peak of the first outbreak in 2010 DeerPRO estimated a cost of $82,000. “The obvious cost of deaths and poorperforming animals is substantial in these outbreaks, but the additional costs of subclinical disease can be significant too,” DeerPRO manager Solis Norton says. The estimate does not include the substantial cost and labour involved with testing, although in the Becker’s case this was minimal because they assisted with Johne’s Disease Research Consortium research looking at diagnostic tests for the disease. At the second spike in 2014/15 a $17,500 loss was calculated due to an almost 6kg drop in average carcass weight – reducing venison income by about $50 an animal – as lighter-weight and suspect animals were offloaded. Over seven years 157 deer estimated at $53,000 were euthanised, mostly due to Johne’s. Norton says the Beckers’ big success has been in reducing the rate of R2 hind positive reactors from 17% to less than 1%. It’s a figure Sean and Cassie are prepared to live with. “We’re happy with the plan we’ve come up with to control Johne’s and now feel more confident in what to look out for and how to feed them to manage stress,” Sean says. Over the next five years they want to keep pushing the better feeding plan by developing further finishing country to grow crops for finishing young stock. Improving the reproductive performance of the hinds is another goal. “We’d like to be consistently weaning

in the mid 90% (hinds to stags). We’re also keen to start looking at introducing a terminal sire.” Although they can see the potential to push forward slaughter dates and will probably trial summer crops to improve growth rates there are limitations, Sean says. “In a largely dryland situation it’s always dependent on the season.”

MULTI-ADVANTAGES Advantage feeders were bought as part of the Johne’s-busting plan but Sean credits the 2% increase in weaning to late summer and early autumn grain and nut feeding. Management bonuses include less grain and nut wastage, plus less time and money spent on carting supplementary feed in winter. Grain used to be fed from a trailer every second day but a topped-up feeder will feed 250 hinds for 8-10 days. Hinds are allocated a daily allowance of 150250g depending on the time of the year. Last year about 50 tonnes of both nuts and barley were fed from January until October. Observation of mob dynamics has led to placement of the feeders away from water troughs so that hinds have to walk a reasonable distance for a drink, leaving less-dominant animals the chance to get their feed quota. Barley and nuts fed from Advantage feeders also help settle sooner newly-weaned fawns.

SECOND-HAND K-LINE Second-hand K-line irrigation has been put to good use. The irrigation, bought off a farmer moving to pivot irrigation, has been used to strategically water 45ha of the deer-fenced block since October last year. Already in place was a pump shed and power used for a limited amount of hard

These post-rut newly weaned fawns will be winter grazed on fodder beet.

The Beckers’ Johne’s Management Plan • Advantage feeders to keep grain and nuts up off the ground • Regular cleaning of stock water troughs and exclusion from wallows where possible • Purchase of Johne’s-resilient stags from Peel Forest Estate. • Annual blood testing of R2 replacement hinds • Recommended-industry triple drenching combo for internal parasite control. hose irrigation so it’s been relatively cheap to get the K-line up and running. More could be added if a water take from one end of the property can be further channelled. The biggest expense is the 45 minutes of labour required during the watering season but the results have been well worth it, a good example being the early wintering grass-saved paddocks for weaners that maintained excellent quality and cover thanks to late summer and early autumn watering. “In a summer dry area even a small area of irrigation can make a big difference.”

DEERPRO The progress of the Becker’s battle with Johne’s has been analysed from kill sheet data collected and supplied free of charge by DeerPRO, formerly JML. The rebranding of the venison processor-funded entity earlier this year was taken to highlight that it was about more than Johne’s monitoring, DeerPRO general manager Solis Norton says. “We’re keen to get the message across that farmers can use us to get their deer slaughter data and use it to benchmark, look at trends over time and perhaps make changes based on the data.” Johne’s monitoring would remain a core function of DeerPRO but over the next year new value-adding data applications would be investigated by quizzing farmers on exactly what kind of data, and in what form they required it. The company was established in 2007 to monitor and collate Johne’s lesion rates and other relevant slaughter data, and point affected farmers in the right direction for support in controlling the disease. Over that time the disease had gone from exploding and causing devastation on a small number of farms to being widespread but at lower infection rates. “It’s still there and although it’s not causing the problems it used to keeping up vigilance is important for international market assurance.” DeerPRO gets funding of about $300,000 a year from a per-head slaughter levy collected by processors.

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August 2017

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LIVESTOCK | ONFARM

Farm production

Kirsty Hill and partner Gary Holden.

• Intensive lamb, bull and deer finishing, and velveting • Finishing: • 10,000 lambs @ 22kg CW • 480 bulls @ 300kg CW • 600 kg velvet • 9000 kg wool

Financial returns

HIGH OCTANE forages drive farm Russell Priest Photos: John Cowpland

Hawke’s Bay farming operation is successfully finishing an increasing number of lambs and bulls on a range of high-quality forages. Four years ago Kirsty Hill and Gary Holden (see p7) decided to quit breeding ewes and cows to intensify the farming business. Kirsty, who has completed a Farmax consultants’ course, ran the numbers with AgFirst consultant Phil Tither. They decided to drop the breeding cows and ewes. They also put a greater focus on velvet production as well as the lamb and bull finishing. The effective area farmed is 505 hectares which includes the home farm Waiwhenua, 325ha (32ha irrigated), 90ha leased next-door and a recently acquired 90ha 15 minutes away at Otamauri. Waiwhenua is near Waiwhare about 53km north-west of Hastings. At an altitude of about 215 metres the area is regarded as relatively summer safe however the weather can be extremely variable. Annual rainfall is about 1100mm, mostly during winter, but there is significant variation within the farm. The farm is split equally between flats and easy hills with predominantly loess over clay soils with some alluvium near the river. Olsen P levels on the developed 28

part of the farm are in the early 20s with the pH about 5.8. Waiwhenua’s main focus is to grow as much forage as cheaply as possible and convert it efficiently. The average net return is 18c/kg DM grown. The challenge for Kirsty and Gary is to carry enough stock through winter to be able to utilise as much of this spring growth as possible. They achieve this by restricting stock intake except for winter contract lambs and feeding crops to bulls during the winter. This winter they are growing greenfeed oats (17ha), Goliath rape (27ha), pea/barley silage (37ha) and fodder beet (2.5ha). Kirsty does most of Waiwhenua’s drilling however the bigger cultivation jobs are left to local contractors. Fodder beet is a recent crop with a relatively low cost a kilogram of

• Kirsty and Gary’s total gross farm income is 26c/kg drymatter (DM) with Sheep, 24c/kg DM; beef, 23c/kg DM and deer, 37c/kg DM. • From July 16, 2016 to June 17 this year, Farmax recorded Waiwhenua’s net pasture growth as 6611kg DM/ha. • Total farm expenses are an extraordinary 8c/kg DM, which Kirsty said was the the figure Farmax spits out. They do a lot of the work themselves. drymatter. Last year a dryland crop produced 18 tonnes DM/ha. More of it will be grown at the expense of the pea/ barley mix. Lucerne balage will be used to boost the protein level of the beet. Growing peas/barley on the paddock where it is to be self-fed as silage, then establishing Goliath rape on the paddock after the silage has been harvested, enables two crops to be grown on the same area in a year.

PERENNIAL FORAGE HUNT With the transition to an intensive finishing enterprise work in progress, Kirsty is still “feeling her way” with regard to forage selection. Areas not suitable for cultivation remain in ryegrass/white clover. Perennial forages red clover and plantain/clover, tetraploid ryegrasses and fescue are grown. Last year during the severe drought she thought a 20ha, four-year-old plantain/ clover stand would need replacing so cleaned it up with cattle. To her surprise a massive germination of plantain and clover seeds occurred after excellent autumn rains. Lambs were withheld for

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Friesian bulls on barley/ pea self-feeding silage.

Waiwhenua hinds.

eight weeks then introduced to a totally reinvigorated sward. Chicory may be added to the plantain/clover swards. Red clover appears to be the bestperforming finishing forage to date and usually only stops growing for a month or two in winter. She believes single-species forage crops like red clover and lucerne in 20ha blocks allows a good number of animals to be rotated around the blocks for an extended period. This minimises the number of times rumen microbes have to be adjusted. Older pastures are being replaced by modern fescues and productive ryegrasses following a rotation of winter oats and summer brassica crops. These grasses perform especially well following autumn rains after summer dry periods. They also show explosive growth in the early spring, a characteristic required to feed the large number of animals wintered. “In a normal summer we do dry out so we deliberately have few stock on and are not interested in trying to grow a lot of forage over this period. Autumn, winter and spring give the most reliable supplies of forage.

THE CONVERTERS The 142ha self-contained deer unit has been a breeding and venison finishing enterprise for the past 30 years. Now the focus is more directed towards producing velvet. The breeding herd is down to a nucleus of 100 elite hinds to accommodate the velveting stags. This year they bought a stag specifically for its strong velveting genes. The oldest velveting stags are five. Gary who has his velveting certificate, spends two or three days a week velveting during the season. To avoid having young weaner Friesian bulls on the farm during the difficult summer period and growing crops to feed them, they buy about 500 in the autumn/ winter period at about 200kg. Some R2 bulls are wintered on grass, grazing immediately ahead of slowgrowing spring-contract lambs, spending three or four days in 3ha paddocks on a 60-day rotation. The remainder winter on a combination of ad lib pea/barley selffed pit silage and Goliath rape in mobs of 40-50 occupying a dry, warm 15ha area between forestry plantings. Country-Wide Crops August 2017

Finishing lambs with staff member Duncan Kerr on bike.

“The self-feeding silage system is brilliant because you don’t have to use machinery which makes a mess when it’s really wet like this winter,” she says. The best of the R2 bulls are killed in the autumn at 550-580kg liveweight (LW) and the remainder in the early spring at 650-700kg LW. R1 bulls bought in the autumn at about 220kg will go on to a combination of Goliath rape and green-feed oats or fodder beet and self-feeding barley/pea silage. After transitioning to beet for 21 days the bulls get about 4-5kg DM and 2kg of silage a head. Kirsty plans to establish an intensive cell-block finishing unit. The lambfinishing business runs from December, when the first lambs are bought, through to November the following year. An agent buys most of the 10,000 lambs they finish. Last year the average buying in price was $71, this year it has been about $95. They expect to average a margin of $20-30/head this year. “We normally try and buy 28-30kg framey lambs in large numbers so that we can put plenty of weight on them over the winter/spring period, taking them to 22-24kg CW.” Lambs with these specifications have been difficult to buy this summer/ autumn forcing them to buy heavier, shorter-term lambs. Both male and female lambs are bought but are run separately. On arrival they receive a quarantine drench, are drafted into weight ranges and managed according to when they are likely to be killed. Spring-contract lambs are finished

on stands of red clover and plantain/ clover. “Lambs at this time of the year are doing in excess of 300g a day on red clover and a little less on plantain/ clover.” Ovation kills all Waiwhenua lambs under its Hawke’s Bay lamb supply commitment programme. Average lamb slaughter weight is normally about 21-22kg however this year it has been increased by about 2kg to make a moreacceptable margin. Waiwhenua was a recent winner of Ovation’s Supplier of the Year Award.

REVVING UP LEASE BLOCK Kirsty is keen to get the recently leased neighbouring block up to productive speed as soon as possible. Olsen Ps have been lifted from below 10 to nearly 20 with 23ha of plantain/red and white clover, and 45ha of new grass established. The plantain/clover area will be subdivided into 2.5-3ha blocks with temporary electric fencing allowing it to be rotationally grazed by lambs over the winter, spring and autumn and bulls in the summer. A mixed crop (12ha) of peas/barley grown in the spring and harvested for silage in the summer was replaced with Goliath rape in February. The silage is being self-fed to R2 bulls in the winter in conjunction with the rape. The remaining 11ha is in green-feed oats and will be used as winter feed for R1 bulls before being established in fodder beet in the spring. Kirsty prefers to plant areas destined for fodder beet and plantain in barley or oats first to break up the ground and help remove some of the potential weed burden. • More photos p98

PLANNING AHEAD Kirsty has three children, Robbie (25) has an ag science degree, Willie (23) an ag and farm management diploma and Amanda (21) a social sciences degree. Kirsty and Gary have structured Waiwhenua Farms, a company to give the children the opportunity to be part of the business through share acquisition.

LIVESTOCK | ANIMAL HEALTH

Oldest meat breed keeps up with commercial world Dave Robertson North Otago

AI of progeny testing ewes.

The Southdown breed has had a long history with New Zealand sheep farming. It has remained a very popular terminal sire through many different trends. They have consistently achieved top prices and clearance at stud stock sales and are prominent around the show circuits. They are popular as a terminal sire option for hogget mating and have a reputation for reaching prime status earlier than other breed options. Ask many sheep farmers they say “the Southdown is making a bit of a comeback”. I have heard this repeatedly for the 10 years I’ve been breeding them. When will they actually arrive fully again? So the claims of early maturity, easy lambing and superior eating quality are based in observation, anecdote or at best studbreeder rhetoric. Where is the scientific evidence about where the breed fits for the NZ commercial sheep farmer these days? To answer this question a commercial Southdown progeny testing programme has been established.

When the commercial progeny are processed we want not just to look at the amount of meat produced, but also traits around eating quality.

It involves 10 breeders from Northland to Southland who have submitted ram hoggets for mating over commercial crossbred ewes at a property in east Otago. It is an exciting venture for the breeders as it will be the ultimate way to see what genetics are really delivering what is required for profitable lamb production. A progeny test is the best way to remove all the environmental variables in what is measured in rams. The initiative has some clear objectives around collating data with relation to commercial lamb production and meat quality from shelf life to the dining plate. The data that derives breeding values is being recorded on SIL. There have always been murmurings about the accuracy and relevance of using breeding value comparisons between rams. Linking the stud flocks to one environment is the only way to sort this out. The rams used were also mated to stud ewes back on their owners’ property to link the commercial site back to the stud breeders’ flocks. With industry chasing lean growth rate and meat yields exclusively in terminal breeds there is suspicion that this is reducing the eating quality of lamb meat. When the commercial progeny are processed we want not just to look at the amount of meat produced, but also traits around eating quality. We suspect Southdowns will have higher levels of fats that deliver the eating quality experience but the proof of the pudding is, well, in the science hopefully. The progeny test has been designed to be linked to the other 30

progeny testing sites around NZ via the inclusion of AI link sires. Some of the top terminal rams in NZ have been inseminated with the commercial ewes to provide progeny that will be directly compared with the naturally mated ram hogget progeny. This will really give us an indication of where the breed is at nationally. The project is funded by the breeders involved and by Beef + Lamb Genetics as part of their initiative to set up nextgeneration sites for testing rams. The other more cerebral benefit of this study has been bringing together breeders for the collective good of the breed. I heard a respected stud stock agent say “breed societies that work together and have a shared focus on the commercial market are generally successful”. I have enjoyed the interactions with the other breeders, as a fairly newcomer to the scene their support have been great. We are all no waiting for the next phase of the program when the lambs arrive on the ground. Country-Wide Crops August 2017

LIVESTOCK | ONFARM Byron and Susan Chittick farm three blocks of land at Ohura.

King Country calvers Anne Hughes Buying and raising low-entry cattle has helped a King Country couple grow their farming operation. Byron and Susan Chittick have been rearing dairy-beef calves for 17 years. The couple now rear more than 700 calves each year, including those born to their own dairy cows. Calves are carried through the following winter for sale at 16-monthsold. Susan was raised on her family’s farm at Ohura. She and Byron ran the family operation in partnership with Susan’s brother and sister-in-law until 2003. The couple have gradually increased their own land holding and now own 62 hectares where they live and milk dairy cows, a 300ha block and Susan’s family’s original 600ha farm, which they leased for six years before buying in 2013. They also lease another 200ha effective. Calf-rearing is a lot of hard work, but the Chitticks say they wouldn’t have what they do today without it. It has taken many years of trial, error and investment to

streamline their calf-rearing system to run how they want. The Chitticks were initially buying milk powder and colostrum milk for calves. Milk powder was expensive and the colostrum supply too inconsistent. They decided to upgrade an old eightbail walk-through dairy shed on their small home block, originally used for town milk supply, to produce their own milk. The shed was stripped out and replaced with a 12-aside herringbone and all new yards. The re-build, new plant and their first 61 dairy cows cost about $70,000. The savings from producing their own milk and breeding some of their own calves saw the investment pay for itself within the first year. Dairy cows start calving early to midAugust. Once they have 12 cows in the milking shed the Chitticks start buying four-dayold calves to rear – about 100 calves every

week for the next six weeks. Ideally, all calves are purchased by September 20. Calves need to be mostly weaned before the dairy cows leave to complete their milking season elsewhere. Dairy cows are leased out from early December. The Chitticks don’t need the milk post-weaning and it’s a challenge drying cows off during peak lactation. “It’s not about the money, it’s that we don’t have to feed them for six months and somebody else is benefitting from them and looking after them,” Byron says. Depending on the season, cows usually return early to mid-May, seeing out the rest of winter on the larger block before coming home for calving. With so much happening from August to December – calving, milking, calfrearing, lambing, docking, weaning and selling last year’s calves – Byron says it’s important to keep their systems as simple as possible. Until two years ago, they had someone buying calves for them. Now it is Byron’s responsibility, while Susan is busy preparing for their arrival. “I’d never been to a calf sale in my life until two seasons ago,” Byron says. “I came home from my first sale with my tail between my legs and just a handful of calves.” He now buys from one local dairy farm and at saleyards in the Waikato. Byron buys white-face calves and all bull calves are steered. In keeping with the white-face preference, their dairy cows are mated to a Hereford bull. He buys mostly bull calves (500-550) and makes up the rest with heifers to bring down their overall average calf price. The Chitticks have had a stock truck built to their own specific design, paying a driver to pick up and deliver their new calves. Byron milks the cows twice a day. The

Farm Facts • Byron and Susan Chittick • Farming at Ohura, west of Taumarunui • Three blocks totalling 1120ha, including one lease • Wintering 4500 ewes, 1200 hoggets and 725 yearling cattle • Milking 120 dairy cows during calf rearing • Rearing 700-750 calves, including 30-35 replacement dairy heifers

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OHURA

Calves progress down the valley as they get older.

The Chitticks converted the old walk-through milking shed on their farm.

Byron Chittick enjoys milking their small herd of dairy cows.

milk is pumped to a tank on the back of a truck and driven out at 7am every morning to the calf-rearing set-up on their larger block 6km up the road. Sourcing part-time staff just for calf-rearing season can be challenging, especially in the small Ohura settlement. Byron and Susan have recently hired a full-time staff member to help in all facets of the operation, but particularly to take some pressure off during calf-rearing.

Raising healthy calves Colostrum and cleanliness are essential for raising healthy, happy calves. As calving nears, Susan Chittick is busy preparing for another season of calf rearing. Calves start out in pens under the covered sheep yards, part of which are converted into calf pens every year. Susan sprays the pens for bugs, puts down burnt lime (which soaks up the ammonia), then wood shavings. As calves arrive they are housed in mobs of about 12 and given a chance for their stomachs to settle after the trip. Their first feeds are of colostrum, which Byron and Susan store from their cows in drums for new arrivals. Calves are initially fed 1.5 litres in the morning and half a litre at night to adjust their tummies. Feeds are built up during the next two-three weeks until calves are drinking at least three litres daily. “They’ve had a big transition for a new baby calf and all in 24 hours,” Susan says. She adds apple cider vinegar to the milk for the first three weeks to aid digestion and checks all calves carefully on arrival. Weeping eyes could be pink eye, which Susan treats with colloidal silver. Weeping navels make it easier to pick up bugs 32

or infections, so she sprays those with iodine. Ears need checking for infections from ear tagging. The faster Susan can get them on oncea-day feeding the better - this usually takes five to 10 days, depending on how many new calves are coming in behind them. They progress from the covered yards to larger mobs in outdoor paddocks with shelter and access to grass, meal and pellets, along with daily milk feeds. Every Monday Susan repeats the spray and cleaning process in the calf pens. They have their own fresh milk supply, but the Chitticks still go through a total of 30-35 tonnes of meal and pellets every year. It can take up to one month for calves to start eating meal properly, but Susan says it is important to have a good milk and meal combination to develop their guts for the transition to all-grass feeding.

‘It’s not about the money, it’s that we don’t have to feed them for six months and somebody else is benefitting from them and looking after them.’

“What you put into that calf young you get it back at the other end. You can’t be stingy.” Fewer calves are arriving on their farm without having had colostrum these days, she says, but without it calves are much more likely to pick up bugs or viruses such as cryptosporidiosis and rotavirus. “It can be scary if you have 200 calves around and you have a bug – we just have to act really fast and separate them.” Their system is helping reduce deaths. Last year they lost 12 calves from a total of 746. The Chitticks vaccinate their cows

against rotavirus and leptospirosis, but different mobs of calves from different farms are penned together at sales and can pick up bugs. While scours can often be nutritional rather than a sign of something more serious, Susan treats it by adding natural yoghurt or Biopect, a prebiotic product containing pectins, electrolytes and dextrose, to the milk. Other than in this product, they don’t see a need for using electrolytes. “The biggest thing with the calf is if it hasn’t had colostrum it will get sick. “If it’s healthy it won’t pick up bugs.” Calves are weaned off milk at a minimum of 85kg. The Chitticks buy milk powder for this time of year to continue feeding any calves not quite ready for weaning when the cows leave in early December. Calves are fed pellets for a week postweaning until they settle down. They are rotated in mobs of about 9095, drenched every month and wintered once before being sold, usually around 300kg liveweight depending on the season. Byron says there is good demand for finishing cattle in late spring/ early summer, when feed surpluses are generally building up, resulting in good margins on their cattle. Calf rearing costs vary and Byron says it’s hard to put a figure on the value of their milk. His estimate – based on their average overall calf purchase price, an estimate on the value of the milk produced by their own cows, power, meal and pellets, transport and miscellaneous expenses – puts their average rearing costs at about $300-$350 per calf. “It’s hard to work out because the calf costs vary a lot. Those 120 calves bred here bring the costs down, but our margins are still well above what the banks require.” To finish the cattle themselves, the Chitticks would need to carry them through a second winter and reduce numbers. This policy fits their system well. Country-Wide Crops August 2017

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

LIVESTOCK | BULL BEEF

A lot of bull Sandra Taylor Growing bulls for beef is an important part of the farm business on central Canterbury’s The Point Station. Around 1100 R1 and R2 predominately Friesian bulls (they also grow 150 Hereford and Jersey bulls annually for the dairy industry) are grown out on the 1340 hectare property near Windwhistle and these are proving to be a profitable land-use option. The Point has been in Steve Richards’ family since 1862, but it was the buying of a block of land in 2005 (in an equity partnership) that allowed them to add bull beef to their traditional sheep and cattle breeding operation. The land came with an existing technosystem and this proved so successful that they have continued to expand and refine the intensive grazing systems that are generating bull growth rates of over 3kg/day. At a recent Beef +Lamb New Zealand Farming for Profit field day, Steve said electricity and water were the key to successful bull finishing, but he also acknowledged the role the correct pasture species and management play in the operation. Blair Holmwood is stock manager on The Point and Steve says they operate very much as a team with everyone having input into how the farm operates. A 100ha hill block is used as a maternal block, for ewes and wintering beef cows, but the balance is flat and is intensively managed for growing and finishing lambs and bulls. They aim to have 70% of their bulls finished before their second winter at a target weight of 620kg liveweight (LW) or 320kg carcaseweight (CW). That second year is money wasted, Blair says, hence the drive to get as many bulls away as finished by 18 months, although about 150 Hereford and 60 Jersey R2 bulls are wintered on the techno-system and sold to the dairy industry in spring. As they off-load these animals during 34

the spring flush, they buy 400kg Friesian bulls (or whatever is available at the time) to replace them and mop up the surplus grass. These are also grown out on the techno-system and finished by the following May.

MODIFYING THE SYSTEM A recent refinement to the bull finishing system has involved the use of GPS to divide the paddocks into 30 cells of 0.8-0.9/ha with permanent troughs placed in the middle. Steve says they were keen to install a permanent trough system as the portable troughs they have been using are prone to leaks, which leads to water shortages. The other advantage of the new setup is they are able to back-fence more easily which enables them to grow more grass. In their techno-system they graze 16 bulls per 0.8ha cell. They aim to run the bulls on to pasture covers of 25-3000kg DM/ha and each cell will last two days over winter, extending out to five days in spring.

GROWING BEEF WITH COCKSFOOT Pastures in the bull finishing units are a mix of cocksfoot, plantain, chicory and clovers. While a very traditional dryland pasture plant, modern varieties of cocksfoot such as Savvy do well in their dryland environment and in a mix with the herbs and legumes, it is proving its worth in driving cattle growth rates. Agricom agronomist Mark Kearney says the mix they used in the beef system was 12kg/ha of cocksfoot, 2kg/ha of both red and white clover and 1kg/ha of both plantain and chicory. As the cocksfoot is slow to establish the clover gets a chance to become part of the sward without being dominated, as is often the case with ryegrass, he says. At a Beef + Lamb New Zealand beeffocus field day, farm systems scientist Tom Fraser said in their environment, cocksfoot can grow more drymatter

The Point Station stock manager Blair Holmwood.

than ryegrass and most importantly it persists – thanks to its deep and dense root system. “Its roots are twice the weight and go twice as deep as ryegrass root so they are better at accessing soil moisture and can sustain an attack by grass-grub.”

GAINING WEIGHT Having grown bulls for 12 years, Steve and Blair know the growth potential of their stock at different times of the year. About 200 R2 bulls are wintered on Kale with an average weight gain of 800g/ day over 120 days. At the end of August, when the spring grass comes away, the bulls are given as much grass as they can eat on the techno-system and they will gain more than 3kg/day. “There is an opportunity to grow animals at a colossal rate in spring if the quantity of grass is there,” Tom says. Calves are bought in November and December through Farmlands. Blair says they don’t buy the early calves because they are usually too expensive, rather they wait in the knowledge they make up weight gains easily. “It’s just a matter of feeding them.” With a preference for straight Friesians, they try and secure at least half their finishing bulls as calves in spring, but will also buy 18-month-old bulls in the autumn to top up numbers as necessary. “The Friesians are the best at growing and their liveweight gains in spring and summer will outdo any beef breeds,” Blair says. The calves spend the summer and Country-Wide Crops August 2017

autumn on pasture and are run in mobs of no more than 50 on a 1ha area. “Bulls need just space and area to move.” They are then wintered on kale for about 100 days from early June. Once the crop is finished most are run on to the techno-system which is where they stay until they are finished. Any lighter bulls – below 400kg – are kept on paddocks away from mob pressure. Once in the techno-system they try and keep the bulls in the same mobs as much as possible to prevent behavioural problems – and if they do have to mix them, they get animals from adjacent cells so they are familiar with each other.

ANIMAL HEALTH

CROPS About 200ha of crops are grown annually and this year 82ha is in a Kestral kale and swede mix for the calves and about half the remaining R2 bulls. Blair says they did try growing and feeding fodder beet with the intention of running the bulls on to it in May, but the transition management required made it difficult. “We can grow very good kale and get good results off it. “Fodder beet has its place and if it was more cost effective to grow we would look at it, but until then kale is working fine for us.” This year, 42ha of rape and grass will be used for lamb finishing and Blair says it is a useful winter feed as they will get three to four grazings off it. Other crops

include a barley cash-crop and ryecorn. The barley is stored onfarm and sold in spring and the barley straw is used as a supplement and fed to the bulls in winter. After the barley is harvested, 25ha is sown in ryecorn and this will generate enough feed for three grazings – typically by winter trading lambs – before it is cut for baleage. The paddock is then sown in grass.

OTHER LIVESTOCK The bulls are run alongside 4550 Romney Perendale ewes, 1350 ewe hoggets, 6500-7000 trading lambs and 120 Angus breeding cows. The progeny from the Angus are sold as steer calves while the heifer calves are carried through, mated and any surplus are sold as in-calf heifers.

02045 WPAFW CW

The calves get a B12 injection and an oral drench on arrival and given oral drenches regularly until they are too big to drench easily, they are then given a pour-on worm treatment. Before winter they are given a copper injection and these injections are then given every three months. Mineral blocks are made available to calves on the techno-system and selenium prills are broadcast over the techno-grazing areas.

The techno-system is closed up in March, allowing pasture covers to build. The bulls are run onto the system in June on a 120-day rotation.

“When you see what they’re doing in these times, you can tell they’re not fair weather bankers.” Justin King, Brookwood Station, Takapau

At Westpac, we’ve made a commitment to New Zealand farming. Our Agribusiness bankers know farming. They know what can be down one day, can be up the next. And they know that there are as many opportunities in hard times as there are in good. We back them. Because we’re backing farming and we’re backing farmers.

To find your local Agribusiness banker, visit westpac.co.nz/agri Country-Wide Crops August 2017

LIVESTOCK | GENE TALK

Balancing the eggs in your basket Nicola Dennis As a scientist, so much of the job is interpreting what farmers already instinctively know into firm, concrete numbers. Years of battling through the elements and farm accounts give farmers an brilliant gut feeling for the relationship between an action and its likely result. Today’s topic is an excellent example of this. Most people reading this article know there is a tipping point in lambing percentage: where those extra lambs are just not worth the effort. A point when the dreams of large lamb cheques turn into bigger slinks piles, smaller weaning weights and barer pastures. You did not have to sit through seminars about datasets and statistical regressions you “just know” that increasing lambing percentage beyond a “certain point” is a bad idea. The genetic trend for number of lambs born per ewe is 0.01. This means that over 10 years, scanning percentage would increase by 10%. That is a very exciting prospect if you have a lower lambing percentage than you would like and you are confident this is because you have a low number of lambs being born. However, for many other farmers, the rams they are using are liable to push them up and over their tipping point. The trouble is that the profit ranking tools breeders use to select for increasing lambing percentage, as they stand, do not easily allow them to stop selecting at the “certain point”. The profit for number of lambs born (NLB) is linear. In a linear world, every extra lamb born is worth the same value no matter how many you started with or

how many lambs you wanted. In this world, triplets are three times the fun. This means that within the all-powerfulbean-counting-machine rams with excessively high breeding values for NLB (and perhaps lower values for other traits) have high scores and can outrank rams that may have a better balance of traits. All this is about to change. The economic value of NLB in the profit ranking (New Zealand Maternal Worth) is going to dump its linear ways and take up a life as a capped trait. What this means is that scientists (my colleagues Tim Byrne, Cheryl Quinton, Peter Amer and the team at Beef and Lamb genetics) have identified the average tipping point for a commercial farm. Using economic modelling they have found the point at which an additional increased in NLB results in a net monetary loss per extra lamb. They have also found that there are diminishing returns per lamb when a farm begins to approach the tipping point. The economic value for NLB will now

Tipping point

Index Value for NLB

Linear

Capped

Breeding Value for NLB

reflect this and there will be a cap on the value for NLB that a ram can reach in the profit ranking (the NLB breeding values themselves will be unchanged). Once a ram’s breeding value surpasses the tipping point, they receive no extra points in the profit index for increases in NLB.

Under the new system, there is no incentive for producing rams with extremely high breeding values for NLB and this has to be a good thing for everyone.

The great thing about the capped system is that only the rams with very high values for NLB are affected by this change. Rams with low and moderate NLB values will still have very similar rankings as they do in the linear system. Under the new system, there is no incentive for producing rams with extremely high breeding values for NLB and this has to be a good thing for everyone. Not least of all, because pumping the brakes on NLB frees up some space in the index to maintain or improve other traits. This will give progressive breeders the opportunity to provide rams that will increase your future profit in other areas (other maternal traits, weaning weight, parasite resistance, yield, growth) while holding on to the great gains you have made in NLB. • Nicola Dennis is a scientist with AbacusBio, Dunedin. Country-Wide Crops August 2017

LIVESTOCK | STOCK CHECK The objective of the European Single Farm Payment Scheme to each farm is to provide basic income support to farmers that is uncoupled to production.

Matching feed to profits STOCK CHECK Trevor Cook Greenfields farm development is not something we have the opportunity to engage in much these days. The dairy intrusions into tussock land is probably the most obvious and recent example of creating a brand new production platform. To have that opportunity in France and Portugal in May this year was a good lesson for me in the need to match land resource to management capability and to markets. When we change the direction of farming systems in New Zealand those match-ups still have to happen but they so often just fall into place. But in these European theatres which have large amounts of flat or gentle rolling land, much of which can be irrigated, the instinctive recognition of what makes a profit has been severely smothered by 50 years of subsidies. This system necessitated going through a methodical process of putting those match-ups together, then changing the mindsets about what drives profit from a grazing platform. The concept of the feed grown being a known entity and cost being matched to animals that will make the most profit from the feed is not such a natural equation as it would seem. Even in NZ I come across farmers who do not manage on the basis of that feed-toprofit relationship. But for these pastoral grazing newbies it required a major mindset change. If there was any instinctive response to which policies would return most profit Country-Wide Crops August 2017

it was always a breeding policy. Cows and more cows although breeding ewes were not excluded. The concept of what gave the best return from grazing very high quality feed was just not recognised. The fact that young grazing animals will always make best use of such feed most of the time, was difficult to convince. Was this always the case in such a different environment and market? Once I found that the relative value of breeding stock to trading stock was similar to in NZ I was more comfortable although on previous ventures into this territory I had come across markets that paid insane amounts for cull cows.

The concept of the feed grown being a known entity and cost being matched to animals that will make the most profit from the feed is not such a natural equation as it would seem.

The very warm temperatures did set up a summer dry scenario for the nonirrigated land and massive pasture growth rates under irrigation. Eighteen tonnes/kg drymatter (DM)/ha was the maximum I would go to, but my local colleague was happy with 23t DM. A sheep breeding enterprise on the hills that supplied lambs to grow fast under irrigation modelled out as being very profitable. Early lambing and weaning had to occur to beat the summer dry. Just whether such a venture is put in to place is yet to be seen, but it was good fun using NZ logic in such a foreign environment.

WHATâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S A SUBSIDY? Coming home I was in the grip of Lions fever. One such supporter who farms in the United Kingdom scrutinised our non-subsidy claims. He was exposed to a few farms that were getting assistance to fence off waterways, wetlands or native bush stands. How does that differ from the environmental subsidies UK farmers get, I was asked? Probably none, I confessed to which the accusation was made that our subsidy-free claims are not valid. That may be the case but the level of subsidy is the big difference. I have been on many farms in Europe that could not exist without subsidies. Our environmental assists are small bickies really, that help compliance. On the other hand, the objective of the European Single Farm Payment Scheme to each farm is to provide basic income support to farmers that is uncoupled to production. This is a substantial addition to farm income. The semantics around whether we have subsidies or not are irrelevant when the bigger picture is looked at as to the impact of subsidies. Of course, there is huge concern among UK farmers over the future of subsidies which are coming from a European money pool. Will a stand-alone UK be able to afford or have the will to continue such farmer support? Long before Brexit there was a threat these farmers were preparing for subsidy drops as the size of that money pool shrank. This possibility has been behind the big drive there to reduce feed costs by using pastures more effectively. Such a drive is successfully proving this change is possible, leading to higher profits. A threat to us? Probably not because increases in production are not the expected outcome, just decreases in costs. Some of the application of basic pasture management being adopted there would be respected here and would be a prod for us to sharpen up our game. 37

SPONSORED CONTENT | BOEHRINGER INGELHEIM

BIONIC worm control technology helps counter the slackening of a ewe’s immune system that occurs prior to lambing, stifling milk production and causing a loss of body condition.

BIONIC® capsules – a tool for performance flocks Richard Rennie

or high-producing sheep farmers across New Zealand the BIONIC® capsule has proven to be the “go to” solution for enabling them to translate the productive potential of their flocks into a profitable reality. But the technology and formulation within the BIONIC capsule has been no overnight arrival. It represents years of innovation, development and refinement for a product tried and proven in animal health care. The history of BIONIC capsules goes back a generation to the original MAXIMIZER® capsules developed in the early 1990s by Merial, to the EXTENDER® capsule and finally the BIONIC itself, released in 2006. The combination of the two key actives abamectin and albendazole into a tablet form represent BIONIC the single mostsignificant development in the BIONIC capsule’s technology. “The most-crucial development was going from a single to a combination of actives. The animal health industry is well aware of the benefits of having a combination in terms of reducing the rate of resistance development,” Boehringer Ingelheim Animal Heath New Zealand technical services manager Justin Hurst says. Early capsules only contained one active, and had a label claim for ewes up to 65kg. Today the BIONIC capsule enables two actives to be combined, in addition to cobalt and selenium minerals, and can be used on ewes to 80kg. “The combination of actives is a perfect fit for the capsule technology. It provides a constant level of lethal compound exposure for 100 days, providing a better kill rate for worms, compared to a single-shot treatment,” Hurst says. 38

But to deliver an exacting amount of the combination over a set period requires a highly precise delivery mechanism, something Boehringer Ingelheim has perfected with significant investment in high-tech partnership. Pharmaceutical company Argenta assembles the BIONIC capsules. Boehringer Ingelheim benefits from Argenta’s deep level of expertise in assembly and formulation of animal health products.

‘The combination of actives is a perfect fit for the capsule technology. It provides a constant level of lethal compound exposure for 100 days, providing a better kill rate for worms, compared to a single-shot treatment.’ Critical areas of assembly include the size of the capsule’s orifice where the dissolved tablet formulation is extruded, and the exacting formulation of the tablet itself that must be controlled to the concise proportions to ensure precise delivery. The automated capacity has enabled BIONIC capsule production to leap with the growth in demand from its initial orders. And that surge in demand has come with good reason as sheep farmers seek to lift the productivity of their flocks. In the 30 years of capsule development the national sheep population has almost halved from 50 million to 30m, yet its productivity has risen by almost as much, producing the same number of lambs from a significantly reduced ewe flock. Country-Wide Crops August 2017

SPONSORED CONTENT | BOEHRINGER INGELHEIM BIONIC capsules have helped contribute to that productivity growth by enabling ewes to maintain body condition score post-lambing, delivering heavier lambs thanks to better milk production and lower worm loadings on spring pasture. BIONIC capsule worm control technology helps counter the slackening of a ewe’s immune system that occurs prior to lambing, stifling milk production and causing a loss of body condition. Parasites become more invasive, then spreading to pasture as larvae in turn infect the new-born lambs and impact upon their growth rates. A capsule trial has showed treated ewes can be 5.8kg heavier on average at weaning and with an average 3.8kg more lamb liveweight weaned per treated ewe. The addition of cobalt maximises the amount of vitamin B12 produced by the ewe and in turn fed to the lamb via her milk. The selenium dose in the bionic capsule is sufficient to last up to 250 days. The technology and the science of the BIONIC capsule history, and proven track record on the farm, is also recognised by veterinarians who work alongside some of NZ’s highestperforming sheep farmers. Richard Atkinson of Atkinson and Associates Veterinary Services in the King Country said typically high-performing farmers with flocks lambing at 150%-plus over a tight lambing period will typically face a grass shortage as lambing nears its end. “Pasture levels get pushed lower and by default more worm larvae will be ingested. “Farmers start to see a tail end in their ewe flock develop and egg counts can soar to 3000 eggs per gram, 10 times the typical amount found in younger ewes.” If these ewes are not treated lambs will be born lighter, grow STATION | GISBORNE slower from lower milk production and some ewes may even die from worm invasion. Rather than advocate a blanket treatment, Richard will often work with his clients advising to draft out twinning ewes for bionic treatment, then possibly singles. “We just watch it year to year to see how it appears to be developing on each particular farm and work from there.” He anticipates this spring could have particularly high worm

NIC, WE’VE HAD ULT S EVER.”

BIONIC has helped contribute to productivity growth by enabling ewes to maintain body condition score postlambing, delivering heavier lambs thanks to better milk production and lower worm loadings on spring pasture.

Trial work has shown treated ewes can be 5.8kg heavier on average at weaning and with an average 3.8kg more lamb liveweight weaned per treated ewe.

where 95% of the worm population is held in the pasture, rather than the animal.” Richard says after a decade of having clients use BIONIC he has seen no indication of resistance developing in their flocks. “We find the biggest chance of getting drench resistance comes from buying in store lambs, or by using generic drenches with no data to support their effectiveness.” His high-performing farmer clients tend to operate in a more intensive, higher-stocked farm environment where worm burdens can be greater than on less-intensive sheep-cattle mixed operations. “For them BIONIC is an intervention tool that enables them to achieve that top-end performance they are seeking.” Further south in the Taihape district Paul Hughes of Taihape Veterinary Services has been engaged with capsule technology for many years, with some of his clients being among the first to trial BIONIC predecessor EXTENDER. “For our clients using BIONIC capsules they are able to get a lot more lambs away earlier than they could otherwise. Their weaning drafts are bigger, and for them they need to move as many lambs as soon as they can. The cost of holding to make weight can be significant.” Paul says despite solid scientific evidence showing that capsules can increase the rate of resistance development, a study he published did not show capsule use being a major factor to resistance development on farms in his district. He does recommend some ewes be left without a capsule in mobs and works with clients each season to see what worm infestations are like. “Here in the Taihape region we are not summer-safe anymore. Once you are into January you are now getting dry and if your pasture supply-demand tells you to move them, you have to. “The store market has not been great over that January period, so these lambs really need to be finished. “For those highperforming farmers in this region that need to get lambs off, BIONIC is a tool, and they consider it costeffective to use it.”

numbers, thanks in part to much of the country having exceptional feed levels over late summer-autumn. “Pasture levels make a big difference here in New Zealand, Country-Wide Crops August 2017

ENVIRONMENT | WATERWAYS

BEYOND reasonable cost Lynda Gray Conservation Minister Nick Smith has made it loud and clear that farmers will need to fence off waterways for the sake of water quality. “You should be of no doubt that of all the things the farming community can do to make a material difference at reasonable cost around water quality is the progressive fencing of waterways,” he said at the May Deer Industry conference. But is $510,000 ($2125/hectare) a reasonable cost for fencing out stock? That’s what a north Waikato hill country sheep and beef farmer could be up for in meeting the fencing costs of the Healthy Rivers Plan Change 1. The fencing figure was calculated by AgFirst consultant Phil Journeaux as part of a November 2016 report to Waikato Federated Farmers investigating the costs to the farmer, and of producing a farm environment plan (FEP) compliant with the Waikato Regional Council’s (WRC) plan. The $510,000 included $480,000 of “potential” 8-wire post/batten fencing over 22kms if the council deemed it necessary to fence off cattle from steep gully sidings. For the report AgFirst visited three dairy, seven drystock and two cropping farms plus one lifestyle block to get representative coverage of farming in the Waipa and Waikato catchments. The cost of fencing alone, without taking into account reticulated water, ranged from nothing on a 50ha beef and cropping farm to $510,000 for the 240ha north Waikato farm. Of the 10 commercialsized, non-dairy farms three required no expenditure on fencing; three between $9500-$22,000; and $70,000, $80,000, 40

$215,000 and $510,000 for the four remaining farms. These costs exclude water reticulation costs which go handin-hand with fencing and on three of the steeper farms the cost of reticulation exceeded that of fencing. Although ball-park figures, they were indicative of the huge costs, Federated Farmers North Island regional policy manager Paul le Miere said.

The cost of fencing alone, without taking into account reticulated water, ranged from nothing on a 50ha beef and cropping farm to $510,000 for the 240ha north Waikato farm. “We weren’t surprised it was high cost. It’s what farmers have been telling us.” Although Federated Farmers could see the environmental benefit from the cost of stock exclusion on lower-lying intensively farmed country, le Miere said the huge cost of fencing off hill country running low numbers of stock per hectare was not justified for the minimal environmental gain and to do so would be only to appease popular public opinion that any stock in any waterway was a major environmental problem. The report highlighted the ambiguity in the rules around keeping stock from waterways. “There is something of a contradiction between Schedule C which requires stock exclusion, and Schedule 1 which allows for alternative mitigations.”

Another issue was the timeline for stock exclusion, which was felt to be impractical due to the difficulties associated with fencing a lot of hill country, along with the cost involved. Feedback in the report from the Waikato Regional Council acknowledged further refinement of the interpretations of Schedule 1 was needed, such as the alternative mitigations expected when it was impractical to fence streams on slopes over 25 degrees. More than 1000 submissions have been received about the Healthy Rivers Plan Change 1 and hearings will be held early next year.

CLEAN WATER PACKAGE Smith’s emphasis of the need for stock exclusion follows the February release of the Clean Water package, the latest chapter in the national freshwater management reforms underway since 2009. The package spells out the timeline for stock exclusion according to stock class (pigs, dairy cows, dairy support, deer and beef cattle); and land gradient where plains are a 0-3 degrees slope; rolling land 3-15 degrees, and steeper land more than 15 degrees. Farmers unable to meet the requirements can apply for permission to develop a stock exclusion plan with their regional council, and those who fail to provide an alternative plan, or don’t meet requirements could face a fine of up to $2000. The Government has estimated the nationwide stock exclusion regulation will cost $300 million to implement but preliminary research by Federated Farmers puts the figure closer to $1.2 billion for drystock farms, and $2b if dairy farms are included. “That excludes water reticulation which on some farms will cost more than the fencing,” le Miere says. Dairy farmers have made the fencing of waterways a priority under the Sustainable Dairying Water Accord, detailing exactly what type of waterways must be fenced off by when. Meanwhile, Beef + Lamb New Zealand and Federated Farmers have submitted on national policy directives, regional plans, and supported farmers to make individual submissions. B+LNZ in their submission on the Southland Regional Council environment and water plan recommended farmers be allowed to prioritise where they will exclude stock from through their FEP in preference to a blanket rule, and that the date for stock exclusion be extended. For more on the Clean Water package go to: www.mpi.govt.nz/protectionand-response/environment-and-naturalresources/fresh-water lyndagray@xtra.co.nz Country-Wide Crops August 2017

ENVIRONMENT | NUTRIENTS

Nitrogen’s path to rivers and lakes Cheyenne Stein Water quality remains a topical issue for the agricultural industry with a lot of research effort being put into the topic. Dr Ranvir Singh, senior lecturer in environmental hydrology and soil science at Massey University is overseeing a series of student research projects focused on understanding the nutrient flow pathways and their potential attenuation on their journey from farms to rivers and lakes. The collaborative project between Massey University Fertiliser and Lime Research Centre (FLRC) and Horizons Regional Council (HRC) started five years ago with Singh at the helm. Singh says he wanted to get Massey and Horizons working together to build a student research programme to advance their knowledge on issues in water quality. These led to the projects being partly funded by Horizons and FLRC. Student projects are based on better understanding of nitrogen flow pathways and its potential attenuation ‘reduction’ in the subsurface environment – below the farm root zone. “One of the major water quality issues relates to the elevated levels of nitratenitrogen in the river. This may lead to excessive periphyton growth, which then becomes an issue for the river ecology, often depleting the dissolved oxygen and aquatic life.” Previous research on nitrogen leaching, put into models like Overseer estimate how much nitrogen or nutrients are likely being leached from the root zone of the farm, but does not consider what happens to the nitrate-nitrogen once it’s

Key findings so far: • Nitrogen loads measured in the river are significantly smaller than estimates by Overseer. • The difference in those figures is likely due to the nitrogen reduction process that occurs in the subsurface. • The capacity of land for denitrification is variable • Has opened the door to many management questions and has widened the scope for further research

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

leached and makes it way to the river, Singh says. Nitrate is a reactive compound so is able to react and may change form on its flow from the farm to the river. In theory the process of denitrification is well understood. Nitrate-nitrogen can change form through to nitrous oxide, through to dinitrogen and mainly occurs under low-oxygen conditions where there is a carbon source and denitrifying bacteria. However, there is limited knowledge and understanding of how nitrate-nitrogen is transformed and transported in the subsurface. “Previous studies have found that when Overseer estimates are compared with loads in the river, up to 50% of leached nitrogen is not accounted for, there is a significant difference between the two numbers – so where is it going? Is it being accumulated or reduced in the system and if it’s being reduced ‘attenuated’, is this reduction uniform or variable across the catchments and subcatchments. These are the questions we are looking into.” The Manawatu and Tararua regions are chosen as the case study catchments for the projects due to the area having higher nitrogen concentrations in surface water, with a large share of nitrogen load estimated to come from agricultural areas. River flow and water quality data collected by Horizons and estimates made by Overseer were used to calculate a ‘nitrogen attenuation factor’. This shows how much nitrogen disappears between the root zone and the river load, The factor sits between 0, no reduction and 1, 100% reduction. Calculations from 13 sub-catchments showed the factor was variable with figures between 0.29 and 0.75, showing that some regions have more natural nitrogen reduction potential than others. To build on this, groundwater surveys were done in 2014. PhD Student Aldrin Rivas took the lead, sampling 57 wells in the area. Water quality was measured to classify them into one of two categories: oxidised conditions, where nitrate should not reduce due to the high amount of dissolved oxygen in the water and reducing conditions, where there are low levels of dissolved oxygen in the water,

increasing the likelihood of nitrogen attenuation. “The results show that the number of wells that were oxidised and nonoxidised, aligned quite nicely with the attenuation factor figures. Reducing wells matched with high attenuation factor areas.” Economically there is value in better quantification and mapping of nitrogen attenuation in the subsurface environment. With rough estimates of about 3000 tonnes of nitrogen being reduced somewhere in the system in the Tararua region, and considering the approximate cost of nitrogen reduction through farm management practises being around $15/kg of N, about $45 million worth of N is being reduced by natural processes. “It’s being reduced somewhere in the system and we don’t understand it, so we can’t use it smartly. So economically it makes sense to figure out what’s happening and the areas we need to be focusing on and where we shouldn’t because it’s already being reduced in the system.” Profiles from the soil surface to the groundwater are measured to see what happens to the nitrate-nitrogen as it works its way through the system. Field sites have been set up with suctions cups and shallow groundwater piezometers at varying depths from soil surface to groundwater. Aldrin collects samples every month and analyses the groundwater chemistry and measures the dissolved oxygen and nitrate-nitrogen levels. “Some of the sites show high dissolved oxygen and high nitrate levels, so it’s again proving that where oxidised water is present, it’s likely that nitrate is being leached and transported into the groundwater and going into the river. But in other areas where there is low dissolved oxygen, there is also low nitrate in groundwater. “Regardless of land use on the top, there could be different reducing conditions in the subsurface environment which kind of puts a control on the flow of nitrate-nitrogen leached from the farm to the river. It’s not only the land use; it’s the transport and transformation process that’s important also.” 41

“In some cases it’s possible that the leaching is not a problem due to the reducing conditions under the ground, so the N being leached isn’t necessarily making its way to groundwater and then on to the surface water.” If nitrous oxide levels are increasing during the tests then it suggests that denitrification is occurring. “The test was applied to a number of sites and it showed that in some of the sites nitrate was reducing faster than the bromide, which is all accounted for by dilution, and nitrous oxide levels are increasing. This is another way of proving that denitrification occurs in certain environments. It’s all building up evidence that’s supporting the same theory.” Assessing the capacity of land to reduce nitrogen this way means at some point it will be possible to match land use with land suitability, to increase agricultural production while reducing environmental impacts in catchments. “Some areas where there is naturally high nitrogen reduction we would not benefit environmentally or economically from huge changes in farm practices for nitrogen mitigation. In others areas with low natural reduction and good connectivity to lakes and rivers there

Regional council collaboration Dr Jon Roygard, freshwater and science manager at Horizons Regional Council says the project making is great steps towards filling the gaps in knowledge around the process of nitrogen transport from farms to waterways. Horizons has a role in increasing its understanding around catchments to inform policy development and this type of understanding is increasingly required through legislation like the national policy statement for freshwater management Roygard says. “We need good information, the better the information we have the better we can target things correctly and really understand the linkage between farms and rivers and the other inputs that all come together to influence water quality outcomes. “We are also looking for opportunities to increase production and profitability on farms and the types of information we are getting from projects like this allows us to explore those avenues.” Horizons and Massey are working closely with other institutions such as GNS science and DairyNZ on other projects in the area of nutrient management, Roygard says. “Bringing in industry partners makes sense for us to ensure what we are doing is practicable and sensible. A great thing about this is the connectivity – the governance team at the council have the opportunity to view the research and in early March students will be in front of council to discuss the research. So the decision-makers are in front of the research, it’s linking the research to the practice side of it, ensuring we are adapting and creating policies that are going to work.” would be benefit. It becomes a handy tool to see where we should be spending the limited resources we have in a way that’s going to make the most impact and improve the productivity and reduce the environmental footprint.” Singh says the research is on-going with much more to be discovered and he hopes the research will be taken on by other councils. “I would like to see more regional

councils getting on board and working together the way that we are with Horizons so that we can build more case studies as the idea it to keep building the work slowly and get more understanding about it – what controls the natural attenuation, is it the soil type, geology or something else? Once we will get enough knowledge built up then we will be able to assess and map out these areas and be able to target out mitigations.”

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ENVIRONMENT | WATER QUALITY

Benefits of a grass strip Glenys Christian Rank grass could be more of friend to farmers than they realise when it comes to planning and carrying out riparian planting, a recent Wellsford workshop was told. “Grassy margins filter contaminants from run-off,” Dr Tom Stephens, a DairyNZ water quality analyst, said when demonstrating the Riparian Planner online programme to 20 farmers, getting them to map waterways on their properties then let it lay out the planting and fencing required. It was important to correctly estimate what percentage of land along waterways was likely to flood every year and choose a suitable fencing setback distance, which varies according to soil type, slope and water flow, he said. On flat-to-undulating land a setback distance of from three to five metres could reduce nutrients, sediment and bacteria entering waterways but wider strips were needed if the objective was to create shade or a wildlife habitat, reduce weed growth and keep streams cool. “You want to get that right so the number of plants recommended is correct,” he said.

‘The Government has set goals. But our focus should be that we’re doing this for our kids.’

“If they are spaced too thinly weeds will come through or if they are too dense you’re wasting money.” Grass could be left in the lower bank zone, the strip of land along the waterway prone to flooding, because planting shrubs or trees there could lead to their catching debris which would impede stream flow. “If you are super-keen you can plant native grasses and just spot spray for weeds,” he said. A one-metre grass strip should also be left around fences put in at the top of the upper bank zone, where trees and shrubs could be planted because the area only flooded periodically. The grass strip also prevented plants being grazed or shorting out electric Country-Wide Crops August 2017

DairyNZ water quality analyst, Dr Tom Stephens, left, works with Tapora dairy farmer, Earle Wright on a map of his property using DairyNZ’s Riparian Planner.

fences and if the bottom fence wire was one foot up from the ground cows would be able to reach underneath to graze. Stephens said farmers could log into DairyNZ’s Riparian Planner at any time for tailored advice on planting their farm. While it would prompt them about actions required, simplify planning and reduce costs, it wouldn’t make decisions required, replace the farmer or their consultants or do the hard work involved. Farmers give the address of their property, then on a map draw in waterways and specify the type of fencing and planting required. The planner will ask if stock is excluded then calculate planting and fencing costs and work out the amount to be done each year. There are online planting guides for regions throughout the country, with five go-to plants suggested as they are hard, fast-growing and can be planted straight into pasture. Ecosourced plants are recommended as they’re the best adapted to the local climate and soils. There’s then a choice of plants for the lower bank zone, mostly sedges, that should be planted at spaces as from half to one metre apart. And for the upper bank zone, where planting should be from 1.5 to two metres apart, a longer list of tree and

shrub options is given. Weed control costs are also factored in. When planting wetlands 10m could be left on the lower banks inside fences, Stephens said. “You want a lot of low-growing sedge and raupo is ideal.” Councils, some of which had schemes funding up to 50% of planting and fencing costs, would send staff out to look at a planned planting area and DairyNZ consulting officers could be called on for advice as well. And Stephens said he or water quality specialist, Aslan Wright-Stow, could be contacted via the planner so they could check the fencing and planting planned. “Do it once and it will last you five years,” he said. If farmers required a farm environmental plan under new regional council rules they would not have to repeat the exercise. Earle Wright, a Tapora dairy farmer with one of the flagship sites for the Integrated Kaipara Harbour Management Group, who organised the workshop, said if the subject of riparian planting wasn’t dear to farmers now, it would be dear in a different way in the near future. “The Government has set goals,” he said. “But our focus should be that we’re doing this for our kids.”

www.dairynz.co.nz/riparianplanner 43

ENVIRONMENT | FARM FORESTRY Life cycle assessment studies show a greater, net reduction in greenhouse gas emissions when you harvest the forests and use the wood in place of more energy-intensive alternatives.

MITIGATION IGNORED Denis Hocking Life has many mysteries, but I am baffled by the Government’s handling of the intertwined forestry and environmental issues. We all know – well maybe not all, but certainly all my contacts – that forestry is booming, while politicians and bureaucrats seem determined to ignore its potential to mitigate several of our major environmental problems. Any considerations here need to start by recognising three facts: • Forestry is the simplest and most readily quantified method of sequestering significant amounts of carbon dioxide. • Landcare Research, and others, estimate there is about one million hectares of erosion prone hill country that needs forest or woody vegetative cover for soil conservation reasons. Not all of this is suitable for commercial forestry. • Forestry is a better export earner than sheep and beef farming, earning on average twice the export earnings per hectare. On much of our poorer farm land forestry is a more profitable land use than pastoral farming for the land owner, even before we consider the carbon. The Ministry for the Environment has just released New Zealand’s Greenhouse Gas Inventory for 1990-2015, and it shows a 24% increase in gross emissions and a 64% increase in net emissions since 1990, though both have levelled off since about 2003-5. You have to be careful reading these figures as they do not incorporate the Kyoto Protocol rules separating forests established pre and post-1990. The big growth area has been transport and we have a Government and populace that seems devoted to ever more roads and ever more vehicles travelling on them. Forestry’s carbon sequestration role has been important for the entire period, typically offsetting about 30% of gross emissions. However it has reduced in recent years as harvesting has increased and there has been significant deforestation with new plantings at their 44

lowest levels since World War II. We have seen some of the Government’s thinking in the recent court case brought by Waikato law student, Sarah Thomson, challenging the Government’s greenhouse gas emission targets. Judging by media coverage I see that the Government has been talking about means of controlling methane emissions with vaccines, chemical inhibitors, animal genetics or specific feed crops plus soil sequestration and other technologies such as electric vehicles.

The Government has been talking about means of controlling methane emissions with vaccines, chemical inhibitors, animal genetics or specific feed crops plus soil sequestration and other technologies such as electric vehicles. Afforestation has not been mentioned. Afforestation has not been mentioned, or not in media coverage anyway. While not decrying any of this agriculturally focused research, none of it is going to be ready for widespread adoption anytime soon. I discussed soil sequestration earlier in the year. It is a worthy objective but very difficult to quantify and track in soils that already have relatively high soil carbon. I assume this technical advice came from the Pastoral Greenhouse Gas Consortium, which seems determined to exclude forestry from all its farm modelling systems for reducing agricultural emissions. This seems to reflect the paucity of forestry knowledge, even awareness, among our agricultural consultants. It’s a pity that the Government lawyer for the afore-mentioned court case wasn’t briefed with the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment’s

report on agricultural emissions, which did consider offsets with forestry. Her figures for a million hectares of strictly commercial radiata pine were an 81% offset for 20 years plus. By extending rotations you could increase this figure, without seriously reducing forest profitability. I am not advocating a million hectares of commercial radiata on all that highly erodible land, but compared to the 5% or so reductions achieved so far by other means, you can see that forestry has the potential to provide serious offsets for some decades and buy the time needed for other technologies. And this is with a land use that is, on average, much more profitable for the country than our default use of sheep and beef farming. Or perhaps if the lawyer had been briefed with this, it might have undermined his case. It needs emphasising that commercial forestry can play this important carbon sequestration role. In fact life cycle assessment studies show that you are actually getting a greater, net reduction in greenhouse gas emissions when you harvest the forests and use the wood in place of more energy-intensive alternatives such as concrete, steel, aluminium, etc.. Or, if you use the wood for fuel. In my own case, I calculate I have the equivalent of 150 years’ of my livestock emissions tied up in my definitely commercial plantations, though most are pre-1990 forests and ineligible for carbon credits. If I stopped harvesting I could increase the carbon storage, but there is a lot stored in my most profitable land use. I have focused on forests’ role sequestering carbon, because that is very topical. But forests, natural and commercial, also improve water quality with much lower levels of nitrogen and sediment than pastoral land. There can be problems with radiata pine in the three to four years after harvest and certainly, not all country is suitable for commercial forestry. But for such a profitable land use it does have a lot of pluses. Country-Wide Crops August 2017

TECHNOLOGY | SMARTPHONES

Choosing your smartphone Alan Royal In the last year, I have given you two articles on smartphones. The way the market is moving it is time to update on some sales and features. Global sales of smartphones to end users totalled 432 million units in the fourth quarter of 2016. This is a 7% increase over the fourth quarter of 2015, according to Gartner, Inc (http://gtnr.it/2tW0hs9). Between them, Android and iOS accounted for 99.6% of all smartphone sales in the fourth quarter of 2016. Of the 432 million smartphones sold in the last quarter, 352 million ran Android (81.7%) and 77 million ran iOS (17.9%). Having got the figures out of the way, let’s have a look at some of the changing features that have pushed Android to the top. I have to admit that I am an Android smartphone fan so you may have to put up with some of my enthusiasm. However, just to show I am not completely one-eyed have a look at this article (http://bit. ly/2tVYpiO) which lists 20 points that support Android purchase, apart from brand and price.

If you, like me, have fingers that refuse to react accurately with a normal keyboard then help is at hand, and it has just got smarter.

I also have to admit that this article is conditioned by the fact I have just upgraded my Android phone to one with 32 GB of internal storage. I have also added an extra 64 GB of extra storage. The phone also has a 5.7-inch screen, a major consideration for viewing (and using) by a person of my advancing age (even taking into consideration the accessibility features built into the Settings).

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Between them, Android and iOS accounted for 99.6% of all smartphone sales in the fourth quarter of 2016.

It also has both a front and back 16 megapixel camera. To put this feature in perspective, this is better than a highquality digital camera I purchased a few years ago. Put the keywords “camera on my smartphone” in Google search to get some great camera use tips. I am increasingly using this phone as my major communication tool. I will now mention a few of the features I use in this phone (apart from making phone calls) that make it so user-friendly. If you, like me, have fingers that refuse to react accurately with a normal keyboard then help is at hand, and it has just got smarter. I use, for different purposes, two keyboards (which can be alternated with ease in the Language and input under Settings). My default keyboard is the SwiftKey Keyboard, which can be downloaded and used for free from the Play Store, the built-in Android apps store. For details on the Internet go to bit. ly/2tVY8MT. The basic feature is that you can just slide your fingers across the keyboard to create words. The app has exceptional predictive texting abilities as well as punctuation features. The keyboard also has an excellent and accurate voice recognition key that converts speech to text (as I have told my family, the best information you can get is by talking to yourself). By the way, I wrote the basics of this article using this keyboard. The other keyboard I use is the free Google handwriting app, available from the Play Store. Read about it at bit.ly/2tW5X5r. Just write on your screen with your finger or stylus. Tip – turn your screen sideways to get an even better and larger keyboard choice. Speechnotes, for free, is another excellent speech to text app with good (speech-generated) punctuation tools. You can try it out at https:// speechnotes.co. It is so accurate I have purchased the paid version for just a few dollars. As a bonus, be sure to visit this bit. ly/2tmLw4r page. For a copy of this article, with active links, email Alan Royal at a.royal@paradise.net.nz.

TECHNOLOGY | FILE SHARING

Keeping them in the picture Want to share lots of photos with your mother, of your child competing in the cross country? Or send your brother a video from your holiday? For many people, the answer is social media. But that doesn’t work for everyone and there are issues around the likes of Facebook compressing photos (so if your Mum wants to download the photo to actually get it printed, the quality may be too poor). Of course, you can try emailing videos and photos, but even though people increasingly have faster internet connections, the speed is still lacking in some parts of New Zealand. Plus, even if you do have a fast connection, it could be that your email provider (or your family member’s provider) places limits on the size of emails sent and received. Sending photos one by one is not ideal if you have a lot of photos to share and videos will often be too big to send.

Take that video of you climbing Kilimanjaro on your holiday that you desperately want your big brother to see. You upload the video to the cloud and your brother can download it. Luckily, if you don’t want to resort to posting a USB stick of photos via snail mail, there are solutions and they involve using what is known as the cloud. “The cloud” is a network of servers (computers) housing your data so you can access it regardless of the device you are using or where you are using it. While the cloud can be used for a wide range of things, I’m focusing here just on photo and video sharing. So, take that video of you climbing Kilimanjaro on your holiday that you desperately want your big brother to see. You upload the video to the cloud and your brother can download it. Dropbox is one of the more popular cloud options for file sharing. Just create an account on the Dropbox website and upload your video. Once it’s up there, you can click the “Share” button and put in someone’s email address. Or, you can click on the “Create Link” option and then use the “Copy Link” option to copy and paste the link into an email; anyone who has that link will be able to see your upload. 46

If your sister hasn’t shared the photos of your last family get-together and you want to see them, then you can request them from her using Dropbox; she doesn’t even have to have a Dropbox account. Her photos will just get uploaded to your Dropbox account when she responds. Dropbox has many more features than just uploading and sharing so it is worth exploring. For example, it has a smartphone app that lets you quickly scan receipts or other notes to Dropbox for accessing later (or sharing). Another popular platform for sharing is Google Photos. You need to have an account, but again it is free to use and you get 16GB of space for original full-resolution photos (or free unlimited storage for high-quality photos in a reduced file size). You drag your photos or video on to the Google Photos web page and click the “Share” icon where you can type in an address or, as with Dropbox, copy a link to then send to someone. There is also a smartphone app to use if you prefer. The third one I use is OneDrive, which is run by Microsoft. It does only offer 5GB of storage for free, but if you are an Office 365 customer you get more. These are just a few of the options so look around and find out what family and friends use.

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WORK HARD, PLAY HARDER

The growing hindrance for huntaways

Woodhead for the win

A wedding, taking out the title of Young Farmer of the Year 2017 - itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s been quite a year for Nigel Woodhead so far. p48 Country-Wide Crops August 2017

ONFARM Joanna Cuttance Leanne and Nigel Woodhead with Fern.

Return to Remote 48

s a teenager South Otago farmer Nigel Woodhead had a plan for happy days. It was simple – graduate university, get a good job, find a great wife and return home to farm. In July he won the FMG Young Farmer of the year. “It’s basically worked out that way,” the 29-year-old laughs. The Lincoln University bachelor of agricultural science graduate, returned to Lovells Flat, two years ago to start his farming career. Along with wife Leanne, they lease his parents’ 400-hectare rolling sheep and beef breeding property. Named Remote, the property is tucked away at the end of a windy, single-lane, no exit, gravel road aptly named Remote Rd, which finishes at the Woodheads’ sheds. Passionate about farming from a young age, Nigel spent every moment he could on the farm. “I always wanted to come home to farm, and raise a family. I also wanted to spend a decent amount of time off farm and away from the area before coming home,” he said. His mum, Bronwyn and dad, Otago Regional Council chairman Stephen Woodhead, farmed Remote for 24 years. They encouraged Nigel’s ambition but never suggested he return to work alongside, or as an employee for them. The plan was always to take over. University, the job and the farm, Nigel had some control over, but happiness was only ensured when girlfriend of six years, Zimbabwe-born Leanne Oosthuizen married him this year on March 31 in an outdoor ceremony at Pounawea in the Catlins.

“It was an awesome couple of days with all of our family and friends. The day was amazing. Leanne designed and styled the whole thing,” Nigel said. Leanne, who Nigel met after the Methven rodeo, grew up on a large crop farm, based an hour west of Harare, in Zimbabwe. The family’s main crop was tobacco, but they also grew paprika, maize and ran cattle. The family were chased off their farm when President Robert Mugabe evicted thousands of commercial farmers. They moved to New Zealand in November 2002.

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Nigel and Leanne Woodhead are determined to make Remote a success.

The Milton Farm Discussion group give their opinions to Nigel about how best to utilise this Rape crop.

The red marks on these mixed-age Growbulk ewes mean they were mated in the first eight days of mating.

Nigel describes his team of dogs as average to good saying they aren’t title winners but they get the job done.

Leanne, a graphic designer, now works as Otago Southland territory manager for New Zealand Young Farmers and helps out on the farm whenever she can. Nigel runs the property single-handedly, but readily accepts help from his parents, saying they would really struggle otherwise. He admits he thought Dad would have been more involved, but affectionately says his dad might be worth about a quarter of a work unit. “Mum actually helps out more.” Leanne and Nigel bought all the stock and plant in the winter of 2015, when they began their lease. Money for this came from selling their home in Ashburton. Nigel had bought the house when he was 24 and he and Leanne

Key facts

set about renovating it, doing a lot of the work themselves. “We sold it before we came down here and made a good profit,” he said. Nigel’s first season was a steeper-thanexpected learning curve. The farm was affected by drought but good lamb prices got him through. Rather than let this knock his confidence he decided to learn from it and work to improve his farm management skills. “After last season’s drought I cut sheep numbers to ensure skinny sheep and poor performance didn’t flow on into this season.” This resulted in being understocked this season. They tailed 3450 lambs instead of the 3700 lambs budgeted for. Most years his dad tailed 3900.

Nigel does not dwell on lamb prices. He believes in his dad’s philosophy that you have to have a lamb in the first place. Get the lambs on the ground and grow them well. To raise lamb numbers, Nigel has put the 42kg-plus hoggets to the ram. Mating these hoggets only happens in the years when the season allows. If he does not feel they have done well enough over the summer, he leaves them to the following year. Nigel is feeling good heading into the winter. The 5ha of beet, which he will feed to the Friesian calves in August and September, looks awesome, he said. He also has 8ha of swedes. “It is a great position to be in considering

The last of the bulls before being sold store or heading to the works.

Business name: Remote Farming Ltd Description: Rolling sheep and beef breeding & finishing Property size: 400ha Effective area: 320ha Wintering: 2500-2600su Growbulk x Wairere Romney ewes Hoggets: 750 LOVELLS FLAT Friesian bulls: 60-90 Lambs killed: average 17.5kg Average weaning weight this season 28kg

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Nigel’s parents Stephen and Bronwyn planted a lot of shelter trees during their 24 years of farming Remote.

this time last year we had little. No spare grass and poor crops along with skinny ewes.” Nigel favours many of his dad’s farming practices. He continues to buy 60 fourday-old bull calves from local dairy farms. Although this year he bought an extra 30 to make the most of beef prices and make up for lower sheep numbers. His mum and Leanne, with Nigel’s help, rear the calves using the Poukawa technique. This is mixing milk powder at a ratio of 500g powder in two litres of warm water. The calves are weaned at 63kg on to ad-lib high protein pellets and grass. At about 100kg they go on to grass only. This takes about eight to 10 weeks. The bulls are killed or sold store before heading into their second winter.

With this many grass grubs in a spade full, there is a problem.

In a move away from his dad’s choice of using Growbulk rams over the Romneybase ewes Nigel is transitioning to Wairere Romney. Prior to scanning in June the ewes do a lap around the square-shaped farm to tidy up the grass paddocks. Most then go on to swedes or beet immediately after scanning, having been divided into mobs of singles and lates, twins and two-tooths, for controlled feeding. Light-condition ewes are drafted off and fed separately to lift their condition score. Nigel does not have a farm consultant but seeks advice from members of the Milton Farm Discussion group. In April the group

gathered at his place, touring the farm and asking Nigel to justify some of his decision making. Nigel then sought advice about a grass grub problem on one of the ridges which, once the group started digging, was discovered to be a lot worse than first thought. The following day, Toko Spraying contractor Rod Murdoch was out spraying with a glyphosate, the paddock then directdrilled into subterranean clover under advice from Luisetti Seeds. Nigel’s aim is to achieve production equal to and eventually better than his parents. This would enable him to buy the farm. Nigel has two younger brothers, both of whom are in engineering fields, and neither wish to farm. Nigel knows this is a help and plans to give them a settlement as soon as financially possible. “We are lucky to be able to lease a good farm, which has the ability to provide a good financial return, so we need to make sure we make the most of it.” The BAgSci has been useful but he says by far the best thing about university was the friends he made. He finds their advice invaluable, describing them as like-minded and forward thinkers. After finishing exams he headed to Western Australia for the harvest in November and December 2009 before returning to work at Ashburton based Midlands Seed Ltd, where after promotions finished as a field consultant servicing the mid-Canterbury area. With a thirst for learning and a competitive streak Nigel was this year’s Otago-Southland representative at the FMG Young Farmer of the Year – which he won. Despite the time and financial pressure of being part of the competition, because he has to employ someone when he is away attending workshops around the country, he believes it has been invaluable to his personal development.

You don’t have to be off the farm to become a member of Young Farmers, TeenAg or Agrikids clubs, Leanne Woodhead says.

Bridging the divide Young Farmers Otago Southland territory manager Leanne Woodhead believes the rural and urban divide can be bridged through Young Farmers, TeenAg and Agrikids clubs. “You don’t have to be off the farm to become a member. Our members are young professionals in their field, they are the next generation of young leaders and if we can provide a platform for them to increase their leadership, skills and knowledge, I feel this will in turn benefit the rural sector,” she said. Leanne is in her third year in the role and oversees 14 Young Farmers clubs in the region and works with the TeenAg clubs. TeenAg clubs are secondary school Young Farmers clubs and Agrikids are primary school clubs. “In the TeenAg clubs we promote the primary industries in a positive light focusing on leadership and career pathways,” Leanne says. Since beginning her role membership has slowly been increasing in each division. She says there will always be space for these groups in the sector because they promote growth and leadership, which will always be relevant. Tokomairiro Young Farmers Club and the Tokomairiro High School TeenAg club were this year’s flagship clubs for Otago Southland at the FMG Young Farmer of the Year, with Leanne’s husband Nigel representing the region in the grand final, which he won, and James Scanlan and Levin Coulter representatives in the TeenAg section.

Two-tooth ewes mid mating. Fodder beet in the background. 50

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Simon Davies on the family farm, Coombe Hay, near the mouth of the Tokomairiro River, south Otago. Photo: John Cosgrove

FARM OWNERSHIP Words by Joanna Davies

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HUNTAWAYS Words by Anne Hughes

Breeding a hip problem An unseen problem could become a growing hindrance for the huntaway breed. Taihape vet Paul Hughes wants more farmers to consider the risk of hip dysplasia when breeding working dogs, particularly huntaways. Hughes has been working with farm dogs for almost 40 years. In 2001 he completed a study on hip dysplasia in working dogs. As a result, he recommended farmers x-ray huntaways’ hips before breeding from them. Few farmers have taken the advice on board. Hughes says hip dysplasia is often unseen and, as a result, not a big priority for farmers. “It takes very severe hip disease to cause lameness in a working dog – they’re muscular, fit and they want to work. “That’s a big problem because when we get to the stage they’re showing the clinical signs, a lot of them will have the disease.” Hip dysplasia is a premature arthritis in the hip joint and dogs do not have to be old to be affected. Hughes’ study found the problem to be more prevalent in huntaways than heading dogs. Twelve per cent of huntaways surveyed had quite bad hip dysplasia. Three per cent were severely affected and their owners were unaware. “Even though the dogs had terrible looking hips on x-ray they didn’t show a lot of lameness – because of that there hasn’t been the enthusiasm for doing anything about it.” Although fairly low, hip dysplasia does have heritability. Hughes says x-raying before breeding and only breeding from dogs with good hip scores is one way to help prevent the problem growing. 52

An x-ray showing good hip conformation, with hips well seated in their sockets.

An x-ray showing hip dysplasia, the dog has flattened femoral heads with bone spurs on the edges of the head and very flattened sockets.

‘THE FACT THAT WORKING DOGS ARE NOT NORMALLY BRED UNTIL THEY ARE OF AN AGE WHEN DISEASE CAN BE EASILY DETECTED WITH A SIMPLE X-RAY IS A SIGNIFICANT ADVANTAGE.’ “The fact that working dogs are not normally bred until they are of an age when disease can be easily detected with a simple x-ray is a significant advantage.” The disease is slowly becoming more prevalent, but not to the extent he originally feared. Hughes says farmers are generally feeding working dogs better and feeding young dogs food specifically designed for puppies. This may be helping slow the occurrence of hip dysplasia. “It has slowly increased, but it hasn’t

been as dramatic as I was thinking at the time.” Hughes says the hip x-ray is quick, simple and relatively cheap, but farmers have many other factors to consider when breeding dogs. He’d like to encourage owners to get the x-rays done, preferably in both the bitch and dog. “We’ll correct diets and have a dog that’s working for the time being, but longer term I’m still concerned that we might be breeding ourselves into a problem.” Country-Wide Crops August 2017

2017

Crops

GROWING GREEN DOLLARS The great GM debate Views from both sides Breaking down the cost of summer crops What it costs and what works best Lessons in the hills A farmerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s re-grassing challenges on hill country Good oil on a new crop How a farmer is making waves with top chefs The N,P,K of fertilister How fertiliser works on pastures

INDUSTRY | GENETIC MODIFICATION

Two billion hectares and no problems… Murray Lane

n 1996 global biotech crop area was less than two million hectares. After 10 years more than 100m ha/ year was grown and last year there was 185m ha. That’s an incredible adoption rate, the fastest of any new agricultural technology, bringing real benefits to farming. If it didn’t, why has it seen such rapid adoption? To put 185m ha in context, that’s 14 times the grassland area of New Zealand, or the combined total area of Alaska, Texas, California and Florida. Cumulatively more than two billion hectares in 20 years. That area is despite massive misinformation campaigns and vigorous unjustified over-regulation. And this technology is in its infancy. Europe stands out as the only significant area rejecting the technology. It’s justification? The “precautionary principle”, whatever that is. I think it is a mechanism to prevent technological change, used by the same people who stand against pesticides, fertilisers, hydraulic fracturing, no-tillage etc. They argue Roundup is too toxic, but concentrated dishwashing detergent is three times as toxic. The European Union threatened some small nations that it would cease trading with them if they adopted biotech crops. The president of Zambia, his country suffering a serious famine, rejected American maize grain, as eaten by Americans, because he had been convinced by “you-know-who” that it would poison his people. Such bullying, pressure-group scare stories of “Frankenfood”, and other unjustified propaganda are the primary reasons NZ’s not adopted biotech crops. How could biotech benefit NZ farming you ask? If I could make it happen, I would modify our largest crop, ryegrass, so it was resistant to our most-costly pasture pests: African black beetle, Argentine stem weevil, Tasmanian grass grub, NZ grass grub, porina. I’d make ryegrass more fertiliser-efficient and white clover resistant to clover root weevil. More immediately, we could have Roundup-resistant cultivars of that amazing summer lamb feed “chicory” so thistles etc cease to be a problem. There are also off-the-shelf biotech

solutions to some of the weed and pest problems encountered in the 300,000ha of forage brassicas we grow. These solutions are available to growers in the United States and elsewhere, but not in NZ. As animal forages there is no human dietary risk. As for crops for humans, Golden rice is a good example of how nutritional value can be improved with biotechnology. It supplies the trace of vitamin A required daily that’s not present in common white rice. Annually millions of the world’s poor die due to vitamin A deficiency, and hundreds of thousands go blind*, yet Golden rice is resisted by anti-GM activists. We have the technology, but our politicians are bullied into saying no. In the 1990s it became possible to identify specific genes representing particular traits, and to insert genes conferring beneficial traits into genomes. An early example was the BT gene offering resistance to chewing insects in maize and cotton. In the latter, spray applications were cut from 13 times per season to perhaps one or two. Think of that when you put on your cotton shirt. There’s an ever-growing number of such genetic biotechnology benefits being deployed worldwide. In Hawaii, commercial papaya production only exists today because the trees have been modified to resist a virulent fungus that would have wiped out the industry. If you are a diabetic, you are surviving on insulin made by fermenting a bacterium that has been genetically modified with a human gene to make that insulin. You didn’t know that? Suggests that there is lot not known about this amazing technology. Some genetic techniques today are so precise they’re called editing, rather than modification. Cut and paste tweaks to genomes allow beneficial traits to be turned on, or negative ones switched off, optimising gene expression. With this technology there is no way to tell that the plant has been modified, except that it may be drought-tolerant, use less fertiliser, be insect, fungi, virus and/or bacteria-resistant, taste better, look better. It’s likely to be more profitable and use less land, leaving more land for nature reserves and other uses. The fake news about this technology has to stop, and the irrational barriers to it in NZ must be removed. We need

Biotechnology is likely to be more profitable and use less land, leaving more land for nature reserves and other uses, Murray Lane says.

politicians that will stand up and demand that NZ farmers get these latest technological tools. • The above column is the personal opinion of Murray Lane based on 30+ years employed in agricultural development in New Zealand.

Commercial biotech/GM crop areas 50,000 hectares or more 1.United States

72.9 million

2. Brazil*

49.1 million

3. Argentina*

23.8 million

4. Canada

11.6 million

5. India*

10.8 million

6. Paraguay*

3.6 million

7. Pakistan*

2.9 million

8. China*

2.8 million

9. South Africa*

2.7 million

10. Uruguay*

1.3 million

11. Bolivia*

1.2 million

12. Australia

0.9 million

13. Philippines*

0.8 million

14. Myanmar*

0.3 million

15. Spain

0.1 million

16. Sudan*

0.1 million

17. Mexico*

0.1 million

18. Colombia*

0.1 million

Less than 50,000 hectares

Vietnam*

Bangladesh*

Honduras*

Costa Rica*

Chile*

Slovakia

Portugal

Czech Republic

Global Status of Commercialized Biotech/GM Crops: 2016. ISAAA Brief No 52

* Developing countries * UNICEF estimates one to two million preventable deaths occur annually as a result of vitamin A deficiency. It compromises the immune system, putting babies and children at increased disease risk, and causes 250,000 500,000 children to go blind annually.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

INDUSTRY | GENETIC MODIFICATION

No place to hide for GMOs Bruno Chambers If there’s one thing that farmers must do, it’s produce what our markets want. When it comes to genetic modification (GM), the number one issue is the markets and they are very clear. Consumers don’t want GM in their food and GM-Free is now effectively the market standard for premium foods. That’s true of Europe and Asian countries, and more recently, the United States, where the huge market demand for GM labelling is part of a growing global trend that will ultimately leave no place to hide for GMOs. The business case for keeping food production GM Free is so strong that a large group of farmers and food producers have joined together to protect the GMFree status of Hawke’s Bay’s productive land. The call might be more difficult if there were GMOs available that would add value to the way we farm. But that’s not the case. For 20 years, GM has offered nothing to New Zealand farmers that would outweigh the market backlash were we to introduce GMOs.

The real commercial sensitivity is the risks arising from GM grasses to NZ pastoral exports and brand reputation. That is why the GM grasses are being trialled in the US for now: leading pastoral industries are concerned about market backlash. Today, GM agriculture is still effectively four commodity crops – soy, maize, canola and cotton. Around 97% of all GM foods are grown in the Americas – most of that production going to foods that don’t have to be labelled as GM and to animal feed. Until now the latter has been a safe

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

no plan to protect farmers who want their pastures to remain GM free to meet buyer requirements, but whose production would likely be contaminated if GM grasses were released. Especially when GM products are a pariah and high-value markets are turning away from GM animal feed, and fast. Last year, Danone – the world’s largest yoghurt brand – pledged that its three flagship products will be GM-free. The market giant is just one in a succession of multinational conversions to GM-Free dairy products recently. Smart New Zealand dairy and meat companies see this opportunity and are moving to export certified GM-free products. This year, NZ Milk Products and Atkins gained certification for the US market from the Non-GMO Project which now certifies around US $19b in products per annum. “Being clean and green is just expected by consumers and you have to go to the next level of expectation. We have gone to the next level which is non-GMO,” Atkins Ranch said. Other companies aiming to capture the best value for farmers by marketing their products as non-GM include Harmony NZ, First Light Foods, NZ Natural Lamb Company, NZ Jerky, Ovation, Wakanui Beef, Duncan New Zealand Venison and PAMU. GM advocates do farmers no favours by playing down the market issues or by implying farmers have to make a decision to adopt GMOs soon, or miss out. There is no GM crop out there – or close – that demands we choose now. Science and innovation are imperative to farmers but our businesses depend on us choosing wisely. Farmers should rightly be focused on extracting as much value as we can from the fact that our fields are GM-Free. If and when GM research delivers and the business case stacks up, we can take another look. For now, the money is with GM free.

Bruno Chambers: no to GMO.

harbour for GM crops but even this outlet is looking increasingly uncertain with the booming demand for non-GM animal feed products. Local research – like AgResearch’s experimental GM grasses – has nothing to offer us farmers in the near term either. A commercial product from the research is at least six-eight years off, all going well, but there are still a lot of questions to answer. AgResearch has said the grasses would increase GDP by $2-5 billion but has refused to make available the modelling and assumptions behind those estimates to Hawke’s Bay farmers. This is surprising and, frankly, unacceptable. Economic projections depend on the assumptions and it is only reasonable that farmers want to scrutinise the promised gains – given that we are helping finance the project. The real commercial sensitivity is the risks arising from GM grasses to NZ pastoral exports and brand reputation. That is why the GM grasses are being trialled in the US for now: leading pastoral industries are concerned about market backlash, even from field trials. So it is of real concern that AgResearch’s official business plan for the GM grasses – at least the half they made available to Hawke’s Bay farmers – shows no recognition of the significant market issues around GMOs. That and there is

• Bruno Chambers is a fifth-generation Hawke’s Bay sheep and cattle farmer and chair of producer group, Pure Hawke’s Bay (purehawkesbay.org)

INDUSTRY | CROP HUSBANDRY

Resilient cropping strategies call Growers need to think about how they use cultural controls to make cropping more robust, FAR conference guest speaker Susannah Bolton said summing up a recurring theme throughout the two-day event at Lincoln earlier this winter. In some cases, the thrust was nurturing beneficial bugs and retaining nutrients, while in others it was about not putting the farm at risk through poor biosecurity or chemical and cultivar selection. Bolton, who heads the “knowledge exchange” teams for the United Kingdom’s various levy-bodies, said having worked with the HGCA Recommended Lists for wheat and barley for eight years she’s very aware growers “tend to go for the top-yielding varieties”. “They don’t really pay a lot of attention to the other data on how robust a variety might be in the face of disease pressure or extreme weather events.” And in 2012, that cost many in the UK dearly, as high rainfall and low sunshine drove disease, reduced grainfill and delayed harvest, she said.

‘What might have been acceptable in a normal season fell apart in 2012.’ “As breeders and growers had pushed for more yield the trend was for varieties that were increasingly late ripening which made them more exposed to the risks of an extreme weather event such as we had in 2012. What might have been acceptable in a normal season fell apart in 2012.” In an attempt to change that, HGCA

UK AHDB knowledge extension leader Susannah Bolton’s thoughts were echoed by local speakers at FAR’s conference.

now produces a graphic plotting varieties on a risk chart taking into account all factors from disease resistance to lodging score and maturity dates. Bolton also touched on ramularia which had become a regular headache for UK barley growers. “It really became prevalent in 2003, associated with resistance to the strobs.” To help growers target the disease better a forecasting system based on leaf wetness at stem extension was being developed. But an underlying problem for UK growers was a tight rotation, and consequent build-up of weeds and particularly soil-borne diseases. Threecourse, wheat, wheat, oilseed rape regimes were common. “It’s an incredible problem. That’s a very narrow rotation.” Research into novel crops, and even mixed cultivar stands, was under way in an attempt to broaden rotations and improve resilience through more diverse genotypes. FAR research director Nick Poole

reflected that New Zealand was fortunate to have, in general, much more diverse rotations. However, he echoed the message to select crops and cultivars strategically to reduce risk of crop failure and resistance issues. “There’s an arsenal of pesticides that’s starting to be compromised,” he said. FAR and Plant & Food Research were monitoring the main crop diseases for resistance or reduced sensitivity to fungicides but such was the breadth of crop and chemistry combinations that they had to pick their battles. For example, there were crop pathogens in vegetable seed crops that “there are real suspicions about” but FAR couldn’t afford to put all its resources into resistance monitoring, he said. For growers, be aware of resistance risks and status, monitor performance of agrichemicals, and use mixed modes of action, integrated with cultural controls, he said. With weeds, resistance was largely in an individual grower’s control, but fungicide resistance management was more of a “social disease” where growers collectively needed to be responsible. A conference delegate suggested farm advisors also have a role in pointing out practice that goes against the common good of the industry, while FAR’s Mike Parker said grower groups in Pukekohe were proving successful in tackling some of the resistance issues faced by vegetable growers there. “So it can be done.” • More from the FAR conference on pages 65 No-till Argie-style; 67 Precision pH problem; 79 Biopesticides and slugs. Country-Wide September: ramularia’s rampage.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

INDUSTRY | MANAGEMENT

‘They do go into a lot more detail than we do.” FAR’s Rob Craigie says.

NZ parallels to UK nutrient update Andrew Swallow A new edition of RB209, the United Kingdom’s comprehensive nutrient management reference book, has been released containing a mass of guidelines for myriad crops and pastures. The update is the first since 2010 for a publication that has been running since 1973 and has long been the starting point for fertiliser rates on UK farms, not to mention, in more recent times, a compliance reference volume. FAR’s Rob Craigie says there are interesting parallels in the advice offered in RB209 and New Zealand recommendations. “For a 12 tonnes/hectare crop of wheat on a silt loam, following their methods you need 320kg/ha of nitrogen, including

soil supply and with our method you need 300kg/ha.” Originally produced by the UK Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, then MAFF’s successor DEFRA (Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs), the latest edition of RB209 is the first under the management of AHDB, the UK’s umbrella agricultural industry levy organisation. It says every field’s fertiliser requirements must be calculated individually taking into account soil type, previous crop, average rainfall, and soil nitrogen supply (SNS) index. While the guide warns against confusing SNS with soil mineral nitrogen tests, testing is appropriate where SNS indices are high and historically variable. “They do go into a lot more detail than we do,” Craigie says.

Nitrogen rates for an average crop are presented in a grid in RB209 based on soil type and SNS. For example, for winter wheat expected to yield 8t/ha on medium soil and SNS index of one, 220kgN/ha is recommended. If previous experience indicates above-average yields can be expected, for wheat increase nitrogen by 10 kgN/ha for each 0.5 t/ha additional yield, up to a maximum yield of 13 t/ ha, it says. Conversely, for low-yielding crops, reduce rates. Growers in the UK’s designated Nitrate Vulnerable Zones (NVZs), which now include most of the country, must have written evidence of yields from at least two previous crops to use more than RB209’s average nitrogen rate recommendations. RB209 also covers potash, phosphate and sulphur requirements, as well as key micronutrients. It has detailed advice on fertiliser timing, product selection, taking tissue samples, and many other aspects of good management practice. The seven sections (see panel) can be downloaded individually from www. ahdb.org.uk/RB209 or it’s available as an app for iOS or android: search for RB209: Nutrient Management on the App Store or Google Play.

RB209’s seven sections • Principles of nutrient management and fertiliser use. • Organic materials. • Grass and forage crops. • Arable crops. • Potatoes. • Vegetables and bulbs. • Fruit, vines and hops.

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Country-Wide Crops August 2017

INDUSTRY | CEREAL OUTLOOK

Key points

Grain prices set to firm Anne Hughes Arable farmers are looking forward to more sustainable grain prices in the coming year. While grain growers shouldn’t hold their breath for a huge surge in returns, Federated Farmers arable industry group chairperson Guy Wigley says prices are continuing to firm. Barley and wheat prices are already about 20% up from the same time last year and Wigley says it appears there will be little carry over from this year’s stores into 2018. Damage to the rail and SH1 routes between Christchurch and Picton from the Kaikoura earthquake means less grain is being bought from the South Island into the North Island. Demand is high enough that the South Island is likely to consume all of its available grain anyway, but there have been some shipments of grain to the North Island. Wigley says the shipping has added about an extra $30/tonne to the cost of freighting grain to buyers in the lower North Island. The improved dairy payout has boosted demand for grain nationwide. As a

result, Wigley says there is very little uncontracted grain left in the North Island, which is likely to run out of grain in spring. While production from the South Island harvest was good, wet weather in autumn made harvesting difficult to complete and subsequent sowings were delayed. As a result, the area planted in wheat in South Canterbury is down. Wigley says Mid-Canterbury farmers eventually got all their wheat planted, but it was a month late, impacting on yield potential. “This last season had a low area of barley harvested because the price was so low, so this coming spring we are anticipating an increase in the plantings of barley compared to last year, to help meet some of the demand that’s out there.” Wigley is hopeful global over-supply of grain will be corrected soon. In response to historically low prices, driven by over supply, United States farmers have planted their lowest area in wheat in 100 years, he says. Australian growers are also experiencing a dry spell on the back of record high production last year.

Arable Industry Marketing Initiative April cereal report Key points as at April 1 2017: • Total average yields up 8% on last year • Lower stocks of unsold feed wheat and barley than last year • Similar stocks of milling wheat and oats • More unsold stocks of feed oats • Estimated total tonnage of milling wheat up 16% from last year • Estimated total tonnage of feed wheat up 18% • Feed barley expected to be down 12% • Total estimated tonnage for milling oats and malting barley up • Planned autumn/winter sowings of wheat or barley up 22% on last year • Sowing intentions for autumn/winter feed barley up almost 50% • Area sown in feed wheat to increase by 7700ha (23%) • Area sown in milling wheat down by 1400ha (11%) • Autumn/winter malting barley sowings lifting by 37% • Milling and feed oat areas expected to decrease. Rabobank senior grains and oilseeds analyst Cheryl Gordon agrees that as global over supply eases, prices will rally to some extent. Dry conditions in parts of the US and Canada are reducing the availability of high-protein wheat, she says. Supply chain issues indicate Argentine wheat production will be down and an average crop in Europe will also contribute to a reduction in global supply.

Fert prices picked to stay low Anne Hughes Fertiliser prices have hit rock bottom and most are likely to stay there for some time. Ravensdown general manager supply chain Mike Whitty says many variables impact fertiliser prices that are hard to predict, such as currency. Over-supply however, has been a consistent contributor to weak markets. With even more production capacity being invested in overseas, markets for some key nutrients could remain weak, which is good news for farmers. This is particularly true for urea, he says, with over-supply largely from new investments into production capacity in the United States. “Once it gets to a certain point a number of countries will be uneconomic and start pulling out.” That has already been demonstrated by

Indonesia and China, which pulled out of nitrogen production when prices were at US$190/tonne FOB. Prices then rose to US$270/t, enticing the two countries back into production and pushing prices back down. “FOB price for urea at the moment is really at the bottom,” Whitty says. According to the United Kingdom Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) June 2017 fertiliser market outlook, a new nitrogen plant in Iowa, US, will produce 1.5-2 million tonnes a year of urea, ammonium nitrate and ammonia. Political and environmental issues also come into play. Fertiliser use is heavily subsidised in India. Whitty says if subsidies are reduced substantially, that could reduce demand and flood the world market. Over-supply and environmental issues could also see China reduce fertiliser production.

“If prices stay below US$200/t we would find a lot of plants in China close permanently. “China is looking very closely at industry and environmental footprints so poorer-performing plants in many industries will close.” Potash prices are recovering from a substantial drop late last year. Whitty says this market should firm during the coming year, but not to alarming levels. AHDB says a new Canadian project is expected to reach a two million tonne production capacity, but 2017 production is likely to be closer to 600-700,000t. A new potash mine in Turkmenistan was completed at the end of March and has a capacity to produce 1.4mt/year. Phosphate is a weak market, with production capacity continuing to grow. Saudi Arabia and Morocco are increasing DAP production substantially.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

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ANALYSIS | PASTURE

ME – what is it and why is it important? Bruce McCorkindale Imagine you have a teenage son who is training for a sports event in six months’ time and needs to increase his strength and stamina. This thinly disguised eating machine is now offered two meal choices. The first choice is a protein shake accompanied by green beans and brown rice. The second is a small, superbly cooked, fillet steak that smells fantastic – the only issue with this is that the steak has been sealed within a very close-fitting cardboard container and the steak is firmly stuck to that cardboard. The next twist is that the teenage eating machine is not allowed to use their hands. Apart from the eating being rather messy there are a couple of important outcomes. The protein shake meal is all readily eaten and will easily provide the energy and nutrient needs of your son. The delicious steak will probably tempt him but the only way he will be able to eat it is by eating the cardboard as well. The cardboard won’t hurt him but it won’t offer any nutrient or energy benefits. He will also spend a lot of time trying to avoid eating any more cardboard than absolutely necessary. The difference between a high-ME pasture and a low-ME pasture to a lamb is a bit like this choice. ME is the amount of metabolisable energy (megajoules) in each kilogram of drymatter (DM) – this is the proportion of the total energy in a food source that can be extracted by the animal. Cardboard would provide minuscule amounts of metabolisable energy. In a low-ME pasture there is typically a low clover content and a higher-thanideal proportion of grass stems and dead material – the clover plants and young fresh grass leaves are the “fillet steaks” which the lamb will spend a lot of time trying to get at without eating the other stuff which is “the cardboard”. In contrast a high-ME pasture will mean the lamb could close its eyes and eat everything on offer. Every bit that goes in its mouth will be highly nutritious and it will be quickly digested

to release lots of energy for growth. The science and maths of this is actually all about energy. Let’s use a 35kg lamb as our example. First some key numbers. A 35kg liveweight lamb needs around 9MJ of energy each day to maintain itself on easy country. It takes around 4MJ above maintenance for 100g of lamb growth (this varies with stage of maturity of the lamb – range 3.5-5.5MJ/100g). A lower-quality pasture may have an ME of about 10MJ/kg DM but lambs will normally be allowed to select the best bits out of it, so their diet would be around 10.5ME. This selectivity helps the lamb get better-quality feed to eat but it comes with a cost in that the lamb will end up eating less and using more energy searching for the good stuff. The poorerquality material the animal eats also tends to slow the passage of food through the gut which means the animal doesn’t feel as hungry and consequently doesn’t eat as much. The net result would be that the lamb’s intake may be limited to around 1.2kg DM per day. At 10.5ME the animal is eating 12.6MJ of which 9.0 are needed for maintenance which leaves 3.6MJ for growth. That’s enough for a growth rate of around 90g/day. If we move the quality offering up a bit so that it is easier for the lamb to eat more and there is more clover in the diet then the same lambs will readily eat 1.6kg DM. If the ME of the diet has risen to 11.5 then energy available for growth rises to 8.6MJ which would drive a growth rate of 215g/day. If feed quality is increased further to really high quality around 12.5ME then intake would probably increase a little further to around 1.7 kg DM but energy available for growth increases significantly up to 12.25MJ which would drive lamb growth of more than 300g/ day. Thinking among forage breeders and their nutritionists suggests there is little to be gained from lifting ME above 12.5 as, beyond this, other factors become limiting (eg: fibre or protein content). What does a 12.5MJ pasture look like? Commonly farmers use forage crops such

as rape to provide feed of this quality and in recent times there has been a surge in interest in grazing herbs and highproducing legumes such as red clover and lucerne, all of which can do it. A well-managed young pasture with a high legume content, well-controlled grass stems and sown with a seed rate (low enough) that allows slowerestablishing legumes to get properly established will also do it. Including tetraploid or Italian-type grasses in the mix will also help. Pasture-topping using low rates of herbicides in late spring is another mechanism for achieving high ME pastures at relatively low cost. This practice pretty well eliminates grass stems and encourages a surge in clover production which when combined produce a huge gain in pasture quality. You may not get to an ME of 12.5 but as you can see from the examples above moving feed quality up from 10.5 to 11.5 can make a huge difference. The key point is that, assuming animal health is being well-managed, improving lamb growth rate is determined by the quality of the feed you offer the lambs. The only way to increase carcase weights without keeping lambs longer is to grow them faster. Looking ahead for sheep and beef farmers one of the key challenges will be how to continue to improve productivity – one critical driver will be increasing the amount of ME you grow. You have quite a few choices and the best will depend on farm factors that influence the amount of area available for each option and the longevity of each option. At AbacusBio we have recently developed with co-operation from seed companies a series of new feed profiles for higher-quality feed to use in our Farmax modelling – these have highlighted the major onfarm performance gains that are possible and helped us to fine-tune models to better replicate what is being achieved onfarm as well as investigate and plan alternatives. • Bruce McCorkindale is a farming and agribusiness consultant.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

ANALYSIS | SUMMER CROPS

Cost-effective feed Cheyenne Stein Jack Frost may still have his icy grip on the country and spring is still some months off, but it doesn’t hurt to start thinking about summer crops. Summer crops prove their worth yearin year-out and Agriseeds’ pasture systems manager Graham Kerr, says he expects to see a rise in their use this season. “Last season (15/16) we saw between 20 to 30% increase in the use of summer crops and my guess is that it will be similar again this year. The focus right now, quite rightly, is on costs and summer crops as an effective low-cost way of growing quality feed during the time of year that you really need it.” Most people should be able to grow chicory at about half the cost of feeding palm kernel, based on calculated costings and yields of 14 cents per kilogram (kg) of drymatter (DM). “This is based on growing an extra seven tonnes of feed over what you would get if you left that paddock in pasture. You are also getting increased metabolisable energy (ME) from that summer crop too.” Typical pasture ME over summer was 10.5 MJ ME, chicory 12-13 MJ ME, while palm kernel was about $0.30/kg DM. “A lot of people say it’s less, but when you consider that it’s only 90% DM

The focus is on costs, Agriseeds’ Graham Kerr says.

and take into account other costs like transport, troughs and handling, 30 cents is probably still on the conservative side.”

SUMMER TURNIPS VS CHICORY Summer turnips were making a comeback in certain areas of the country this year, but chicory remained king for many areas. “Summer turnips aren’t quite as hardy as chicory. In the lower North Island they are great and in high altitude areas. When you get into areas of high humidity like in the Waikato and Bay of Plenty then they start to struggle.”

‘There is a definite increase in variability in our climate, and the question in farms systems is how do we build in more resilience to handle that variability. That’s where summer crops are a key tool.’ Unlike chicory which had a large tap root, turnips didn’t root as well. Like many brassicas they were prone to a range of insects and their bulbs often rot in the humidity, he said.

“A lot of farmers have tried turnips but find chicory more reliable. In a wet year you can grow both turnips and chicory and get a good yield. But when you need a summer crop it’s dry and when you get humidity along with that, chicory will out-yield turnips.” Picking a summer crop was about figuring out what grows best in your location. Another factor to keep in mind was sowing time and grazing. Turnips and chicory were sown at the same time, usually by November 1. Turnips needed to be sown early when there was good soil moisture to allow them to establish. Once they were well established with a good plant root system they were quite drought hardy. “Turnips will get you about 30 days grazing from the end of January to the end of February and you need to wait

Table 1: Cost of turnips Item

Cost

Spray out + Glyphosate herbicide

$100

Cultivation

$320

Sow Seed

$90 $75

Weed sprays (including application)

$165

DAP 150KG per ha and Boron at sowing*

$130

Urea 89 kg per ha twice (2x$100)

$200

Pest spray twice (2 x $60)

$120

Total turnip crop cost per ha

$1200

* These are contractors costs for a quality seedbed and full spray and fertiliser programme. In some cases costs may be less (e.g. in some year pest sprays aren’t needed * Boron is needed to avoid hollow heart in turnip

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

Turnips and kale provide feed for 1100 dairy cows in this 690ha block.

KEY POINTS • A good seed bed is important Sowing date is critical to optimal crop yield for both turnips and chicorySummer turnips are suited to low-humidity or high-altitude areasIncorporate pasture renewal into your summer crops plan.

Table 2: Cost of chicory Item

Cost

Sprayout + glyphosphate herbicide

$100

Cultivation

$320

Sow

$90

Seed

$210

Weed sprays (including application) DAP 150kg per ha at sowing Urea 80 kg per ha twice (2x$100) Total chicory crop cost per ha

$80 $100 $200 $1100

* These are contractors’ costs for a quality seedbed and full spray and fertiliser programme. In some cases costs may be less.

fodder beet and are being innovative with different ways to use fodder beet. I honestly struggle to see fodder beet as a summer crop due to price. But that’s one of the wonderful things about the dairy industry; people are always trying new stuff.”

COST SAVINGS Chicory remained king for many areas.

for them to mature 80-90 days before grazing. With chicory it’s a multi-graze crop. It’s first grazing is usually mid to late December then you can graze it every 20-25 days.” It worked out to be the same yield between turnips and chicory, but the flow of yield was much different with chicory. Chicory also required a larger area meaning the costs involved could be higher but depending on location, this might work out more economical. “The more summer mild areas typically the rain is a bit more reliable and often you only have a 30-40 day need for summer crop. When you get into lighter soils you have a longer, potentially drier period which fits chicory well, so in this scenario chicory would work better economically.” The larger area required for chicory could be advantageous for the purposes of pasture renewal, but farmers should be cautious of timing when spraying out, Kerr said. “Many people want to leave chicory in to get another grazing out of it, so don’t sow new pasture until April. Your first grazing of new pasture isn’t until

August or September as the establishment is slower over winter and it never really gets going. So getting permanent pasture in on time is more important that getting another chicory grazing, you are sacrificing your long term to get short term gain.”

FODDER BEET Fodder beet had been talked about as an option for summer crops, but Kerr wasn’t convinced. “Some people are looking at it as a summer crop but the thing is it so late maturing. In the trials you sow it early in spring and by June the following year you’re yielding 20-24 tonnes average. If you come back into summer in February you probably only have half that yield. It’s not economical when you’re paying $2500 per ha, that’s twice the cost of turnips.” People were considering fodder beet because of the potential advantage it gave them in terms of flexibility. When it’s really dry they could feed it, but if they didn’t need it, they could leave it until June/July. “People are finding their way with

The cost breakdown of chicory and summer turnips were based on contractors’ costs and Kerr said they were probably on the expensive side and although there were some ways of cutting costs, it didn’t pay to cut corners with summer crops. “We have accounted for good weed sprays and fertilisers, this is the highquality job. A lot of things farmers may be able to do themselves, if they have the time to do that then they can absorb some of the costs.” Depending on soil fertility, fertiliser costs could be cut down, while self sowing could eliminate contractor costs. “If you want to save 25% on your cropping, I would sow 25% less crop. You have to get the yield to make it economical and you get that through good management.” Summer crops were going to become more critical in farm systems going forward, Kerr said. “There is a definite increase in variability in our climate, and the question in farms systems is how do we build in more resilience to handle that variability. That’s where summer crops are a key tool, they do grow extra drymatter and high-quality drymatter at a time where many farmers are short.”

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

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Country-Wide Crops August 2017

SOILS | MANAGEMENT Turning these beds 90 degrees allowed controlled drainage of water and removed ponding risk.

Shaping land to improve drainage Dan Bloomer LandWISE has been using GPS mapping and modelling to create very accurate contour plans. Some of the software we use can model the effects of rain storms and identify water flow paths, depth and velocity, and areas where water will pond. The flow-path analysis also highlights areas at risk of soil erosion. We can design new land topographies to ensure good drainage and automatically create cut-and-fill maps for GPS-controlled earthmoving. We used the technology in Horowhenua, helping cropping farmers understand flows, drainage, ponding and soil-sediment loss through erosion. We anticipated a lot of land shaping would be needed to address crop loss from ponding, and to ensure well-managed drainage. In most cases, little work was needed. Small changes would allow water to flow out of crop furrows, reducing losses, making access much easier and reducing the risk of soil loss when rain storms caused blow outs. By lowering the downstream headland most paddocks would drain adequately. Of particular interest was the impact row direction can have on drainage and ponding, and on the risk of soil erosion. The modelling showed rows running across the contour increased ponding and increased the severity of erosion. This goes against historic opinion. When rows run down the contour they can drain freely, with each carrying only

The depth of cut or fill is controlled by RTK-GPS mounted on the blade itself.

the water that falls on it. When rows go across the contour, each is a dam. This stops drainage and causes ponding and crop loss. During big rain events the dams overflow, and all the water escapes at a single place with great velocity. As row after row is breached, depth and velocity increase, scouring the soil and creating gullies through the paddock. The topsoil ends up in drains, rivers and lakes – exactly where we don’t want it.

When rows run down the contour they can drain freely, with each carrying only the water that falls on it. When rows go across the contour, each is a dam. This stops drainage and causes ponding and crop loss.

We are also using the technology at our MicroFarm in Hastings where we have grown onions for the last three years. Part of an Onions New Zealand Sustainable Farming Fund project to map onion crop variability, this experience highlighted a probable impact of poor surface drainage especially at establishment time. We know we have areas that under-perform because we have made yield maps that show huge variation (0-100+ tonnes per hectare). How can we calculate the cost of poor drainage? Is the cost of levelling justified? We used the concept of Yield Gap to estimate crop loss, contractor rates to assess surface levelling costs and created a simple cost-benefit budget. Yield Gap is the difference between what we could have produced and what we actually got. Our approach was to subtract the achieved yield in any area from the average yield in the top producing area. We used Arc GIS to create a Yield Gap Map that showed about 8% of the paddock with an average Yield Gap of 44t/ha, 12% lost 28t/ha and 31% 16t/ ha. A further 33% of the paddock lost 8t/ha. In total this suggested a crop loss

Detailed surveying and later cut and fill control are completed using the tractor’s RTK-GPS system.

of about 9.7t, or 7.16t/ha. At a return of $450/t, that equates to $3150/ha. Because we knew inadequate irrigation impacted one area, we adjusted the areas to compensate. The paddock was surveyed with Trimble FMX RTK-GPS and the data exported to OptiSurface® software to create a topographic map, assess drainage patterns, design alternative finished surface options and generate a cut and fill map. The cut and fill map can be exported again and loaded into the FMX system. Then when levelling is done, the FMX system automatically controls scoop or levelling blade height to achieve the design surface. Our chosen design requires 408 cubic metres/ha of soil to be shifted with a maximum cut of 350mm and maximum fill of 172mm. A cut of 350mm requires that top soil be removed to a temporary storage area, the subsoil levelled and top soil returned. Including ripping to remove compaction caused by the levelling machinery, and as we are dealing with a small area, we budgeted a contractor cost of $2000/ha. An onion loss of $3150/ha and a drainage cost of $2000/ha indicates a return on investment in the first year of $1150/ha. We should pay for levelling with our first crop. • Dan Bloomer is a consultant for LandWISE Hastings.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

SOILS | FAR CONFERENCE

Argentine cropping quadruples with no-till Andrew Swallow No-till seeding has helped Argentina’s cropped area quadruple in the past 30 years while New Zealand’s adoption of the practice remains pedestrian, delegates at FAR’s recent conference were told. Edmundo Nolan, large-scale farmer and secretary of Argentina’s no-till farmers association, Aapresid, kicked off the conference’s second day with an enthralling outline of how arable area in South America’s second largest nation has soared from 8 million hectares in the 1980s to more than 30mha today. “It may be 35 million hectares now: that’s the success of no-till,” Nolan said. In 1989, when Aapresid was formed, less than 100,000ha was established by no-till. Now, 90-95% of the cropped area is established without plough or cultivator.

‘God gave us a problem, not a solution, but in the middle you are all right. But now, thanks to notill, we’re able to crop in the east and in the west. Historically, traditional tillage practices meant cropping was confined to central regions, where soil texture and rainfall are both moderate. To the west, rainfall declines to 500mm in the lee of the Andes while to the east, closer to the coast, 1500mm/year is the norm. Unfortunately, due to the prevailing west winds and soil formation processes the low rainfall area generally has sandy soil with low moisture retention, while nearer the coast clays dominate. “God gave us a problem, not a solution, but in the middle you are all right,” Nolan said. “But now, thanks to no-till, we’re able to crop in the east and in the west.” Crop residue retention has cut wind erosion 98% in the sandy west while in the east it prevents erosion due to rain and run-off. “The residues work like a shock absorber so the raindrop loses a lot of

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

its energy when it hits them and runs off into the soil very gently. Without the crop residue the raindrop is like an explosion: it covers the soil pores and you get rapid run-off.” Overall, no-till reduces soil erosion 96% compared to conventional tillage, Nolan said, as he rattled off a compelling list of other advantages over cultivated crop establishment (see box). Those advantages, and farmers’ desire to run sustainable and profitable businesses, had driven adoption, not government policy. “If anything, they’ve been against us,” he said, though export tariffs on beef had played a part, making cropping a more profitable land use on all but the most marginal country. But no-till’s also become the norm in the fertile middle country where a typical rotation over three years is soya, wheat/ soya (two crops in one year), and corn (grain maize). Nolan presented margin data (see table) showing last year’s rotation produced an average margin of US$516/ha (NZ$717/ha) after variable, machinery and overhead costs but excluding land. More strategic planning and training has been required for growers to succeed with no-till, Nolan said, and that’s largely been achieved by word of mouth at meetings and field days organised by Aapresid and other farming organisations, including four unions. More recently social networks have become “very useful”. A growing challenge is herbicide resistance with 28 different weeds of 17 species now confirmed resistant to one or more herbicides. Nolan described annual ryegrass, Lolium multiflorum, as Argentina’s “super weed” as it is now resistant to glyphosate, fop and dim graminicides and ALS-inhibitors. But while such problems are likely to increase, he didn’t think a widespread reversion to tillage would become necessary. Rather, the weeds could be combatted with smarter cultural and agrichemical controls, including rotations of crops and chemistry, and use of cover crops. “They don’t like no-till in North America and they have a huge problem with resistant weeds. I don’t think the problem is no-till.” Cover crops are mainly used to mop up nitrogen between, for example,

Argentinian guest speaker Edmundo Nolan relayed how no-till has made cropping in his home country sustainable.

corn harvest in March and soy sowing the following September or October. “But we don’t have a nitrate leaching problem. The big concern is agrichemical contamination.” The cover crops aren’t necessarily sprayed off: some are simply mulched with a roller-like tool covered in blades that crushes and cuts the crop into the soil, he said later. Having spent a week travelling New Zealand with FAR, Nolan said the cropping machinery he’d seen here was “very different”. “The Great Plains drill, for example. We’ve not used one for 15 years because it’s not able to drill into the huge amount of residue we have.” He said his drill had two rows of 75cm opener discs with 1.5m between them front to back, and 34cm between them in each row to give a 17cm row-spacing. That spacious arrangement meant it could cope with the 12-14 tonnes of residue a maize crop typically left. “You are able on YouTube to watch them.” • Emundo Nolan is responsible for 25,000ha of crop and 7000 dairy cows in the Sante Fe region of Argentina, part of New York Stock Exchange-listed Adecoagro’s 180,000ha of cropping in Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay. See www.adecoagro.com

Argentine no-till argument • • • • • • •

96% less soil erosion. 70% less evaporation. 60% less fossil fuel required. Lower operating costs. Fewer hours in the field. Promotes biodiversity and bioactivity. Higher, more reliable yields.

Getting the good oil: Hawke’s Bay grower Hugh Richie (left) quizzes Argentinian guest speaker Edmundo Nolan at the FAR conference in Lincoln.

NZ no-till evidence accumulates Results from two long-term trials presented at the FAR conference suggest wider adoption of no-tillage could pay, particularly where irrigation isn’t an option. While the costs and returns of the different approaches weren’t discussed, on yield and soil condition results to date direct drilling’s coming out the winner. FAR researcher Bryan Mitchell relayed findings from the levy-body’s crop establishment trial at Chertsey which has been running since 2003, comparing ploughing with non-inversion tillage or direct-drilling. Yield differences from the establishment techniques weren’t significant under irrigation during the most recent three-year cropping phase of the trial: 2013 wheat, 2014 peas, 2015 wheat. However, without irrigation (“dryland”) both direct-drills produced

significantly higher pea yields and there was a trend towards higher yields from no-till in the 2015 wheat. Looking longer-term, no-till plots have produced the highest yields off dryland in eight out of 10 seasons. Meanwhile, regular assessments of soil characteristics under the plots shows the no-till improving the Chertsey silt loam soil’s structure, Olsen P, organic matter content and water-holding capacity, compared to non-inversion tilled or ploughed. For example, the no-till soils in 2015 were found to have the highest waterholding capacity at 33% and 36% by volume respectively, dryland and irrigated, compared to 30.5% and 33% under ploughed dryland and ploughed irrigated respectively. Non-inversion tilled plots had water-holding capacities in between.

Argentine crop gross margins 2016 Crop

Soya (full season)

Wheat

Soya (half season)

Corn

Yield t/ha

4.2

4.0

2.8

Gross return (US$)

830

488

554

1021

Costs exc land

295

336

217

497

Margin US$/ha

535

152

337

524

Source: Presentation by Edmundo Nolan, FAR Conference, 2017.

Not so fast to no-till in NZ Speaking immediately after Nolan at the conference, FAR’s Bryan Mitchell relayed the findings of a survey of New Zealand growers’ tillage practices in 2016, the third in a series which started in 2006. Compared to 2011, ploughing had dropped as a method to establish arable crops after a break crop from just under 20% in the North and just over 20% in the South, to about 10% in both islands. In 2006 ploughing was at 30%. However, the plough has largely been replaced by non-inversion tillage, either one or two-pass, rather than direct drilling which accounted for 17% of crops after breaks in 2011 and 2016 in the South Island, and 43% and 45% of crops in 2011 and 2016 respectively in the North Island.

“Multiplied over time that’s quite a bit extra moisture you have up your sleeve,” Mitchell said, suggesting irrigation frequency could be reduced and/or water made to go further with wider adoption of no-till. Follow-up tests on the plots this year (2017) after two years of ryegrass found a further 3% increase in water holding capacity and improved aggregate stability. “That really highlights how important it is to have that restorative phase in the rotation,” Mitchell said. Plant + Food Research’s Mike Beare presented results from the nowdiscontinued Millenium Tillage Trial at Lincoln, which ran from 2000 to 2011. It too showed no-tillage maintained better soil structure than ploughing or noninversion tillage, this time on a Wakanui silt loam. The soil structural advantage under no-tillage was despite no significant difference in total organic matter trends between tillage treatments, but crucially there was a redistribution in the profile, ploughing spreading the organic matter through the top 25cm while no-tillage maintained most in the top 7.5cm. The site had been pasture and all cropped plots lost 16-17% organic matter compared to pasture over the 11 years, regardless of tillage technique. Within that there were subtle differences though: no-till plots lost less organic matter overall owing to a lower content initially, while organic matter under fallow plummeted 24%. “The most important thing is to keep returning that organic matter input through a crop,” Beare said. Of the cropped plots, those ploughed lost organic matter most rapidly in the first three years of the trial with an associated rapid reduction in structural condition, falling below a score of five out of 10 within four years having been eight at the outset. “When our structural scores drop below that [score of five] yields tend to decline,” he said. However, when wheat, peas or ryegrass were grown there was no significant difference in yield between the tillage techniques. Only in four of the five years barley was grown did the no-tillage plots produce higher yields. Beare also presented results indicating no-tillage establishment of pasture after winter grazed rape or ryegrass could help reduce nitrogen losses. Meanwhile a hot-water extraction test looks to offer an improvement on standard mineral nitrogen tests for predicting release of nitrogen from soil organic matter. “We think this is a really critical area.”

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

SOILS | FAR CONFERENCE Few if any spreaders are Spreadmark-certified for lime.

Lime trial reveals spreading issue Andrew Swallow A Sustainable Farming Fund project initiated by the Foundation for Arable Research (FAR) involving South Canterbury growers Michael Tayler and Colin Hurst is raising serious questions about soil pH management. At FAR’s recent conference, Allister Holmes told how the growers used a Veris sampler to map the pH of their paddocks at Orton and Makikihi respectively, then created lime-spreading prescriptions for a variable rate-equipped spreader. Rather than go variable rate across the whole paddock, they used a flat rate on three 12-metre bouts evenly spaced across the paddock, and a nil rate alongside those, to provide a comparison with the variable rate which was used for every other pass. Spreading bouts were set at a slight angle to the normal tramlines in the paddock, as was the Veris sampling protocol, to minimise the risk of following the line of any previous applications which might have caused linear variations in the paddock. The lime was applied at rates designed to lift the pH to 5.8 using the equivalent of one tonne/ha of lime applied for every 0.1 pH below that. The target average application rate at Orton was 1t/ha, and 3t/ha at Makikihi, but the variable rates ranged 0-5t/ha. Barley was duly sown in autumn 2016 and harvested last summer with yield-map equipped headers, the Orton crop doing 9.4t/ha off the variablerate area and 9.2t/ha off the flat-rate and nil-lime area. At Makikihi, where the starting pH was as low as 5.2 in places, 7.3t/ha was harvested off the variable-rate area, and 7.2t/ha off the flat-rate and nil areas. However, none of the yield differences were statistically significant.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

FAR’s Allister Holmes is following up some concerning results from a lime trial.

Analysing the results, Holmes said they “realised there was a real issue” with the spread pattern and, consequently, amount of lime applied at Makikihi, and to a lesser extent at Orton. It simply didn’t match the prescription (see table). A generic Spreadmark test result chart to show the spread pattern of lime, which Holmes presented at the conference, showed a probable cause of part of the problem. Even on intended flat-rate runs application rate would have ranged from half to twice the target rate due to the 12m bout width. On variable-rate blocks, where up to 5t/ha of lime had been targeted at the lowest pH areas, the variation was even worse, probably due to a combination of groundspeed,

spreader design, and the ballistics of the lime. “Most trucks are Spreadmark-certified for products such as DAP and urea but very few, if any, are certified for lime because it varies so widely in its consistency,” Holmes said. At the highest attempted rates, the aperture at the back of the truck was simply too small for the hydraulic chain drive delivery to pull enough lime out on to the spinners for the speed the truck was driving, it seems. Meanwhile, even where enough lime came out of the truck hopper, variable ballistics probably meant twice the target rate was applied down the centre of the bout, tapering off to zero at about 8m. While the project has another two years to run, and Hurst and Tayler will be mapping yield across the project paddocks again this coming summer, they say the findings so far are valuable. “As an industry we need to understand the quality and spread characteristics of lime a lot better and the swath width we use to apply it needs to reflect these things,” Hurst said. “It may be as simple as using a 6m or 8m bout width instead of 10 or 12m.” Another possibility is more-precise

Lime trial target rates versus actual Site detail:

% of paddock at Makikihi (pH5.2 before, ave lime applied 3.1t/ha, yield 7.2-7.3t/ha).

% of paddock at Orton (pH 5.7 before, ave lime applied 0.7t/ha, yield 9.2-9.4t/ha).

0.1-0.5

22%

26%

0.5-1.0

50%

41%

1.0-1.5

23%

15%

14%

0.566

0.748

Variance from target t/ha <0.1

>1.5 Correlation (R²)

Source: Presentation by Allister Holmes to FAR Conference, 2017.

grading of lime, or using granulated product, to avoid the problem of fines not spreading as far as coarser particles, resulting in a rapid lift in pH down the centre of a spreader bout, but much slower response further out. “Or maybe we just need to look at boom spreaders for lime?” Hurst notes granulated products are a lot more expensive but on higher value crops they might be justified to ensure even spread. “The problem is that at the extremes of pH some of the micronutrients get locked up so no matter how much other fertiliser you put on, it might not be used because the crop’s yield is limited by something like zinc.” That’s echoed by FAR’s Rob Craigie who says he’s seen problems from both low pH and too high. “You can get striping where lime’s not been spread evenly and we see zinc and manganese deficiencies due to the nutrients being locked up at high pH. In a trace element trial at Barrhill there was a 0.95 t/ha response to manganese in an autumn-sown feed wheat.”

‘Most trucks are Spreadmark-certified for products such as DAP and urea but very few, if any, are certified for lime because it varies so widely in its consistency.’

As a Federated Farmers’ representative on the Fertiliser Quality Council, Hurst said he would be discussing the issues with other stakeholders in the lime and spreading sector. “It’s not just the equipment we’re using to put it on, but the product itself.” New Zealand Groundspread Fertiliser Association president Brent Scully said the project’s findings were significant but not surprising. “Until a clear objective measurement of the particle size and strength of the product to be spread is given, accuracy of placement cannot be assured.” Agricultural lime was generally not given a Spreadmark test because it was notoriously difficult to spread from a twin-disc fertiliser spreader, he said. Holmes said in light of the project’s findings, FAR was working with Ravensdown on developing a

Ravensdown response In light of Holmes’ presentation to the FAR conference, Ravensdown says it is committed to working with its shareholders to ensure precise application is achieved. In the past year it has completed 92 variable-rate applications for lime and the FAR trial was the first job since it had started variable rate application five years ago where some possible discrepancies may have arisen. It says it is working with FAR, Massey University, its spreading applicators and clients on this issue, looking at field complexity, spreader capabilities, GPS positioning and product distribution. It intends to continue working with the industry to ensure that accurate placement of all fertiliser and lime through variable rate application is achieved wherever practicable.

protocol for precision lime application recommendations, which should include matching bout-width to spreader capability and product quality, and groundspeed to maximum application rates. Getting more spreaders Spreadmark certified for lime, and more lime supplies Fertmark certified, was also a priority. “Little and often may be part of the solution if we find we can’t apply rates of more than one or two tonnes/ha accurately.”

SCOTTISH INSIGHT Earlier this year precision-farming specialist Jim Wilson, who grows cereals and potatoes in Scotland and runs Soil Essentials, told a FAR field day pH is one of the first sources of variation to tackle (Country-Wide March, p54). Following Holmes’ presentation to the FAR Conference, Wilson was asked what he thought of the findings and how he’s achieved precision pH management in practice. He said it was no great surprise FAR and the growers found the distribution of lime to be poor and it could actually have been worse than the spread pattern Holmes presented.

“Lime is a variable product and, in general, lime spreaders don’t have the same ability to be set for different products like fertiliser spreaders do,” he said. Most fertiliser in the United Kingdom is applied by sophisticated tractor-mounted or specialist spreaders which are easily adjusted to ensure even distribution with various materials. Settings include fitting different spreader vanes, adjusting vane angles, moving drop points for the material onto the disks, variable speed disks, and adjustable height and angle of the spread point above the crop. “In general, lime spreaders don’t have this range of settings,” he said. “Also, lime is seen by most applicators as a product that is low-cost therefore not so important to spread accurately, when the opposite is true, as you can do a lot of damage with poorly spread lime [due to] variable pH [and] trace element lock up.” One option to improve lime spread pattern was a dedicated boom or curtain spreader, such as those made by Agrex or Ryetec. “I think grading or prilling lime is just adding cost. Best just to take a bit of care in the job.”

Grower Colin Hurst in one of the barley paddocks involved in the trial.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

FORAGE | KALE

Pest mind-set shift needed Lynda Gray A shift in the way we approach pest control in crops could yield economic and environmental benefits, two leading researchers say. Dr Paul Horne of Melbourne-based IPM Technologies and Plant & Food Research scientist Abie Horrocks were speakers at a West Otago Beef + Lamb New Zealand Farming for Profit day earlier this year where they urged farmers to ditch the cost-per-litre of spray mentality and instead think about cost of pest control per hectare. And don’t forget to get down on your knees and eyeball the insect life in your brassica crops, they stressed. IPM is nothing new in horticultural circles but it’s a new way of thinking in the management of forage brassicas such as swedes, kale, turnips and rapes. Horne and Horrocks say it is not about doing nothing; nor should it be confused with integrated pesticide management which uses monitoring to guide insecticide

use but ignores the effect of biological or cultural controls. IPM combines insecticide use with beneficial predator effects and cultural techniques such as tillage to control crop pests. “There’s been the perception that for lower-value broad acre crops it (IPM) is uneconomic but that’s wrong,” Horne told the field day. Supporting his claims is research by Horrocks showing IPM is not only effective but also cost-saving. In a three-year MPI Sustainable Farming Fund project on 12 Canterbury farms IPM was compared with conventional management of seed and forage brassica crops in arable, sheep and beef, and dairy support systems. Although the final analysis is not yet complete, preliminary results (see table) show that there was a one-third reduction in the amount of insecticide applied under IPM compared with conventional management of the forage brassicas. On average, this resulted in a $15/ha cost saving. Also, of the sprays used, 77% were selective in the

An insect audit of Nelson and Fi Hancox kale crop revealed a low prevalence of pests relative to beneficial insects, but that could change if the weather warmed up, Paul Horne says.

IPM versus conventional management of brassica feed and seed crops. Cost average of insecticide/ha Seed (5 paddocks) Forage (6 paddocks)

Conventional

IPM

$124.47

$89.89

$71.93

$56.73

% of the total sprays applied that were selective Conventional

IPM

Source: Abie Horrocks, Plant & Food Research.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

Research by Abie Horrocks has estimated a one-third reduction in the amount of insecticide applied and a $15/ha cost saving under IPM management of forage brassicas compared with conventional management.

IPM system compared with only 28% in the conventional system. Horrocks says farmers traditionally turn to broad-spectrum sprays because they’re cheaper, but in the long term they are false economy because they knock out beneficial insects and lock growers into prolonged chemical use. Key to the success of IPM is regular monitoring of both beneficial and pest insects to anticipate attacks and plan control with selective sprays. Broadspectrum sprays may be used where there are no selective sprays available, for example, at establishment for pests such as Nysius. “We’re not saying you can’t use them,” Horne told the Otago field day. “It’s one approach but under IPM we tend to steer away from them because they wipe out beneficials.” Pest species developing resistance to agrichemicals is another strong argument for adopting IPM. For example, diamondback moth has become resistant to a number of chemical groups overseas, including several insecticides that are regularly used in New Zealand. Even the relatively new ‘Group 28’ sprays, which kill caterpillars and some aphids, were becoming ineffective due to resistance in Southeast Asia. “If we lose these products we’re in deep trouble.” The Otago field day was on one of Fiona and Nelson Hancox’s three farms across which they grow 200ha/year of brassicas, including kale, soft turnips and swedes. An insect audit of a kale crop on the day revealed few pests relative to beneficial insects.

IPM expert Paul Horne says successful IPM requires regular monitoring of both beneficial and pest insects.

Natural pathogen as pesticide Bt – Bacillus thuringiensis – is a sprayable pathogen and a good example of a safe and caterpillar-selective treatment, Horne says. It is effective but “easy to make fail” if three rules are not followed: it needs to be applied in late afternoon during summer to prevent rapid breakdown by UV; no rain or irrigation should be applied in the 24 hours after application; a feeding attractant should be added to make it more palatable to target pests. Milk powder or molasses can be used as attractants but it is best to get guidance from a crop advisor before adding such materials, he says.

“We’d say that no action was needed but if the weather warmed up it could lead to an influx of Diamondback moth or cabbage white butterfly so you have to keep monitoring and looking for eggs, rather than holes in leaves,” Horne stressed. Nelson Hancox said with brassicas account for about 10% of their area getting management of them right was important. He’d started down the IPM road by getting an agronomist to monitor

crops to guide spraying and was taking on more of an agronomic management role himself with the goal of growing better-quality, higher tonnage crops for minimal cost. “We have grown turnips for 5c/kgDM so we want to see if we can do that across more of the crops.” They’re reducing spray rates where possible based on weed and insect monitoring results, and as of the February field day had cut one early

spray on 30ha of kale completely. “So we’re starting to see results.” However, Nysius was still a problem, Hancox added. “We found a lot in early January so had to spray.” • A pocket-sized guide, titled ‘An identification guide to pests and natural enemies in fodder brassicas in New Zealand’ is available from Du Pont or Plant & Food Research.

IPM the way forward Adopting integrated pest management for all crops, not just brassica, will help the sustainability of cropping in New Zealand, FAR’s Abie Horrocks says. The cost and difficulty of producing and registering new pesticides means growers shouldn’t rely on a never-ending pipeline of products coming to market and everything possible should be done to keep the current armoury effective. Also, some products are being withdrawn due to regulatory restrictions or, in some cases, manufacturers simply responding to public pressure, she says. One of the aims of IPM is to get selective chemicals working alongside biological control agents, mainly predators and parasitoids. Although there is still much to learn about pest and biological control agent relationships, crop by crop, and how smart use of cultural controls can manipulate the balance, advisors and the agrichemical supply industry are starting to upskill. That’s hardly surprising because a survey of growers, undertaken as part of the Brassica IPM Sustainable Farming Fund project (see main story), revealed all growers would expect their crop advisors to be able to make recommendations based on IPM principles.

“Ultimately it is just the farmer’s choice as to whether this is the path they want to go down but it is something they should consider, with good reason. It is not just a feel-good thing,” Horrocks says. One sentiment that has to go is the perception that adding a cheap insecticide to a herbicide or fungicide tank-mix is good insurance and will do no harm. “It can be very disruptive as such products tend to be broad-spectrum and you may kill all the predators and parasitoids which can lead to further pest outbreaks in your crop.”

PREDATOR OR PARASITOID? Beneficial bugs in crops fall into two broad categories: predators and

parasitoids. Predators, as the name suggests, eat pest species for food. One predator, such as a lacewing or ladybird larva, may eat hundreds of aphids before pupating. Consequently when aphid levels rise, such beneficials are very effective in reducing numbers. However, in a pestfree crop there will be insufficient food for them so they are unlikely to be seen. Parasitoids, in contrast, require only one of their hosts to be present to continue their lifecycle. The parasitoid, typically a tiny wasp, lays an egg in the host aphid or caterpillar where it hatches and eats the pest from the inside out. Mummified aphid carcases are a tell-tale sign parasitoids are active in the crop.

IPM information sources Following the Beef + Lamb New Zealand field day in February a newsletter was produced detailing many of the beneficial bugs which, if given a chance, help protect brassicas from pests and how sprays affect them. Go to www.beeflambnz.com and search for “West Otago Farming for Profit”. Narrowing the search to “documents” speeds the process. Plant & Food Research, as part of the brassica IPM Sustainable Farming Fund project, has posted three video clips, each about six minutes long, on IPM which can be viewed on www. youtube.com/user/plantandfood. One is an overview, another focuses on monitoring, and the other on which chemicals to use.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

FORAGE | PLANTAIN

The plantain trial is comparing the success of crops that were hardgrazed before sowing with those that have been sprayed out.

Herbs for the hills Anne Hughes Steep faces are the first to burn off in a dry season. A Massey University student is researching how to establish plantain on uncultivable hill country, to offer some protection against dry conditions. Baeley Ravenwood is studying for her Bachelor of Agricultural Science degree with honours and wants to find out if plantain on hill country could be a viable option for farmers looking for ways to produce extra summer feed and, if so, the best ways to establish it.

Her main focus is to compare the success of different herbage controls – whether to spray or just hard-graze existing pasture out before sowing – comparing success of earlier and later sowing dates and of plants sown on north versus south-facing slopes. “I’m really just trying to find out how the moisture in soil affects plantain and if it can successfully be sown on hill country without cultivation.” Her trial is divided into 32 plots. Tonic plantain has been hand-sown over each plot – one way vertically and one way horizontally.

Half the plots are on the north facing side of a gully and the rest on the southfacing slope. Eight plots on each slope were sprayed out before sowing and the other half were hard-grazed by sheep. Half the trial plots were sown in the first week of March and the other the first week of April. “Using different dates is going to change soil temperatures and moisture content,” Ravenwood says. “Often people wait quite a long time for sowing to get the rain coming in, but if you leave it too long it gets cold too quickly to really get it going.” The sprayed-out plots on the north-facing slopes appeared to have established better, but Ravenwood planned to count the young plants for a precise germination rate. She says her family grow plantain on flat country on their coastal Wairarapa property and many farmers use it for added drought resistance, but there was no research on the best ways to establish the crop on hills. Being a taprooted plant, plantain needs a chance to replenish its root reserves in winter, but this also makes it more drought-resistant in summer. After winter, Ravenwood will do some quality tests to see if there is any variation in ME and nutrition.

Regulatory rethink required for gene editing Andrew Swallow Gene editing is set to bring a new wave of genetically modified organisms to market and, in New Zealand, could spur a regulatory review, delegates at the Foundation of Arable Research’s recent conference were told. In a lightning summary of genetic technological progress, Professor Paula Jameson of the University of Canterbury’s School of Biological Sciences explained how the CRISPR* gene editing technique is taking the commercial genetic and medical industries by storm. CRISPR allows geneticists to make very precise changes to an organism’s genome and, crucially from a regulatory perspective, leaves no trace of the modification after the initial process. Consequently such organisms will be impossible to distinguish from those which might have acquired the same characteristics through natural mutation and selection. In contrast, commercial GMOs such as herbicide-tolerant soya or canola, or insect-resistant maize, cotton or egg plant, retain a fragment of the bacterial vector used to make the modification

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

meaning they can be analysed to show they are GMO. “New Zealand law regulates the process, not the trait, so at this point they [gene-edited plants] would be treated exactly like a GM plant,” Jameson said. However, much as NZ takes a pragmatic approach with canola or soy oil labelling because there’s no way of telling if the oil was produced from GM crops or not, so we, and other countries, might have to be pragmatic with produce from geneedited organisms. Jameson said scientific organisations in Europe and Scandinavia are very positive about gene editing and, as the widespread acceptance of insulin made using genetically modified bacteria shows, where the trait matches a publicly recognised need biotech products can succeed even in countries generally considered anti-GM. “There are a whole heap of medicines made with GM micro-organisms and they don’t have issues with those.” Jameson suggested gene editing might be used to reduce seed shedding in perennial ryegrass. Information generated by gene sequencing has identified the key genes that were selected during the domestication of rice, maize and

sorghum, genes which stopped the seed shedding. “We have identified genes in ryegrass that potentially cause seed shedding, and could now use gene editing to stop this, to the benefit of our cropping farmers. We could also use this technique to target specific genes that would allow an increase in the number of seeds or increase their size in crops such as ryegrass, forage brassica and peas.” Another possibility is increasing plants’ ability to produce a plant hormone that confers drought tolerance, however at present this requires genetic engineering, not just editing. As an example, Jameson suggested peas could be bred to be drought-tolerant but without the yield penalty normally associated with drought-tolerant crops, because the traits would only be triggered when the plant was stressed. Such traits have been genetically engineered into rice, peanuts, bent grasses and canola already. “In Australia, in field conditions, it increased yield in rainfed and irrigated canola,” Jameson said. *CRISPR stands for Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats.

FORAGE | LEARNING CURVE Matt Walker with fodder beet.

Challenges of fodder beet Colin Grainger-Allen Fodder beet has become a popular choice for many farmers given its high yield, potential to extend lactation and put weight on cows, but it does have its challenges. Compared to other crops it requires precision planting, and careful attention when transitioning cows to avoid acidosis. It’s also a more costly option, so you want to make sure you get the most bang for your buck, if you haven’t already, now is a good time to start thinking about growing next season’s crops. Growing fodder beet has been a steep learning curve for the Walker family on their Reporoa, central North Island, farm. They are now consistently growing a high yield and have overcome some of the initial stumbling blocks. “We learnt a lot in the first few years,” Robin Walker admits, especially about seed bed preparation and weed sprays. “It’s a specialist crop to grow compared to other winter crops with special needs and considerations. Getting the right information was a challenge in the early years and we now have a plan for growing the crop and transitioning cows,” Robin says.

They are now consistently growing 25-30 tonnes drymatter (DM)/ha crops, which saw them begin transitioning cows late March. Matt Walker explains they bought a lifting bucket this year so they could lift some beet and load it into the feed-out wagon that has scales. This allows them to accurately feed small amounts to the cows in the grass paddock without having to make the breaks so small that all the cows don’t get

Farm facts • • • • • • • •

Location: Reporoa, Central Plateau Farm owners: Robin and Fou Walker Contract milkers: Matt and Chloe Walker Effective dairying area: 1633ha Milk production: 150,000 MS 16/17 year Herd: 386 2.9 cows/ha Breeding worth: 109/47 Supplements: DairyNZ system 2-3 with 210 tonnes palm kernel, 10ha fodder beet, 3ha turnips, no runoff.

a chance to eat some fodder beet. They choose a low-DM variety fodder beet that is easy to eat and have had no problems getting heifers to eat the beet bulbs. They do make sure the cows and heifers are transitioned separately and are then mixed together once they are both fully transitioned. Starting at 0.3kg DM a day they use the rule of no more than 1kg DM increase every second day to avoid acidosis and dust with 50grams/cow of dicalcium phosphate (DCP) a day. Milking cows will get up to 5-6kg fodder beet DM/day and once dried off this will increase to 8kg DM fodder beet, 2kg DM silage and 2kg DM pasture for the winter. Matt recommends watching for yield variations across the paddock and adjusting break sizes as required and remembering that the yield will increase as fodder beet keeps growing right through May and June. It’s also easier to feed with the rows across the paddock to help with consistent feed allocation. For more information about fodder beet and transitioning visit dairynz.co.nz/ fodderbeet Farmers can also seek further advice from other farmers who’ve used fodder beet through Dairy Connect, visit dairynz.co.nz/dairy-connect. • Colin Grainger-Allen is a DairyNZ consulting officer in the Bay of Plenty.

Cows graze the fodder beet on the Walkers’ Reporoa farm.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

HILL COUNTRY | ONFARM

Te Mara Helicopter regrassing costs Te Mara costs Cost

Lessons in the hills Anne Hughes Early attempts at aerial cropping and regrassing have been far from perfect on Te Mara Farms. Hamish Clarke, pictured, says plenty of lessons were learnt to improve the process in the future. But he says any improvements to the pastures are better than the alternative of doing nothing to address poor fertility and pasture quality on their new hill country breeding hind block. The Clarkes bought the block, 2km from their home farm, in 2015. To lift fertility and replace gorse, scrub and unpalatable grass species with higher-quality feed, they have embarked on a summer aerial cropping programme. Hamish hopes summer crops will help lift growth rates in young deer. The two-year cropping and regrassing programme is being implemented three hectares at a time, mitigating the risk of a crop failure. Summer crops are followed by annual ryegrass. The first 6ha (two paddocks) under development will be sown in permanent pasture in two-three years, depending on how the Italian ryegrass and Chicory mix performs. Hamish says they could have invested in more fertiliser and fencing instead, but he estimates summer cropping and regrassing could lift their hill country productivity by up to 50%. “That’s bigger than any other gain I can see for this block.” The Pasja crop alone was enough to take all Te Mara’s yearling hinds through summer. The block is already

KEY FACTS • Te Mara Farms • Tauraroa Valley, 20 minutes south-east of Otorohanga, northern King Country • Campbell and Helen Clarke, son Hamish farm manager • 550ha in total • Dairy, dairy support, velvet stags, breeding hinds and dairy beef • Aerial cropping and regrassing on 150ha breeding hind block

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

well subdivided. Hamish says applying superphosphate was an option, but they have seen the benefits of summer cropping and regrassing on the home farm. “In the cropping programme we’re fixing the fertility at the same time. “Browntop was not competing, but I wouldn’t want to get into this cropping programme without investing in fertiliser – otherwise you’re trying to grow a high value, high expense crop that’s always going to be limited with low fertility.” Hamish is now looking at how to best apply the seed and looking into why some of the annual grass seed was found damaged days after sowing. The seed was uncoated and applied on its own without fertiliser. “I was concerned that we appeared to have a lot of damaged and incomplete seeds on the ground, but I’m not sure if it was the spinners, deer or something else entirely.” Hamish says placement with aerial sowing can be a challenge. Conditions in spring were less than ideal for aerial sowing and, as a result, much of the Pasja seed ended up in a gully. “If you get it wrong you get it really wrong. “I don’t think we’ve perfected it by any length.” He says it is important to communicate expectations clearly with helicopter operators and to hold out for moresuitable weather. “Have that conversation that you’d like to be a priority when the weather comes right.” Weeds are an ongoing challenge and Hamish has found it harder to get the timing right with autumn sowings. “We were way too late this year and it just took ages for the grass to get going.” He plans to throw some seed around by hand to see if any issues were related to helicopter application and to trial a variation in seeding rates. “We’ve just gone for high seeding rates on the basis that it’s not worth getting the helicopter around again – we’ll look at possibly scaling that down.”

Units/ha

$/unit

Total

Chicory seed

19.5

390

Pasja seed

12.5

150

Annual seed

3.8

133

Italian seed

3.8

133

120

720

Glyphosate

6.75

155

Wetting agent

3.6

Slug bait bag

350

Perennial seed

4.8

Heli spray

Clover seed Cropping cost/ha

$2215

NB. Some prices are based on public price lists rather than actuals. NB. A saving of $207/ha is created from back to back cropping. Additional fertiliser costs Cost

Units/ha

$/unit

Total

Heli fert

180

360

Fertiliser

725

Total cost/ha

$3300

Helicopter-based crop costs Helicopter chicory application costs Cost

Units/ha

$/unit

Total

Chicory seed

19.5

390

Perennial seed

4.8

Clover seed

Heli spray

120

360

Glyphosate

6.75

101

Slug bait bag

210

Wetting agent

1.8

Cropping cost/ha

36 $1342

Helicopter pasja application costs Cost

Units/ha

$/unit

Total

Pasja seed

12.5

150

Annual seed

3.8

133

Perennial seed

4.8

Clover seed

Heli spray

120

360

Glyphosate

6.75

115

Slug bait bag

210

Wetting agent

1.8

Cropping cost/ha

36 $1080

THE TIMELINE Te Mara Farms’ aerial cropping and regrassing: July–August: Hoof and tooth • Mixed-age hinds forced (unsuccessfully) to clean up thick thatch left by rising two-year-old heifers, while being fed 73

maintenance in a neighbouring flat paddock. Mid-October: First spray (goal was late-August/mid-September) • Hinds were removed a fortnight prior, allowing grass to create fresh leaves. • Six litres of glyphosate with 500ml of Pulse (wetting agent) per ha. • Goal of first spray was to kill unpalatable grass species. Early November: Second spray (goal was early-October) • Three litres/ha glyphosate with 500ml/ ha Pulse. • Goal of second spray is to remove weed seed bank before crop establishment. Summer Crop Seeding: As soon as practical in days following second spray. • 450kg/ha DAP, 150kg/ha Serpentine Super and 15kg/ha Boron at seed application. • First paddock planted with 16kg/ha chicory. • Second paddock planted with 8kg/ha Pasja. • Both paddocks given 10kg/ha slug bait. Utilisation of crops: Mid-October until mid-March • All yearling hinds set stocked on Pasja three–four weeks after planting, taken off mid-April. • Spikers had three chicory grazing, fourth and fifth grazing given to MA hinds and fawns. Summer crop removal:

Winter potential Hamish Clarke is keen to investigate the potential for winter hill cropping, particularly for feeding Te Mara Farms’ velvet stags. He says hill country cropping poses both financial and environmental risks. “We’re not breaking ground so the erosion risk is probably lower than on cultivated hill country.” With new farming rules being proposed within the Waikato region, Hamish says it could become hard to gain resource consent for aerial cropping. “It does concern me that potentially it will be outlawed by the proposed regulations. “It’s a good tool if it’s used correctly and I’d be sad to see it disappear because one version of it didn’t fit the mould.” Late March-early April • Chicory sprayed with two litres/ha glyphosate and 500ml/ha Pulse for broad leaf weed control (predicted 50% loss in chicory plant population). • Pasja sprayed with four litres/ha glyphosate and 500ml/ha Pulse. Complete kill. Establishment of winter grass: Mid-April • Pasja paddock seeded with annual ryegrass at 35kg/ha, plus 10kg/ha slug bait.

Potential hostility Anne Hughes Success in hill country cropping can be highly variable. Agfirst Gisborne sheep and beef consultant Peter Andrew says many factors are out of our control when cropping on hill country. Hills can be a hostile environment for growing crops. Andrew says it requires a high level of expertise and experience from both the farmer and contractors involved. About half of farmers in the Gisborne district have tried hill country cropping to some extent, he estimates, but probably only 10% have stuck with it. Crop failures tend to be with the strike or heavy weed control. “We do tend to have a lot of weeds that are kept suppressed by the normal pasture sward. As soon as you stir them up it is all on. So you need to be right on the money with the herbicides. The same can happen with insects.” Andrew recommends focusing on flat land cropping first. “The flats are at a lower establishment cost for higher yields and are therefore a 74

much lower risk venture.” One time when hill country cultivation is easy to justify is to smooth out the original “bush bumps” or post drainage, he says. “This once-in-a-lifetime contouring can add significantly to land value.” Done successfully, hill country cropping can be a good way to enhance winter feed supply on higher-altitude back country or alternatively, provide more summer feed options in dryer coastal areas. Andrew says farmers do need to be mindful of our sometimes shallow top soils and not to bury these during the cropping process. “Some top soils are quite shallow, so you have to be careful you don’t bring up too much sub-soil.” Costs vary, but usually include a capital fertiliser component to bring fertility up to suitable levels. At a minimum, hill country cropping would cost around $500/ha, including cultivation, sowing with an air seeder on a power harrow and maintenance fertiliser applications. Andrew says some farmers are spending

• Chicory paddock seeded with Italian ryegrass at 35kg/ha, plus 10kg/ha slug bait.

LESSONS LEARNED • Planning ahead and getting wind conditions correct is essential when dropping a small seed from a great height. • Mild winds have the potential to create a crop failure through incorrect placement. • Once seed is mixed with fertiliser there is a short time limit for application. • Coated or heavier seeds are more suited to aerial dispersal. • 25-50% higher seeding rates can give adequate germination in good conditions. • A thick grass residual thatch at seeding will significantly lower germination rates. • Slug bait is a worthwhile investment when compared to the cost of reseeding. • The use of three glyphosate sprays within a six-month period is a relatively cost-effective method for removing the vast majority of hill country grass weeds. • Wet weather assists the germination of seeds broadcasted onto uncultivated soil. • Pasja requires a transition period, during which deer need access to both Pasja and grass.

Cropping issues Peter Andrew says most hill country cropping problems occur around seed strike and establishment, including: • poor soil preparation • insufficient soil compaction • seed sown at the wrong depth • low soil moisture • low level of soil fertility • grazing at the wrong height.

more than $1000/ha, including a comprehensive range of insecticide, herbicide, and fertiliser to improve the chances of success. “Farmers need to look at their own situation and consider cropping against what are the other opportunities for getting a better return from their money.” That could be better investment in fencing and fertiliser or improving stock water supplies. “You might be better to invest in water, which might provide 20 years of better summer pasture utilisation. “If you’ve got good expertise in cropping and all these other things have been ticked off, then you might want to sow a hill country crop.” Country-Wide Crops August 2017

HILL COUNTRY | CROPS

Focus on fertility with all-grass system Anne Hughes Part of a 20ha area before regrassing in 2014 on Laurie Copland’s Northland farm.

An all-grass system allows Laurie Copland to focus on fertility and pasture quality. With year-round grass growth, the Northland farmer has no need for crops to feed stock through winter or the drier summer and autumn months. Laurie finishes bulls, steers and heifers on his 200-hectare mostly hill country farm at Broadwood, north of Kaikohe. He has been improving hill country pastures for 30 years. He doesn’t have an annual pasture renewal programme, focusing first on correcting fertility and fencing. “If the good pasture doesn’t come after that, then you regrass.” On the hills, Laurie aims to keep Olsen P levels around 20 and pH at 5.8-6. He sowed 12ha of new grass on hill country this year – a mix of ryegrass, cocksfoot and plantain. Cattle chew down the chosen area before it is sprayed out by helicopter in late February. If there is enough trash remaining – dead or dying weeds and kikuyu, scattered manuka, blackberry or sedge the spray is followed by a burn. Laurie says burning seems to create a good seed bed. Depending on weather conditions, the helicopter will over-sow grass seed in early April. Laurie keeps an eye on weather forecasts and tries to get the seed on just ahead of any expected rain. “This year we had some quite heavy downpours. I’d sprayed out just before that and got the seed on because I was worried the moisture in the ground would germinate weeds and poorer grasses.” Laurie uses good-quality coated seed. He finds the coating adds weight, which helps the seed fall through dead matter to the soil. New grass is usually ready for grazing two months after sowing. It costs about $650/ha to regrass his hill country. Country-Wide Crops August 2017

Laurie doesn’t include fertiliser in that figure, because he believes it should be done regardless before regrassing, or weed sprays which are done as needed – usually a spot spray the following summer. “I don’t do it often, so over 10 years

that’s only $65/ha to improve the quality and grow more grass.” When over-sowing on hill country, Laurie says it is important to plan ahead and not leave anything to the last minute. “Touch wood I’ve never had a failure.” Nor has he had any problems with sediment washing off the hills during the renewal process. With good grazing management, Laurie says ryegrasses come away well without regrassing. However, he has found there to be advantages in the new ryegrasses, particularly around summer and autumn performance. He usually uses an AR37 diploid permanent ryegrass, which is highly palatable to cattle. Autumn can be very dry in Northland, so Laurie likes to let pastures go to seed. “At least there’s some seed to come away when the autumn rain comes to compete with the weeds.” High winter rainfall and the persistent nature of kikuyu do present some feeding challenges in Northland. “The only thing we can predict is we’re going to get rain in winter.” At his stocking rate, Laurie can manage rotations during winter to prevent cattle making too much mess in winter. The stocking rate is about 600kg liveweight/ha in mid-May – slightly lower on the steeper the hills and higher for easier country. Grass grows so well during winter that bulls can continue 1kg/day weight gains. He doesn’t focus too much on trying to take the kikuyu out. “It will come back. I just want some quality ryegrass underneath. “The kikuyu slows down for winter, but ryegrass keeps growing.” 75

ARABLE | HEMP

Kanapu hemp seed oil has been targeted at the high end cuisine market. Photos: Ben Clement

GOOD OIL ON A NEW CROP Rebecca Harper Hemp is a fledgling industry in New Zealand, but Central Hawke’s Bay farmer Simon White is making waves with top chefs – and it’s all thanks to hemp seed oil. (See Hemp story p16) Simon and his business partner, Isaac Beach, formed Kanapu Hemp Foods Limited three years ago and are now producing and selling their own Kanapu hemp seed oil. Isaac had the research and development and marketing know-how, and Simon was experienced in growing small seed crops – a perfect match for a new venture producing a premium quality superfood. The company has a completely integrated supply chain and is responsible for the product, from the moment it goes in the ground through to the labelling of bottles and marketing. Simon and his wife Lou and their children, Millie, 3, George, 2, and Oscar, 9 months, are the fourth generation to live and farm on Simon’s family property, Ludlow Farms, at Otane. The silt and peat soil plains at Ludlow provide an ideal environment for growing a number of crops, including hemp. The arable programme is complemented by a drystock finishing policy. About 4000-5000 winter trade lambs are finished annually, depending on the season. Lambs are bought in from February through the autumn and most are gone by October. About 220 beef Friesian R2 bulls are finished year-round, and killed at a target weight of 300-320kg. They kill roughly 25% before the second winter, with the remaining bulls wintered and killed the following spring. “It fits the feed demand to kill the 76

Kanapu co-founders Isaac Beach and Simon White. Photo: Ben Clement

earlier ones. All the bulls are on the class four country, the silt loam and free draining soils, through winter. There are no bulls on the cropped arable paddocks, they’re for the trade lambs,” Simon says. Ludlow is a family operation. Simon’s parents, Neil and Gwen White, also live on the property, with Neil still actively involved in the business, along with fulltime staff member, Andy Fallaver. Simon attended school in Hawke’s Bay before heading south to Lincoln University where he completed a diploma of farm management. He then travelled overseas before spending two years shepherding in the Wairarapa and a stint casual mustering in the South Island. “An opportunity came up to purchase some land on the boundary of our home farm and I came home in about 2006.” Simon’s role involves day-to-day running of the business, making the decisions, signing crop contracts and organising staff. Hemp is a new crop for Ludlow, as well as being relatively unknown in NZ, so it was always going to be a bit of a punt – but one that is paying dividends.

“As farmers we are always looking for the next best thing when it comes to return on investment, and by sheer chance Isaac and I met. He had some ambitious plans, a lot of knowledge and had been overseas and researched it. He met with people growing hemp and knew the opportunities. We put a project in place for our first year of production and we were reasonably successful.”

SUCCESSFULLY GROWING HEMP The Whites were already in small seed production and with their scale it was not hard to dip a toe in the water and plant a small area in hemp. Last year they planted 3ha and this year it is likely to be more. They didn’t have to drop anything out of the operation to accommodate the hemp. “We had the scope to grow it, 3ha out of 450ha is not a lot, and we only tried it on a small scale,” Simon explains. “We knew the ins and outs of it (small seed production) and had the infrastructure to plant, harvest and dry hemp. “We had the soils as well, hemp Country-Wide Crops August 2017

Farm facts • Ludlow Farms, Otane, Central Hawke’s Bay • Simon and Lou White • 625ha • Predominantly flat – about 80ha of rolling hill country (can still get a tractor over it) • About 450-500ha cropped annually • 10 different varieties of crop – process vege crops for McCain, cereals and grains, malt barley, squash and small seed product like grass seed, carrots, coriander and hemp • Winter trading lambs – about 4000-5000 annually • Finishing beef Friesian bulls year-round – 400 bulls (mix of R1 and R2) • Annual rainfall: about 750mml

likes really fertile soils and heat units (sunlight), the warmer temperatures.” Environmentally, it fitted with their crop rotation, which was an important consideration. They plant in late spring and harvest the crop in late summer, and the hemp is produced under the Good Agricultural Practice (NZGAP) NZ Approved Farming and Environment Management System. NZGAP aims to ensure the safe and sustainable production of fruit and vegetables in NZ and Ludlow has a number of crops produced under the certification. “It’s about the environment, things like fertiliser inputs, traceability, hygiene and health standards, clean implements, looking after the soils and the land.” Simon says NZGAP is recognised in the marketplace and they are audited regularly. They are exploring importing hemp seed from overseas. “You can’t propagate your own seed to grow here. Last year we grew a French variety and we are trying to procure a Canadian variety for the coming season.” The crop is not without its challenges and there are no registered chemicals

Simon and Lou White with their three children, Oscar, George and Millie.

OTANE

available for use. “It is a challenging crop to grow in that respect, there is no real weed control and if you have a weed burden you could have issues. We are managing it similar to other crops. We plant later and have a high level of cover crop, which doesn’t give the weeds an opportunity to come through.”

The main pest issue is birds at harvest. “They love the seed. We do everything we can to deter them, bird scarers etc. The crop can look fine but when you come to harvest the birds have taken half your crop.” Many of their crops are under variablerate fertiliser, seed and irrigation. Soils are mapped into different zones and they also undertake soil grid sampling.

“There’s so much variation in the paddocks and in some zones we might put on zero fertiliser and lime and other areas in the same paddock might get 100%, so it’s meeting the exact requirements of that crop.” Results for the hemp so far have been 1000kg of seed/ha, field dressed. Returns are about $3000-$4000/ha. Simon has not irrigated hemp but plans to do so this year and believes water, at the right time, could have a big impact on yield. “We harvest at about 30% moisture and dry it down to 10-12%. The seeds dry from the top of the plant down, you’ve got to get the mix right and harvest some moist seeds and some dry seeds. “That’s another challenge, when to harvest. We have learned from experience, you just have to keep checking it. There’s no science behind it, it’s just knowledge. But you can moisturetest it.” Once the seed is dry it gets dressed out (machine dressed) and then pressed using a special press. They get about 22% oil and the rest goes to protein flour for animal feed. The oil is bottled and then sold. Millie and George White.

Winter trade lambs at Ludlow.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

“It’s very exciting to be involved with a new, innovative product. We have to stay ahead of the game too, because others will jump on the bandwagon. There are risks involved and the industry is new here, but the market overseas is huge and the opportunities are huge if we can establish customers overseas and provide the finest oil. “If we could produce the best hemp food products in the world that would be a pretty great achievement.”

HEMP TO BE LEGALISED AS A FOOD Changes to regulations around hemp in NZ, which are set to legalise hemp as a food, are a game-changer and Kanapu is well-positioned to take advantage. Currently, only the sale of hemp seed oil is legal in this country. The Whites and Isaac are 50/50 shareholders in Kanapu Hemp Foods Limited and they have set up joint ventures with other processors. Isaac’s entrepreneurial bent, networks and marketing knowledge, coupled with Simon’s practical farming knowledge to successfully grow the crop mean they are able to own and control the entire value chain. The hemp industry was virtually non-existent in NZ when they started out and they have learned a lot by trial and error. They see great potential for Hawke’s Bay, and the wider economy. “We are looking to really get the industry going and establish a commercial product. We might also look at having other contract growers to grow hemp for us. “If we can create an industry on the East Coast of the North Island, or even in Hawke’s Bay, it creates a community vibe, jobs and economic value for New Zealand. It has benefits for us onfarm in terms of diversification and the environment. “We have clients wanting the product and with the regulations lifting it opens up new avenues. We were anticipating the regulations to be lifted in three years, so it’s come a lot quicker than we thought.” Isaac is responsible for marketing the product and continuing to build the brand.

Dog Midge catches a ride on the back of the ute.

“In 2013 when I started looking into it (hemp), it was difficult to get any information to build a business case. I looked offshore and identified a number of countries that had a record in industrial hemp,” Isaac says. He believes Hawke’s Bay is a great place to base the business. “With the infrastructure and support available in Hawke’s Bay, I would argue we produce some of the best food in the world in Hawke’s Bay. That inspired us to test the hypothesis – is it feasible, will it provide a return?” The short answer is yes, and demand is outstripping supply at the moment. Kanapu has deliberately targeted the high-end culinary market domestically, working closely with chefs to develop and test the oil, and has met with success, having a 100% strike rate with those approached. About 12 chefs in Hawke’s Bay are using Kanapu oil, with half a dozen niche retail stores selling the product. They also sell online. Wellington craft brewery, Garage Project, has used it in beer. “Simon and I didn’t really understand how popular the product would be. We only produced enough to test the marketplace and I don’t think we will have enough product to last until next harvest, so I think that shows it’s been a relatively successful experience for us,” Isaac says.

HEMP AS A SUPERFOOD Simon says hemp has huge health benefits, with an Omega profile of Omega 3 and 6, which provides the perfect balance for the human body. “I’m not aware of any other product with that.” The oil also has high levels of gammalinoleic acid (GLA), which is good for

things like inflammation and eczema, as well as lowering cholesterol and being good for heart health. “You can use it for anything, apart from cooking, it’s good in smoothies, drizzled on food, in salads and dressings or just take it on a spoon – a 5ml serving a day is recommended. Some chefs are infusing it into meat dishes and getting great results. “We are really engaging with the customer, inviting people to come and see their crop, securing supply contracts and working back from there – we plan to do more of that. “It’s new, interesting and different. As well as the health benefits and food production story they can come and see where it’s been grown.” Isaac says while they are only selling domestically and online into Australia, long-term the plan is to export the product. “You kick yourself because we didn’t produce enough to meet the demand we are receiving post-launch, but we didn’t want to produce far too much and have our product not stand up. “There’s always an element of thrill involved in developing a new product but we try to remain removed from the results and keep going. We are just two Kiwi blokes trying to get a good product into the marketplace, we hope internationally in the next couple of years.” While Kanapu is focusing on hemp seed oil for now, they have plans to diversify their product offering and Isaac says they have development initiatives for three new products in the next 12-18 months, ones they anticipate could be even more successful than the oil. “It’s excellent nutrition in terms of the protein profile and these are products that could transform the space of dairy alternatives. There’s a lot of potential for this industry to expand and grow and add value to the New Zealand economy, to create jobs and deliver returns for the farmers who grow the product. The outlook is really promising.” For more information or to purchase visit: twww.kanapu.co.nz

Ludlow is predominantly flat and the Whites grow 10 different varieties of crop. 78

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ARABLE | PESTS

Spring slug warning Crops will need closer monitoring for slugs this spring to avoid a repeat of the damage seen in 2016, FAR’s new environmental research manager Abie Horrocks says. While weather ultimately drives slug damage, reduced tillage is increasingly a factor. “Don’t wait until you can see slug damage in the crop,” she says. “By then the slug population will likely be so high that you’ll be on the back foot with control.” Monitoring in-crop population, especially at establishment, is crucial, she says. “It’s so easy to get complacent, and then you’ll get taken by surprise when the slug population erupts.” Monitoring is particularly important in susceptible crops such as clover, seed grasses and brassicas, but all crops, including cereals, can suffer damage. Slow early growth, particularly in generally wet weather, should ring alarm bells. Slug control strategies should be built into an overall cropping plan including cultural controls. “For example, pay attention to seedbed quality. Aim for good seed and soil contact and coverage, which prevents slugs from moving through crevices in the soil where they can readily access the seed.” Natural predators are worth encouraging. Carabid beetles – of which New Zealand has three native species commonly found in paddocks – make a valuable contribution, particularly on immature slugs, reducing the need for, and frequency of, pellet applications. “But you’ll need to be careful with insecticide use to encourage [beetle] populations… Carbamate-based products, for example, are not ‘beetle-friendly’.” Four species of slugs are agronomically significant, a FAR and Plant and Food Research Sustainable Farming Fund project found, the two most common being the grey field slug (Deroceras reticulatum) and the brown field slugs (Deroceras panormitanum). Country-Wide Crops August 2017

Natural protection: Carabid beetles, commonly found in paddocks, make a valuable contribution, particularly on immature slugs.

The grey field slug responds most quickly to changes in moisture and causes up to four times more feeding damage.

Horrocks says the grey field slug “is the one to look out for” because lab trials have shown it responds most quickly to changes in moisture and causes up to four times more feeding damage.

‘Pay attention to seedbed quality. Aim for good seed and soil contact and coverage, which prevents slugs from moving through crevices in the soil where they can readily access the seed.’

FAR’s recommendation on slug monitoring has been welcomed by Zelam, whose parent company Lonza has been supporting European farmers with slug-control strategies for several years.

“There’s been a big change in Europe over the last 10 years with much greater emphasis on awareness and pre-emptive control strategies that involve population monitoring to stay ahead of the game, and a move away from the ‘one size fits all’ approach to slug control,” Zelam’s Mike Swift says. “There’s a growing realisation that slug control should be part of the same, modern precision-led approach to crop protection that we adopt with products such as fungicides where several factors contribute to an effective decisionsupport system.” Subject to registration, Zelam hopes to have a new European molluscicide available in New Zealand for spring crops this year. Its support package will include a smartphone app to ensure accurate application calibration in the field and a guide to slug species, crop damage symptoms and incorporating slug control into an integrated pest management strategy. 79

ARABLE | SOILS and NUTRIENTS Effluent increases the pH of pastures.

How N, P and K work on pasture Karen Trebilcock If you’ve looked at a fertiliser company website, or listened in on a discussion group talking about fertiliser don’t feel bad if you’re confused. N, P, K – what do all these mean and why does your pasture need them? N is nitrogen which is the stuff that makes up almost 80% of the air we breathe. It’s a gas but when it gets oxygen atoms added it becomes nitrites (two oxygen atoms) and nitrates (three oxygen atoms) and combined with hydrogen atoms it becomes ammonia (three hydrogen atoms). Then there is urea which is ammonia combined with carbon dioxide but with a hydrogen atom left behind somewhere. Maybe it’s best not to worry about the chemistry. All you need to know is that when someone is talking about urea, they’re actually talking about nitrogen, or N as it’s also known because that is nitrogen’s chemical symbol on the periodic table, that thing we all learnt about in science at school. If someone says they have put 100 units of N on their farm that means they have spread the equivalent of about 200kg of urea/ha (urea contains 46% nitrogen). Phosphorus, also known as P because that’s its symbol on the periodic table, unlike nitrogen, is hardly ever found just as phosphorus. That’s because it’s highly reactive and, even better, it’s also pyrophoric which is a reasonably cool chemistry term meaning self-igniting. You never knew that about super did you? Super, which is what farmers call it, is superphosphate which is phosphorus which lots of oxygen atoms attached to it which makes it non-pyrophoric somehow 80

and is combined with sulphur because sulphur is great for grass growth and has a happy relationship with phosphorus (as in it’s non-explosive). And just when you thought you were getting the hang of all this (and maybe side-tracked by things that may or may not go boom in your fertiliser bin) there is potassium which is known as K. They figured out potassium back about 1800 when they found it in potash (vegetation which they burnt in a pot – pot ash) but decided it would be cool, just to confuse us all in the 21st century, to name it on the periodic table after the neo-Latin name Kalium, the symbol P having been taken by phosphorus about 150 years earlier. Potassium in its elemental form is an alkali (where the word Kalium comes from) metal which means it likes to get together with oxygen to form salts such as potassium oxide. If it is not hanging around with a few oxygen atoms, you guessed it, it’s reasonably unstable. And while we are on the subject of things that go boom remember nitrogen, the most stable, common element in the NPK group? Well urea is what American domestic terrorist Timothy McVeigh used to blow up the Alfred P Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma in 1995 killing 168 people. Hopefully by now you will have a new respect for fertilisers and when you are told not to mix them with something don’t do it. Listen to your fertiliser rep. So why are nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium the big three in fertiliser and how did we figure it out? Again, forget the chemistry. In their elemental form, NPK are not great for keeping anything alive but hundreds of years ago, even thousands, we figured out that by adding humus, guano (seabird

excrement) and wood ash to our fields it made things grow. And guess what – humus, guano and wood ash mostly contain nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. Today nitrogen can be applied as urea, DAP (diammonium phosphate) or in a multitude of different forms all with brand names made up by your fertiliser company. Urea and DAP are highly dissolvable becoming ammonium when it rains. Ammonium (a liquid with four hydrogen atoms) is used by the plant for growth but if it doesn’t rain, urea and DAP turn into ammonia (a gas with three hydrogen atoms) which plants can’t use and it’s lost to the atmosphere which means you’ve spent a whole lot of money and not done a lot for your grass growth. Because of this, fertiliser companies also sell nitrogen fertilisers which are coated with urease inhibitors (urease is a soil enzyme which is involved with all of those hydrogen atoms getting added) which makes the N more likely to stay in the soil instead of being lost

With the right fertiliser, this is what your grass should look like.

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Fertiliser stored at a depot.

to the atmosphere. It will cost more but is probably worth it if rain isn’t in the forecast. Nitrogen is the cheapest way to produce something for your stock to eat. It will usually grow grass cheaper than you can buy in feed but, and it’s a big but, nitrogen is the biggest contaminant to waterways from farming. Because it’s so water-soluble it moves through soils quickly, especially when soil temperatures are below 5C and grass is not actively growing and taking it up. Waterways with high nitrogen concentrations have high algae growth and lots of dead fish in them. Nitrogen is a useful farming tool but always use it with caution. Phosphorus is applied as superphosphate, serpentine super (which has magnesium), DAP or a variety of other branded products. It’s important for plants because it’s needed for photosynthesis (how plants use energy from the sun and carbon dioxide from the air to grow). It comes from guano and mineral deposits around the world which is becoming a small problem as the seabird population is not growing as fast as the human population and we’ve almost mined all of the rock. In New Zealand, phosphorus levels in soils have been determined since the 1970s by the Olsen P test which is simply a measurement of how much P is in the soil. The test doesn’t work so well in extremely high or low pH soils so your fertiliser rep when doing soil tests may not use it. Unfarmed land in NZ can have Olsen P levels of 5 to7 and dry stock farms can typically have levels between 15 and 20. Dairy farms tend to have higher Olsen P levels because phosphorus is expensive and dairy farming usually makes more money than sheep and beef. Applying phosphorous fertilisers to soils with low Olsen Ps will shift the levels much higher than applying it to Country-Wide Crops August 2017

soils with high Olsen Ps so don’t put it on if you don’t have to. Phosphorus is another baddy when it comes to waterways. RPR is reactive phosphate rock which is a slow-release phosphorous fertiliser and so favoured by organic farming systems. Potassium is applied as potash super, potassium chloride (also known as muriate of potash) or branded products. It’s used by plants for growth and particularly for flowering and maturing. Calcium, Ca on the periodic table, has to be mentioned here as it is needed to keep soils at the correct pH which is 5.8 to 6. A high pH (alkaline) soil or a low pH (acidic) soil stops plants absorbing fertilisers because the processes in the soil, very simply, don’t work as well. Lime, which is calcium with some oxygen and hydrogen atoms added, increases pH. Different fertilisers also affect pH. Nitrogen lowers it and RPR, as well as dairy effluent, raises it. Soil testing by your fertiliser rep, or independently, will show what and how much fertiliser needs to be applied to your farm. Some people also recommend foliage testing, especially for particular nutrients. Lately there has been an emphasis on soil testing each paddock, instead of just taking a few samples across the farm. This will target the amount of fertiliser needed paddock by paddock and will be beneficial if the property has been farmed for some time and silage made in the same paddock every year or different crops grown. Soil types across a farm also have an effect of whether nutrients are used by plants or are lost to waterways. As well, keep an eye on your grasses, especially your clovers, as they are good indicators of how healthy your soils are. Low-fertility soils grow clovers with small leaves, brown top and fescue will dominate pastures on acidic soils. Besides NPK and Ca, lots of other elements are required by plants such as sulphur (S) and magnesium (Mg) and trace elements such as boron (B), copper (Cu), manganese (Mn), iron (Fe), zinc (Zn), selenium (Se) and molybdenum (Mo). Specific fertiliser mixes target some of these such as mixes for swedes and turnips which have boron. All of these fertilisers (apart from RPR) can be called chemical fertilisers which is a term that has had lots of bad press. There is research on both sides but in the end you have to figure out a farming system that works for you. Whatever you do, remember you have to put something in to get something out, you can’t make something out of nothing and although sunshine and water (mostly) come for free to make

Urea.

Diammonium phosphate which is known as DAP.

Balance Agri-nutrients’ SustaiN which is nitrogen fertiliser with the granules coated with an urease inhibitor. Superphosphate.

Potassium chloride, also known as muriate of potash, can be grey, white, pink or red depending on its origin.

your grass grow, every day the milk tanker leaves your farm, or the stock truck, they are taking away nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium. You have to put it back somehow. • Karen Trebilcock is a Dairy Exporter reporter based in Otago. 81

CROP PROTECTION | PEST CONTROL

Be aware of pasture pest signs Anne Hughes

nowing how to assess the likely extent of damage and the best way to combat pasture losses, depending on your farm system, can be the best defence against pests. AgResearch scientist Colin Ferguson says the most problematic pasture pests right now are black beetle in the top of the North Island, grass grub and Porina nationwide. Porina caterpillar numbers eased this year, after presenting a big problem for many North Island farmers the previous season and despite very large moth flights observed this summer. Ferguson says Porina outbreaks can be predicted to some extent. “When Porina populations are stable it is because numbers are kept in check by a range of natural diseases, but when populations are disrupted we can expect outbreaks. “The recent North Island damage was brought about by the very dry late summer of 2014.” Porina populations suffer in these conditions, but so too do the natural Porina come back strong after very dry summers.

Back up feed is the best defence against Black Beetle.

diseases that help keep these pests in check. “That allows numbers of Porina to build up and we see damage, especially in the second and third years following that dry summer. The natural diseases also build back up, but lag behind the Porina.” The damage doesn’t always occur all at once, often parts of paddocks or parts of the farm show damage one year and other parts the next. Large moth flights this summer resulted from high caterpillar numbers last winter, but the populations measured this winter are lower than the previous two years. That is because the diseases are back. “If we get a couple of average summers from now on we’ll see a reduction in Porina.” Despite that, it still pays to take note

of when Porina moths fly in your area and think ahead, especially in very dry summers and if pasture renewal follows cultivation. Ferguson suggests digging some holes to count caterpillars eight to 12 weeks after the main flight, when caterpillars have hatched to work out what, if any, impact there will be on pastures. This will help decide whether action is required, or if there is enough feed to cope with any expected damage. Ferguson says just two caterpillars per 20cm spade square will result in production losses. “That number over a hectare will eat as much as one-two ewes.”

‘If we get a couple of average summers from now on we’ll see a reduction in Porina.’

More than that will cause plant deaths and eight per spade square is enough to take out pasture completely. “That is equivalent to set stocking at 5-10 ewes/ha over the entire winter when pastures are not growing.” Spraying pastures with insecticide to kill the caterpillars can be a good insurance to protect young pastures. “If you can’t be bothered digging, that will insure your pastures, but if you dig you can make an informed decision whether control is necessary and if so, what return are you going to get back for the cost of that?” Don’t be fooled by good late summer/ 82

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Pest fodder Pasture pests are developing a taste for a popular winter feed crop. AgResearch scientist Colin Ferguson has heard of emerging insect problems in fodder beet. The crop’s surge in popularity is providing previously relatively obscure pests with an abundant food supply. “We’re starting to see insect damage now in the fodder beet that we weren’t seeing before, particularly from a caterpillar eating leaves, which scientists think is the caterpillar Spodoptera exigua, commonly called beet armyworm, but we need to confirm that,” Ferguson says. To farmers, this appears to be a new pest, but it has been around for some time. There is no data yet on whether or not the caterpillar is impacting plants. Impact will likely vary across the country. Ferguson says some farmers have sprayed the pest, but there is currently no labelled insecticide product for use against it on fodder beet. Ferguson says seed companies are keeping a close eye on the emerging pest and they are probably the best point of contact for farmers with concerns about their crop. autumn growth or having plenty of cover. Rank pasture covers when Porina moths are flying aids egg and caterpillar survival. In most of the country Porina damage is predominantly seen from April to June. However, farmers in the lower/central North Island may not see damage until June or July.

GRASS GRUB Ferguson says grass grub damage has been widely spread in recent seasons, possibly related to weather conditions and is particularly noticeable this year. Just like Porina, grass grub are usually regulated by natural diseases, thus very dry summers and cultivation can be precursors to damage two-three years later. Dig holes in February to look for small grubs. Eight or more per hole means you will see some damage. If numbers are low, nitrogen can help grass and clover tolerate grass grub feeding. The plants will also be more nutritious, so the grub will need to eat less. Applied early, insecticide can prevent damage occurring. Applied later it may help prevent more plant losses and weeds invading bare open patches. “It’s a judgement call for farmers to make - how much damage do they expect, can they cope with that or do they need extra feed or will the spring growth kick in before the plants die?” Country-Wide Crops August 2017

Grass grub damage has been widely spread in recent seasons.

Unfortunately, insecticide also kills the sick grubs that are suffering from and spreading natural diseases. “Anything we do to wipe out the pests wipes out the natural diseases as well.”

BLACK BEETLE Black Beetle survival this winter is expected to be close to normal. Ferguson says very little can be done to control this pest, so it is more a matter of having enough feed in the system to combat any damage. “When you’re thinking spring feed, if you’re in a black beetle area you may want some extra maize or other feed as a buffer for any lost feed.” Ferguson says the bio-control agent against clover root weevil is doing a good job of keeping this pest under control. New pasture sown on cultivated land can be at risk, as the weevil will likely make a comeback in that pasture before the bio-control agent catches up. Young clover plants need a chance to get established before the weevil comes back. This can be achieved by using a break crop of anything that isn’t clover.

SCIENTISTS BATTLE AGAINST PESTS Scientists and seed companies are continuing work to create new bio pesticide and endophyte defence against pasture pests. AgResearch scientist Colin Ferguson says this work is ongoing, but the endophytes available are effective. AR37 endophyte is proving very successful against Porina and also offers some protection against black beetle. Occasionally he hears about AR37 endophyte failures against Porina, but often this is during an extremely high challenge when damage would have been much worse without endophyte

protection. The chemical produced by the AR37 endophyte fungus stops being produced in really cold temperatures. “When we’ve had very high populations of Porina – 200-250 per square – if it wasn’t protected by AR37 I would expect no grass survival. “If you regularly get hit with Porina you should be looking at an endophyte to protect your ryegrasses.” DLF Seeds released a new endophyte in autumn. Happe provides tolerance to Porina and other insects, with no negative effect on animal safety, growth or palatability. DLF says Happe is the first meadow fescue novel endophyte in the world that is available in a perennial ryegrass cultivar. Ferguson says endophyte options for grass grub are more limited, but the Cropmark Barrier Combo meadow fescue does provide good protection for farmers who want to grow this type of pasture. Failure of the bio-control agent for Argentine stem weevil (ASW) is occurring nationwide, but the impact on pastures is yet to be established. Ferguson says this is extremely rare and appears to be due to evolved resistance in the weevil to the biocontrol agent. For the past 25 years, ASW has been well controlled in established permanent perennial ryegrass pastures by a combination of the biocontrol agent and a range of endophytes. “In some cases the endophytes are undoubtedly the prime control, in other cases the impact of the biocontrol agent is strong,” Ferguson says. He says the bio-control agent still has some impact, but there is a concern that if this can fail, similar problems could emerge with the bio-control agent for clover root weevil. 83

CROP PROTECTION | AGRONOMY

Weeding out clover and plantain problems Cheyenne Stein Plantain and clover crops are becoming increasingly popular but weed control can be a challenge. Mat Dorward, forage & cropping adviser for H&T agronomics says there are ways to tackle the issue and developments in plantain cultivars look promising. Plantain is essentially a broadleaf weed bred and developed as an alternative pasture as it was discovered that it has a high nutritional value. “It’s not clover that’s the issue, there are plenty of on-label clover sprays such as Thistrol or Pulsar. Plantain on the other hand is actually on the ‘weeds controlled’ on a lot of those chemicals.” This means plantain is reactive to chemicals such as phenoxies, a family of chemicals that induce rapid and uncontrolled growth when sprayed on broadleaf plants, result in them “growing to death”. The development of PG742 is likely to offer slightly better thistle control options, Dorward says. PG742 is an Agricom-bred plantain that has some phenoxy tolerance, allowing some phenoxies to be applied, which is not the case with Tonic plantain. “PG742 is only new to the market, so we’re still testing the waters, but what we have seen in trial work thistle control looks promising.”

WEED CONTROL IN ESTABLISHING PLANTAIN AND CLOVER When establishing a crop of plantain and clover, early weed control is the key for a successful crop and the common spray recommendations for broadleaf weeds haven’t changed much. “Bentazone has been widely used in the

last three to four years. It’s quite a soft chemical and is off-label for plantain but when applied under the right conditions: small weeds, lots of water, warm growing conditions – if you get all those ducks in a row then the results are generally very good.” When weeds are too big or growing conditions are less than ideal (too cold and moisture stress), there is poor uptake of the chemical, resulting in average results. “If you get weed control right in the first year, it allows the crop to establish a lot better, which gives you benefits in terms of growing more drymatter (DM) but also benefits in terms of weed suppression and ground cover, making it difficult for weeds to establish in the second year.” Dorward says if you don’t get weed control right in that first year of a crop, you will be chasing your tail as weeds get larger and become harder to control. Grass weed control is on-label and generally pretty successful with the sprays such as Clethodim and Haloxyfop-P. “Weeds are competing for space, moisture, light and nutrients, so you need to be eliminating them to allow the crop to flourish and increase production. Although in a low payout year this can be tough, Dorward says skimping on weed control, particularly during the establishment phase, would put farmers in a worse position later down the track, and end up costing money, quality and DM for years to come. “It’s no different to a pasture system, the first three months are important for the longevity of that crop and sets it up for the years to come. We need to educate farmers that they are running an intensive system which requires more

Nutritional – Plantain and four clovers - Lightning Persian clover, Balansa, Mainstay and Tribute.

inputs, like spray and fertiliser, than a pasture system but it will generate greater returns.”

WEED CONTROL IN ESTABLISHED PLANTAIN AND CLOVER Plantain doesn’t compete well with naturally seeding grasses such as browntop and Yorkshire fog which can limit production of plantain, meaning control of grass weeds on an annual or bi-annual basis is important. Broadleaf weeds and thistles are a big issue for both establishing and established crops and requires lateral thinking when tackling them. Bentazone is still largely used as the base chemical, however spiking with other off-label proprietary products in order to overcome the poor uptake of Bentazone alone, particularly on hairy thistles such as scotch thistles. “With established crops you generally have more grass weeds and bigger thistles which are harder to kill. So we are using Bentazone with different spikes depending on the paddock and weed situation.”

Plantain facts • Higher palatability over ryegrasses • High protein and mineral content • High digestibility of 75% (vs 55% for ryegrass) • Rapid fractional degradation rate (2.5 hours to 50% degradation vs six hours for ryegrass) • Responds best to rotational grazing but can also be set stocked • A prolific re-seeder; meaning the crop will often get stronger as it gets older • Increased cool season drymatter production.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

CROP PROTECTION | PORINA

On the hunt for moths Anne Hughes Ruapehu farmers are arming themselves with knowledge to identify and anticipate potential risks from pasture pests. The Ruapehu Pasture Pest group was formed in response to the increased porina challenge that followed some very dry summers. Farmers have been trapping porina moths in flight during summer to learn more about their flight patterns. After damage to pastures on his Raetihi farm last year, Dan Leary was keen to trap Porina moths this summer to learn more about them. In some of the shady country, pasture losses were as high as 40%. Dan observed some big flights over the farm in early February and March, filling the trap to overflowing. He dug ground six weeks later, but did not find the volume of caterpillars to indicate a big threat of damage this year. Leary has learnt that Porina survival is

largely weather-dependent and eggs seem to survive better in shady, moist areas. He expects the dry autumn would have killed many. With support from Beef + Lamb New Zealand, the Ruapehu Pasture Pest Group has held two field days so far. These have been well attended by farmers who have been able to see soil samples containing different pests, to learn what to look for on their farms and how to identify pests in their different stages. Dan hasn’t had to spray pesticide against Porina yet. He hopes applying urea will boost grass growth enough to make up for any lost production, if pasture damage occurs. He has heard that the “hoof and tooth” approach can prevent Porina damage. That seems to be working in his cattle cell grazing blocks, where there is a definite line of Porina damage directly under the polywire, where stock are not grazing or trampling the caterpillar holes. “I’ve learnt a lot about them and I know what to look for now.” Ruatiti Valley farmer Merv Williams has also found the pasture pest group useful for learning how to monitor porina

flights and trap moths. “We’ve learnt how to start monitoring Porina movements earlier, but there just doesn’t appear to be any quick fix answer,” Merv says. He also observed a large flight over his farm in February and although any damage won’t appear until late winter/early spring, numbers of moths underground didn’t indicate a high risk to pastures this year. “There are Porina around, but I don’t think they are in alarming numbers.” Merv says they have gone into winter with more feed than in recent years, so hopefully that will provide enough of a buffer to mitigate any Porina damage to pastures. In his 40 years of farming the property, Porina have only appeared in the last four. Merv sprayed for Porina the first two years. It helped control the damage, but was a hassle trying to get the timing and conditions right for spraying. The next Ruapehu Pasture Pest field day is being planned for spring.

aahughes@gisborne.net.nz

Pasture damage from Porina moth caterpillars.

The main thing to remember is that every paddock is different and you have to treat it that way, Dorward says. The rate of chemical and type of chemical recommended varies a little bit year-toyear and varies for weed type and size, temperature, growing conditions and the rates should reflect that. “We have found that in some cases Bentazone and a spike followed by topping a few weeks later proved really effective on large scotch thistles, which can be hard to control. Bentazone tends to have a better uptake on waxy thistles (nodding, variegated, winged). Hairy thistles like scotch thistles the uptake is pretty poor, hence why we have had to play around with spikes.” Spring control of thistles can work well Country-Wide Crops August 2017

but is often a difficult time due to high feed demand and often a lack of spare paddocks. Late autumn control of thistles can be most effective as thistles are seedlings and feed demand is slightly lower than in spring. “Farmers often stay off their paddocks in the winter to set them up for calving or lambing so pre-winter can provide a good opportunity to control weeds.” Dorward says the key message for weed control on established plantain and clover crops is that sometimes it has to be approached with a bit of innovation, particularly when it comes to thistle control. “Every paddock is different, there is no blanket spray recommendation that

you use on every plantain and clover paddock. That’s where a good rep comes into play who has a good understanding of chemicals, spray timings etc.”

Key messages for plantain and clover • • • • •

Spray weeds early High water rate – 300L water 15C air temperature 12C soil temperature Active growth to ensure better chemical uptake • Spraying when weeds and thistles are small • Consult with your agronomist to get the best advice for your crop.

CROP PROTECTION | PEST PROTECTION

Brave new world of biopesticides Andrew Swallow Move over chemistry: biology is coming to an ag-chem store near you. A six-year research programme (see panel) to develop biological products to manage some of New Zealand’s main pastoral, arable and horticultural pests and diseases is starting to deliver, judging by the comments of its leader, AgResearch’s Maureen O’Callaghan, to FAR’s conference earlier this winter. Citing an article that appeared recently in Nature headed “When The Pesticides Run Out”, she told delegates that while the headline was alarmist, in future it’s likely there will be fewer effective agrichemicals in our armoury against crop pests, weeds and diseases, due to organisms developing resistance, increasingly zealous regulation, soaring research, development and registration costs, environmental concerns and public pressure. “It’s an issue that’s not going to go away,” she told delegates. Biopesticides in the form of viruses, bacteria, fungi, nematodes and other biologically derived products offer an alternative and they’re attracting “huge investment” globally in light of the pressure on agrichemicals. Besides offering alternative controls to maintain food production for a growing global population, typically biopesticides have narrow host ranges and are very safe for operators, consumers and beneficial species alike, O’Callaghan said. To date, NZ-developed biopesticides are few but one example is Bioshield Grass Grub. Its active ingredient is the bacterium Serratia entomophila formulated for sowing as a granule that kills 10-20% of

the grub population within six weeks of application and provides protection from re-infestation for three-five years*. “Pest resurgence after agrichemical application is a real problem that can be avoided with this type of technology,” O’Callaghan said. Finding the beneficial bugs is only part of the programme: optimising formulation and delivery to ensure a live, active control is applied in the paddock is just as important. “There’s no point having a product that no-one can apply. And we need to think who will make and distribute them, as well as how farmers will use them.” Consequently AgResearch is working with “commercial partners” – O’Callaghan didn’t say who – to take products to market, noting there’s “a lot of IP involved”.

‘There’s no point having a product that no-one can apply. And we need to think who will make and distribute them, as well as how farmers will use them.’

One novel bacterium the programme’s been working with is Yersinia entomophaga. It kills several key pest species including grass grub, porina, plantain moth, diamondback moth and black beetle, yet is safe for bees, earthworms, birds, fish and small mammals. Identified in NZ for the first time about 2010, it’s since been formulated into

Next Generation Biopesticide programme The Next Generation Biopesticide programme is a collaboration between AgResearch, Lincoln University, and Plant & Food Research run by Bio-Protection Research Centre (see www. bioprotection.org.nz). The six-year programme was allocated $2.1 million a year by the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment when launched in 2013 with additional funding and in kind support from Grasslanz Technology Ltd, FAR and Zespri. It aims to develop prototype biopesticides featuring rapid knockdown capability, multiple modes of action against pest complexes, low resistance risk, and which are cost-competitive with existing controls.

AgResearch’s Dr Maureen O’Callaghan updated delegates at the FAR conference on the Next Generation Biopesticide programme, which she leads.

prototype sprays, granules or baits, and is “on a pathway to commercialisation”. O’Callaghan said after the conference it typically takes “no less than five years” from discovery of a biopesticide to commercialisation and may take 10 years or more. Endophytic fungi don’t have to go through the pesticide registration process, so tend to be among the fastest to market, but bacteria and other bugs do, so generally take longer. To import an overseas organism adds even more hurdles, so the programme’s concentrated on microbes already in NZ. With endophytes, commercialisation in pasture grasses has been the focus to date, but O’Callaghan said ones for maize and brassica are possible too. “There are a staggeringly large number of fungi present inside a maize plant. Some are pathogens but a number show promising activity against various pests and diseases,” she said. Studies carried out at the Bio-Protection Research Centre have identified more than 150 fungi in brassicas. Besides sprays, granules and baits, O’Callaghan said seed treatment “is a nice approach” to deliver some biopesticides, requiring little inoculum but placing the product “where it needs to be: right around the roots of the plant where a lot of the pests are”. *Product information from www. biostart.co.nz . Biostart is an Aucklandbased specialist in biological agricultural and horticultural products manufacturing in Morrinsville.

SLUG BIOCONTROL POSSIBLE? Later at the FAR conference, O’Callaghan’s AgResearch colleague Mike Wilson suggested a slug-killing nematode used in glasshouse horticulture and gardens overseas might be deployed in open fields here. Nemaslug contains the nematode Phasmarhabditis hermaphrodita and has been available as a biocontrol for slugs Country-Wide Crops August 2017

CROP PROTECTION | BIOSECURITY

Biosecurity starts at home DO YOU KNOW THIS NUMBER: 0800 809966? Every farmer should and it should be programmed in their cellphones, Federated Farmers biosecurity spokesman Guy Wigley told FAR’s recent conference. “If you find something you don’t recognise, for goodness sake ring the [MPI] 0800 number. Time is very important when it comes to responses to biosecurity incursions,” he said, going on to endorse MPI’s 2025 Biosecurity Strategy which advocates every farmer acting as a scout for incursions. “The sooner we put our hands up and recognise an incursion the better the chance of eradicating it.” Farmers could also do a lot to protect their own properties, crops and stock, which would not only benefit their own businesses, but help slow the spread of incursions nationally. A farm biosecurity plan should be made, which in the case of cropping farms should include ensuring all machinery coming on to the property is free of trash, harvest residues and soil to prevent import of weeds, pest or diseases.

Ensure all machines coming on to the farm are clean, Feds’ biosecurity spokesman Guy Wigley told FAR conference delegates.

Ideally, machinery should be cleaned between paddocks too in order to limit spread of problems within a farm. “If you later find you have an incursion of something in one field, you’ll be very thankful you did.” Once established and recorded, such problem areas should be harvested and/or baled well before the end of the paddock

Beware oneyear result risk

Dead as: grass grubs killed by Yersinia entomophaga, a bacterium which shows promise as a biopesticide against a range of agricultural pests.

in Europe since 1994. In 2012, thanks to a FAR Sustainable Farming Fund project, AgResearch discovered it in a few slugs here, and in July last year the EPA ruled it is not a “new” organism to New Zealand, clearing the way for registration and commercialisation. “With a bit of improvisation I think we could get it to work on broadacre crops,” Wilson said. Overseas it is sprayed on, but Wilson suggested injection in the seed row, or some form of seed treatment might be alternative delivery methods. As a facultative parasite, it could survive temporarily on crop residue until a host (ie: slug) passed by, he pointed out. BASF, which produces Nemaslug, said it was looking at where the product might work in NZ, however there were considerable challenges to be overcome, particularly for a broadacre field Country-Wide Crops August 2017

to give contaminated material as long as possible to work its way out of the machine. Even simple tools, such as heavy discs working ground after fodder beet, should be cleaned because noxious weeds such as velvet leaf could be carried between paddocks and properties in the soil, he warned.

application. As yet no application for product approval has been lodged with EPA or ACVM. Wilson said the patent on P.hermaphrodita as a biocontrol has expired so it’s possible another company could develop a product. “At the moment it is quite expensive to use, probably too expensive for use in cereals, so we’re hoping to test it on vegetable crops.” A low cost approach might be to apply much lower doses than those currently commercialised in the hope the nematode population establishes and multiplies sufficiently to limit slug damage at a later date. However, at germination and seedling stages of crops such as brassicas, and even maize, it only takes a few slugs per square metre to be economically damaging, he noted.

If you’re on FAR’s database, by the time you read this you should have received this year’s spring cultivar evaluation booklet. FAR released the booklet online in early July and said hard copies should arrive in mailboxes about two weeks later. Commenting on the content, FAR’s Rob Craigie said last summer’s conditions really tested spring barleys, with plots lodging at Methven and St Andrews and brackling at Pendarves. Such a year was “no bad thing” from a trials perspective as it provided valuable data on traits such as stiffness and resistance to lodging. Growers could use the data to make decisions if they were particularly concerned about those things, but that shouldn’t be done without looking at fouryear mean results too to ensure decisions were made on robust data. “Some of the newer varieties were at the top of last year’s results but they’re still numbered varieties so we won’t say too much about them until they have two or three more years’ data behind them.”

PLANT & MACHINERY | CEREALS EVENT

TRITON SP DRILL

Innovations on show Despite many of the big names not making an appearance at this year’s Cereals Event in the United Kingdom, machinery innovations still make their debut in droves. Nick Fone rounds up a few of the highlights. LANDQUIP JCB FASTRAC CONVERSION Suffolk sprayer specialist Landquip had its take on the 4000-series JCB Fastrac on show for the first time. With the cab shifted forward ahead of the engine, the skid unit can accommodate a 5000-litre demount spray pack or a spreader body. The combination of a 220hp Sisu engine and the Fendt Vario stepless transmission makes the tractor ideal for working steep ground where a mechanical driveline is a must. Being able to infinitely vary speeds through the CVT box gives similar functionality to a traditional hydrostatic transmission, according to the firm. The design of the stainless steel tank fully utilises the long platform created by the cab being in front of the engine. This is said to result in equal 50:50 weight distribution, adding to the “goanywhere” vehicle’s abilities. Slightly larger capacity custom-built, shaped stainless steel fuel and hydraulic

tanks mounted on the nearside enable large diameter flotation 710/60 R38 and R46 rowcrop wheels to be fitted. In addition to the existing mudguards, the conversion gets 560mm wide steel guards complete with mud flaps to prevent soil being thrown on to the booms. Being a bespoke-build, options are available for the spray pack with pumps of 450-litres/min or 700-litres/min which are kept clear of the drawbar to ensure bowser towing is still possible. Tri-fold aluminium booms up to 44 metres wide concertina in to a narrow transport width of 2.55m and height of just over 3.8m. In an effort to ensure downtime is kept to a minimum Landquip says it has worked hard to ensure the demount procedure takes no more than 15 minutes so the tractor can be quickly back in the field. The $NZ355,000 rig working in the Sprays and Sprayers demo area has been sold to Scottish Borders firm Crop Services which operates seven self-

Having tried virtually every direct drill on the market, grower Simon Chaplin felt no single machine on offer was capable of dealing with a full range of soil conditions. Farming more than 1620 hectares across Cambridgeshire, Northamptonshire, Norfolk and the Scottish Borders, he wanted to move to a one-pass zero-tillage crop establishment system across all his sites so he set out to develop one. And the Triton SP is the result. A very simple box-section frame carries two rows of rigid tines which carry the coulters. Two further rows of tines follow this running just offset to the leading ones to create a sideways heave to close the slot without the need for a following press wheel. Without a packer roll he says the drill can travel in more-challenging conditions and the surface is left undisturbed and unconsolidated so weed seeds are less-likely to emerge. Metering is provided by a Weaving front tank and widths of 2.4m, 3m, 4m and 4.8m are available but not yet in folding format. A 3m version will set you back $NZ44,300 with the cost of a front hopper adding to that. propelled units plus a further 10 or so trailed and mounted sprayers. For the first half of 2017 it has been working with a 6.5-tonne lime/fertiliser spreader on the steep terrain throughout the Borders and Fife and has since swapped across to spraying duties with a 4500-litre spray pack and 36m aluminium booms.

MASCHIO PLOUGH Following Maschio’s purchase of a controlling share in Italian plough manufacturer Moro Pietro Meccanica, the company now offers a full line-up of three to six-furrow models in its distinctive scarlet livery. Two model ranges are available, all with mechanical or hydraulically variable working width adjustment and either shear-bolt or hydro-pneumatic auto-reset obstacle protection. The Unico M is the mid-range line suitable for tractors up to 200hp and topping out at five furrows. The heavy duty Unico L shares many of its smaller sibling’s features but is built to cope with up to 300hp up front. It is available in four, five and six-furrow formats. According to the company the key features of its ploughs are fast front furrow width-adjustment, intelligent hydraulic auto reset, simple, rapid body and skimmer adjustment plus a memory function for headland turnovers that avoids wear-andtear on the vary-width linkages. Prices for the UNICO M start from $NZ24,150 while the UNICO L starts from $NZ33,660, depending on specification. A full range of body choices and optional extras are available.

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CARRE ANATIS ROBOT Carre had its robotic weeder working on a small demo plot. The Anatis has been developed in partnership with the University of Nantes and is designed to work autonomously at the timeconsuming task of removing weeds in row crops. Electrically driven, the version on show was equipped with a 1.2m wide inter-row hoe and an evaluation Weedseeker unit designed to recognise individual weeds and give them a shot of herbicide. The rear three-point linkage has a side-shift facility that ensures the hoe stays on the straight and narrow while Trimble RTK keeps the wheels in line. In addition further cameras detect obstacles and bring the unit to a halt. Controls are accessed via a smartphone/tablet app although Muller and Beckhoff computers on the flanks of the Anatis are used for all the main settings. Track width is adjustable to suit different crop row spacings. Work rate stands at around 3-4kph. It’s no longer a concept – the first unit has been sold in France and another four are in the pipeline. Pricetag $NZ126,950-$NZ142,800.

BROCKS ROTO-VARIO Apart from wowing the crowds with its monster 24m rolls, Brocks had a brace of novel ditch-cleaners on display. Built for the Essex-based firm in France, the Roto-Vario line-up includes models with reaches that extend from 2.8m to 4.5m. A rotary cutting head cleans a semi-circular groove along the bottom of the ditch, flinging out the spoil and leaving the banks undisturbed. That’s a key factor in good drainage maintenance, according to the firm, as vegetation on the sides helps to retain soil and stop the waterway clogging up. Hydraulically adjusted deflector plates control the throw of spoil and mean it can switch from flinging out to the far side of the ditch to spreading it out in a fine layer across the field. With a chain-drive the power requirement isn’t particularly heavy, key issue being tractor weight to carry the hefty offset arm. Prices vary from $NZ14,200 to $NZ31,955 depending on model choice.

GRANGE MACHINERY Having only been up and running for a year, Grange Machinery reports strong demand for its pre-drill/ implement soil-looseners and fert kits. Set up by exCultivating Solutions’ Rhun Jones, the business started as a wearing-metal specialist and, following customer enquiries for a follow-on to the defunct firm’s product range of fertiliser kits for drills and compactionalleviation toolbars suitable for mounting on drill drawbars. The yellow-liveried versions are said to be much more user-friendly, taking just a few minutes to unhitch from the drill or implement rather than several hours. As before, the toolbar remains at a set height for headland turns with the tines and discs lifted in and out of work by a spool-valve. On the new 6m version the wingsections are plumbed into the same hydraulic circuit so that as it pressurises they swing forward and up, allowing the drill/cultivator drawbar to swing in tight against the toolbar for ultra-tight turnarounds without the two bits of kit clashing. The 6m,12-leg unit adds 200-250hp to the power requirement of any implement and costs $NZ39,050 to $NZ40,830.

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BRISTOWS STRIP-TILL SEEDER Linconshire firm Bristows had a new version of its Split-Level subsoiler on display specifically for establishing oilseed rape. Up front there is a choice of surface-loosening tines or discs followed by a choice of subsoiler legs – either wide-winged, minimum disturbance or rearward raked. The company’s trademark hedgehog Multi-Tooth Tiller Roll provides initial consolidation and levelling ahead of pairs of angled disc coulters. Supplied by a Stocks TurboJet metering unit, the discs are cranked over at a 45 degree angle, placing seed in two rows directly in line with where the legs have run. Finally individual flat roll sections firm up the ground behind each pair of coulters.

BAYER In an effort to help limit operator exposure to chemical nasties before regulations have them banned, Bayer has developed its Easy Flow closed transfer system. A clever connector is screwed on to the neck of the container, piercing the foil in the process. The can is then inverted on to the filling station which can be mounted on the sprayer, bowser or simply kept at the chemical store and coupled up when required. With it in place the operator can dispense a measured amount, rinse the whole rig and disconnect the can all without coming anywhere close to the product. Bayer has placed 80 units out for evaluation this season on farms around the UK and expects that when it comes to market it will retail for around $NZ1065, distributed through Billericay Farm Services.

ANDERSON PRO CHOP 150 Nottinghamshire contracting and engineering firm D Clifford and Sons is the new importer for the Anderson range of balechasers, in-line tube wrappers, feeder wagons and straw chopper/feeders. Capable of handling both big square and round bales, key USP for the Pro Chop 150 is that it uses a separate horizontal bladed rotor to chop and tease out material rather than knives on the blower flywheel. On the back of this are hydraulically adjusted counter-knives to alter the aggressiveness of its action and a flap to limit the flow of material in to the rotor. The company says this arrangement means it’s much less-inclined to bung up with dense, clumpy wads and also that users can fit a screen to get a really fine chop, similar to the effect of a tub grinder. In chopping mode the Canadian unit can fling straw up to 18m but a two-speed gearbox for the blower means it can also be run at a slower pace to feed out baled silage and hay. Price for the trailed machine is $NZ35,500.

LARRINGTON Lincolnshire trailer maker Richard Larrington reports a surge in interest for his specialist ‘anti-bruising’ box loader trailers from overseas and to that end has developed an even bigger tri-axle version. Helped along by a weakening pound, export demand has risen leading to inquiries from all over the globe including Poland, Slovakia and California. Until recently in the US, the harvesting of root crops has been a manual task with sweet potatoes, onions, etc wind-rowed by machine and then transferred to boxes by hand with cheap labour from over the border in Mexico. Now however, with

GRIMME CROP CART Developed in the United States by Grimme subsidiary Spudnik, the Crop Cart is under evaluation in the UK for this harvest. Effectively it’s an 18t chaser bin that can be used for all manner of root crops as well as grain. In the base of the hopper there is a rubber conveyor that can either propel material rearwards and out through the tailgate or send it forwards to the telescopic unloading conveyor. In standard build this is a web but can be swapped for a belt when used for cereals and pulses. It can discharge its entire load in three minutes. Not only useful for harvesting, the CropCart is used by growers in the States to bulk-load planters as well. Further adding to its versatility, there’s also the possibility of swapping the up-and-over rear door for a spreading hood, turning the unit into a muck and compost application rig. As yet there’s no indication on pricing but it’s unlikely to be a cheapie with its standard spec of 600mm wide rubber, air-brakes, steering rear axle and hydraulic suspension.

Trump’s proposed wall on the cards, growers are having to look at mechanising their operations. Step up the Larrington box-loader. A frame that sits on top of the boxes carries 12 individual cushioned fall-breakers. The harvester driver simply unloads direct on to the frame as if filling a bulk trailer then, back at the yard, the frame is raised and the potatoes tumble gently into the boxes ready for a forklift to unload them. They’ve become one of Larrington’s most popular products and with more and with more concern about soil care, nearly every one that goes out the door is now a tri-axle unit. They’re hi-spec kit with 560mmwide rubber, air-brakes and steel springs as standard and a $NZ88,765 pricetag.

TRACKED SAMPO

HERBST GRAVEL CART AgriLinc had a range of Herbst trailers on its stand including a simple but cleverly made gravel cart for back-filling draining trenches. The 8t capacity hopper drops material on to a sliding cross-conveyor which can distribute material to either left or right of the trailer thanks to its side-shift facility. A hydraulic shutter is used to control the rate of flow of stone into the trench. Requiring three spool-valves, the eight-tonner retails for $NZ15,533.

Braintree-based Trials Equipment had a Sampo plot-harvester equipped with Zuidberg rubber tracks on display. Paired together specifically for Suffolk trials harvesting contractor Envirofield, the tracks have been bolted on not for extra traction or limiting compaction but for stability. That’s because nearly all trials plots are harvested at 90 degrees to the tramlines so the relatively small wheels of a plot combine drop into the ruts, causing issues for the header and also the threshing gear inside the machine. There’s no room for sieve levelling on these diminutive harvesters so it’s all about keeping them on the level. With a $NZ40,831 pricetag, the tracks will be evaluated this season with a view to them becoming more widely available next year.

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PLANT & MACHINERY | BEET LIFTING BUCKETS

Proof in a versatile tool Joanna Cuttance Inch Clutha farmer Mark Watt bought a beet bucket for transitioning cattle on to fodder beet but it did not take long for him to discover the bucket has many more uses. He bought the 2.6-metre Rata Root Crop Bucket three years ago and couldn’t remember the price but the retail price now is about $7000. Watt can change the sawdust in the calf pens in record time. He places a piece of plywood in the bottom of the bucket to prevent the sawdust falling through. When the calf pens are sorted he parks the bucket beside the wood splitter then when he is finished splitting the firewood and the bucket loaded, it is emptied directly into the woodshed. The bucket is also useful for picking up rubbish. He describes as awesome for the SF Brigadier fodder beet he grows, a variety recommended for lifting. Having a beet bucket has made farm management a lot easier. This year he lifted a 20m strip of beet beside a shelter belt. This area of cleared beet was a great area to start break grazing as the cattle had room to move and shelter from the cool winds, resulting in no break outs. Though Mark felt confident using the bucket he would not recommend an inexperienced driver operating it unsupervised. He felt there could be a risk of tipping a tractor if the bucket was too heavily loaded. Dean Willis, who farms at Bull Creek, in Otago, bought his beet bucket last winter and says it takes a lot of practise to work it perfectly. You need to use the hydraulics a lot, adjusting continuously depending on the weight of the beet, he said. Get it wrong and you end up with a lot of dirt, however some days that is just the way it goes. Dean grows SF Brigadier fodder beet. He said the bucket was a lot easier to use last winter compared to this winter. Last winter the bulbs were big, a lot of the

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bulb out of the ground, and the ground was reasonably dry. This winter, coming off a cool, wet summer, the bulbs are about a third of the size as last winter and a lot of the bulb is in the ground. This has made the bucket quite difficult to work with he said, as often he was getting too much dirt.

One farmer lifted 80ha of beet in two weeks with a 3.5m bucket into a truck and trailer. Dean said it was tough because this winter has been very wet and there was only one paddock he could use the bucket for lifting in. Despite the difficulties of this winter he still highly recommends a bucket because when you get it right it is great and all it takes is practice, he said. Dean owns a dairy heifer and beef grazing block, and bought the Rata 2.6m bucket to speed up the day-to-day workload when transitioning stock. Before buying the bucket he would put bulbs on a trailer and take them to the

cattle, increasing the number each day or so until the heifers were ready to go on to beet. This worked well when he only had a small number of mobs but as he got more mobs he found this very time-consuming and he also needed his children to help. Now he can do it all by himself. Like Mark, Dean has found he does not leave the bucket in the shed once transition is over as he has discovered the bucket is very useful for picking up hedge clippings, and also for logs which he can bring home and cut up for firewood. Agriboss, TME and many engineering firms also sell beet buckets. The common width sizes are 3m, 2.6m and 2.4m. An AgriBoss 2.6m bucket sells from $7500$8000 depending where you are in the country. The weight and capacity (cubic metres) for the Rata buckets are: 3m is 520kg and 1.8, 2.6m is 430kg and 1.4 and the 2.4m is 400kg and 1.3. JJ Otago Ltd recommended retail price is $7990 for the 3m, $6975 for 2.6m and $6540 for the 2.4m and optional bucket skids $300, all exclusive of GST. For those looking to try-buy or only want a bucket for transitioning stock, some companies offer hiring. Rex Hire at Winchester, South Canterbury, hire the 2.6m Rata bucket for $190 (inc gst) for three days (the minimum), $350/seven days and $990.00/28 days. As hire fees are expense rather than an asset, it can help reduce the tax bill. AgriBoss owner Peter Kitchen hadn’t leased a bucket yet but was willing to. He has given farmers a bucket to try and they usually buy it. The AgriBoss is designed to lift any variety including sugar beet. He says one farmer lifted 80ha of beet in two weeks with a 3.5m bucket into a truck and trailer rather than bring in a harvester. It meant the leaf which is 5-6t dry matter and has 25-30% of the protein, wasn’t wasted. The soil was in such good condition it only needed a maxi-till before drilling again.

An Agriboss beet bucket.

SOLUTIONS | GROWTH PROMOTANT

Growing with Gibberellic acid

rian Mace and his growth promotant Gibb-Gro were registered with the Primary Industries Ministry in June 2009. “Those were the days,” he says, “when the cost was high at over $20.00 per hectare plus the application.” Gibb-Gro is a naturally occurring growth promoting substance obtained from the culture of the fungus Gibberellic Fujikuroi and contains the naturally occurring hormone gibberellic acid GA3. Brian entered the market with a substantial price reduction and everything just flowed on from there, he says. As his business grew he naturally brought product in larger lots the price got more competitive – now at $5.85 per hectare plus gst delivered. With clients from the far north to the bottom of the South Island, Brian says “word of mouth is my best advertising

by far, you just can’t beat it”. Main selling area is Southland/Canterbury and he is able to meet his clients when he attends the South Island Field Days in Christchurch and Gore in alternate years. “It is good to put a face to the name when they arrive at my site and thus a relationship is formed,” he says. Gibb-Gro is used to help bridge a feed gap. He encourages his clients to apply 70kg of nitrogen (N) per hectare in late June, or a bit later in the South Island, then follow behind their stock with the Gibberellic plus 30kg N preferably mixed in with the Gibb through spring. “That way one should not run short of feed,” he says. “It is hard trying to play catch up and we all know that grass goes away quickly.” He also thinks farmers, like it or not, are all turning a little green and with using less urea they feel happier. Brian has been told many times by clients

Gibb-Gro is a naturally occurring growth promoting substance obtained from the culture of the fungus Gibberellic Fujikuroi.

that after an application of Gibb-Gro mixed with the likes of N or seaweed-type products they rest easier knowing their grass will grow and it is getting a feed as well. Plus the money savings are there.

More? Contacted Brian on www.gibb-gro.co.nz 07 571 0336 or 0274 389 822.

Portal to aid vets, nurses and support staff

Bayer Territory Manager, Megan Hunter and veterinarian Dr Aaron Begg from Remuera Vets

Bayer New Zealand has launched VetSpace, a training portal that provides a wide range of online training essentials for keeping veterinary clinics up-to-date with developments. The portal offers broad training across all aspects of veterinary practice – for free. It’s available to all NZ veterinary practices wanting to keep up-to-date with the latest in product development, clinical information and business or retailing advice. Bayer New Zealand managing director Derek Bartlett says the portal represents a new level of training for vet practices because it caters to everyone.

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“Many online training portals focus on new products or information for vets only. We’ve taken it a step further and incorporated training modules for other vet clinic staff – the support staff, vet nurses, technicians and managers who are all an important part of keeping a veterinary business going. “We really wanted to provide easy access to the most relevant information to enable vets to improve their practices – both technically and from a business point of view,” Bartlett says. Courses cover information relevant to both farm animal and companion animal vets as well as mixed vet practices. Well-known and respected industry vets, including learning and development specialist, Dr Lab Wilson, have designed some of the courses. “Current thinking in learning and development circles recognises the value in training that allows busy people access to ‘just-in-time’ learning in bite-sized chunks. “VetSpace provides this specifically for veterinary practices enabling practice personnel to learn what they want, how they want and when they need,” Wilson says. Keeping up-to-date is not only an ethical obligation, but is also essential in providing a high level of service and ensuring best practice standards are maintained, he says.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

CLASSIFIEDS

Plants grown from H&T Optimised seeds, left, produced 13% more shoot mass and 400% more root mass than those grown from Poncho and Vitaflo-treated seeds, right.

Enhancing seeds with Optimised Feilding-based seed and crop specialists, H&T Agronomics have spent the past four years developing seed enhancements that improve crop yields and improve environmental outcomes. H&T Business Manager Duncan Thomas has worked on this project since its inception. “Our vision has been to grow stronger plants that allow us to reduce foliar treatments later in the crop’s development. H&T Optimised seed enhancements are providing better-targeted, low-dose applications 800 700 Shoot Root

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that are carefully sealed on to the seed.” Trial work was completed in 2016 to identify improvements in the early development of maize seedlings comparing H&T Optimised seed to industry-standard treatment options. The outcome of this trial work was published by the New Zealand Agronomy Society and showed a significant increase in root and shoot mass at 39 days after sowing. “This trial work has been a major revelation to us. It confirms trial data that has been presented to us from agronomy companies operating in the United States and Europe. It is a major step forward for maize growers in New Zealand. We will be offering this technology to farmers this spring.” Thomas and managing director Paul Oliver will travel to the US to further explore opportunities for seed enhancement next month. Oliver is excited about the opportunities this presents. “We have installed world-leading seed enhancement machinery in our store. By exploring the latest technology being developed in the world’s largest cropping markets we have the opportunity to unlock the potential developed from enormous research programmes.” “The ability to manage crops using biological treatments that benefit both the farmer and the environment is our vision for the future.”

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ESTATE | SNAPSHOT

Cropping land in demand Anne Hughes

egetable growers are helping buoy sale prices for Waikato cropping land. Property Brokers rural real estate agent in the South Waikato and Central Plateau, Paul O’Sullivan, says demand for horticultural land is seeing growers looking south of the Bombay hills into areas like Matamata and Morrinsville. In some cases land suitable to cropping is selling for similar prices to dairy land, up to $70,000/ha around Matamata and $50,000/ha in South Waikato. O’Sullivan says more maize is being grown on the Central Plateau, with good results. Demand for maize-growing blocks is being driven mostly by the dairy and dairy support sectors. With sales around the Central Plateau and South Waikato dominated by dairy, buyers looking for dry stock properties are struggling to find what they’re looking for. Proposed new rules under the Healthy Rivers plan change continue to slow dry stock sales in the Waikato. Dairy farmers have already had a programme of high productivity and they’re benchmarked against that, he says. Dry stock farmers are facing bigger limitations, especially after many reduced stock numbers in recent years due to drought. Cropping land is keenly sought after in Northland, if it ticks the right boxes for location, soil type and contour. Bayleys rural real estate agent in the Northland district of Kaipara, Catherine Stewart, says demand for cropping land is driven mostly by the dairy sector. However, beef farmers are also taking an interest in land traditionally suited to dairy, as they look to intensify their systems. Stewart says farmers were growing less maize during the recent fall in the milk solids payout. Maize is making a comeback now that prices have lifted and dairy farmers will often grow maize on a

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

run-off or support block. Prices for recent sales of cropping land have been around $22,000/ha. There is strong interest in land suited to kumara growing. Stewart says land with contour, fertility, soil types and infrastructure suited to the kumara industry is selling well, for $28,000$33,000/ha. Stewart is marketing a productive cropping and grazing farm near Dargaville. The 416ha farm is being offered for sale in the variety of single titles. The farm is predominantly flat with some rolling hill country and planted 65ha in maize. With good infrastructure and fertility, the property has been used for cropping,

dairy support and bull finishing. Cultivable land with irrigation and strong soil types command a premium in mid-Canterbury. Farmlands Real Estate mid-Canterbury agent Rob Harnett says this type of country is highly sought after for growing root vegetable crops. Interest in mixed cropping land suitable for growing barley, wheat, maize and small seeds like clover is equally high. Harnett says this type of land has been selling in excess of $50,000/ha. This market is underpinned by demand for dairy support blocks, many of which are also growing maize, barley and wheat.

aahughes@gisborne.net.nz

On the market, this farm has a history of cropping, dairy support and bull finishing.

Infrastructure and fertility on this Northland farm are impressive.

ESTATE | HAWKE’S BAY

y t n e l p a s n Optio i u n a r a t o T at

historic homestead adds to 275-hectares of easy-rolling country near Ongaonga in Central Hawke’s Bay which has been finishing an impressive number of stock to good weights and grades and is now for sale. Totaranui has been run mainly as a finishing property to a larger station in the Wairarapa with sheep and cattle purchased as and when required, using its deep silt loam soils and summer rainfall to maximise profitability. Geoff Waterworth from Professionals Patrick and Scott says the recent fertiliser history, climate and contour of Totaranui make it a desirable property as a standalone farm, dairy support or to continue its existing finishing and trading operation. “It’s an easy-contoured farm that grows a lot of grass,” he says. “An estimated 75% of the farm is tractor country and there has been a significant policy of rotational cropping with about 50% of the farm in new grass.” Totaranui with its five titles lies about 7km from Ongaonga village and 28km from Waipukurau, where it nudges into

the lee of the Ruahine Ranges to receive welcome summer rain. About 23ha of the farm is made up of high-producing flats that flow into gentle-rolling contour with scattered stands of native bush characteristic of the region. It’s a picturesque landscape with an open space covenant and Waterworth says the stands of native bush are considered a positive addition to the farm for shelter and shade as well as its aesthetic appeal. “It’s a very attractive part of the country and west of Highway 50 is a very well known area for farming, with a bit more rainfall. The farm backs on to the Tukituki River as well, so it’s close to the proposed water scheme.” Waterworth describes Totaranui as a pristine property with a good standard of improvements that make it a desirable farm. It’s been subdivided into 34 paddocks that he says are mainly superior condition, with a new scheme pumping water from a bore to holding tanks high on the property, before being reticulated to troughs in each paddock. Farm facilities are extensive and include a four-stand open-board woolshed that Waterworth says is in good

order and works well, with a night pen for 400 sheep. Sheep loading facilities take stock direct from the woolshed. Other facilities include a large four-bay lock-up implement shed plus a three-bay implement shed, a hayshed, loafing barn, stables and a good set of pipe cattle yards. The Totaranui homestead was built in the 1880s with four bedrooms upstairs, while downstairs boasts a large kitchen befitting the size of the house, a formal dining room and two large living areas. The homestead was extensively remodelled about 1980 and the outside of the home is in very good order, while the interior is ready for a family to add their own personal touch. A three-bedroom sunny home on an elevated site is ideal as a stock manager’s residence and is in good order. “It’s a pretty easy farm to manage in a good area. Ongaonga is a small country village boasting a golf course, general store and tavern and it’s a great farming community with plenty of local events.” Totaranui is for sale by negotiation. To view the property visit www.housepoint.co.nz/DU874 and for further information contact Geoff Waterworth on 027 437 8063 or Wayne McDonagh on 027 445 3199.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

ESTATE | WEST OTAGO

Primed for production at Moa Flat A huge makeover in the past few years of a 277-hectare sheep and beef farm in West Otago has lifted it to the point a new owner can walk in and achieve top production results. The Moa Flat farm sits 17km from Heriot, 29km from Tapanui and 64km from Gore on rolling to medium hill country, with some steep areas and it’s for sale at $3.825 million. Mark Wilson from Southern Wide Real Estate says the well-presented farm has been substantially refenced and has a good regrassing and fertiliser history to improve production for its sheep and beef finishing operation. “A younger, driven family purchased it four years ago and they’ve pulled water lines into each block, refenced 7km and redone the yards surrounding the woolshed so someone can walk in now and carry on farming. “They’ve done a lot of refencing and everything is in very good order with great access throughout the property.” The property is now subdivided into 53 paddocks with troughs in each supplied with water from the Moa Flat scheme which is pumped to a tank before being gravity fed to each paddock. About 2000 breeding ewes are

wintered on the farm along with 700 hoggets, 60 R1 cattle, 10 R2 cattle and trading lambs. Cattle are bought in to finish, while lambing begins from September 15 and has achieved carcase weights between 19 and 19.5kg. Winter and summer crops are grown on the farm and it now has rye grass sown into 13.1ha of the previous summer crop, 6.7ha of chou moellier and 17ha of swedes, with the balance in permanent pasture. New grass and crops receive Focus Fertiliser via helicopter as well as the usual fertiliser application. Last year 180 round bales of balage and 50 round bales of hay were made out of surplus pasture. A four-stand raisedboard woolshed and covered yards for 1200 woolly ewes is part of the farm’s infrastructure which also includes two three-bay haysheds, a chemical/storage shed, grain shed and older five-bay shed. A large four-bedroom-plus office brick home built in 2004 with stunning views across the farm is another very appealing aspect of the property, he says. To view the farm visit www. southernwide.co.nz ref SWG1754 and for further information contact Mark Wilson on 03 208 9283 or 0274 917 078.

Taking the credits with the views

Sit back and enjoy a passive income from the forestry rights on a 632-hectare Taupo property, with carbon credits along the way and the potential for future subdivision on its elevated position which enjoys expansive views over the lake. It’s a prime location, less than five minutes’ drive from the lakeside Kinloch village, 20 minutes from the centre of Taupo and close to the Kinloch Golf Club, which all lends itself to future development or tourism. Large areas of easy contour provides scope for development overlooking the

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

picturesque Kinloch valley and beyond to Lake Taupo. The 516.3ha of eucalyptus generates a passive income from a forestry right with a further 15 years to run. Another 4ha is planted in 31-year-old douglas fir, while 50ha is in regenerating bush, 31ha is conservation land and the remainder is roading and tracks that enable easy access around the property. Tony Rasmussen from Bayleys says the passive income would provide a good return on a purchase price of about $4 million. Further returns are obtained

from carbon credits accumulated from trees growing on the property, with future development potential of the land. “It’s a great location. The Kinloch area is quite popular for housing around Taupo with a lot of lifestyle blocks, and land is becoming scarce. This is one of the larger rural land blocks with such close proximity to Taupo.” To view the property visit www. bayleys.co.nz/2800490 and for further information contact Tony Rasmussen on 027 429 2253 or Carlene Reid on 021 759 558.

FARMING IN FOCUS

More photos from this month’s Country-Wide. Kirsty Hill and son Robbie.

One of Waiwhenua’s riverside camp accommodation units.

Looking towards Waiwhenua’s historic homestead.

Kirsty’s eight-week old Border Collie pup. Staff member Duncan Kerr on bike.

George White.

Byron Chittick had his own truck built for bringing home calves.

Young stags newly weaned.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

Nigel Woodhead.

Arjan vanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t Klooster.

FMG Young Farmer of the year 2017 Andrew Wiffen.

Lisa Kendall.

Hamish Best.

Richard French.

Farm manager Cody Marshall in the deer shed during weaning. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a busy time, but deer only take up 20% of the total workload.

Country-Wide Crops August 2017

Nigel Woodhead.

Lisa Kendall.

The small farm where Byron and Susan Chittick live and milk their dairy cows.

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