SYSTEMS MATING STRATEGIES
C
Cycling to fewer bobbies Equity partners Catherine Tither and Sally Harper are boosting milk production and reducing the number of bobby calves on their Rai Valley operation. Anne Hardie reports. Photos by Anne Hardie. 34
atherine Tither was already milking 161 cows before the tanker drove up the track for the first milk pick up of the season and by August 23, 75% of the 665-cow herd had calved. Into that hectic start the team ended up rearing the dairy-beef calves on the farm as well which meant a total of 490 calves on the milking platform. On the Rai Valley farm about an hour east of Nelson, Catherine and her partner Sally Harper are part of an equity partnership that bought the property eight years ago. The farm ranges over 313 hectares that sweeps up from a 240ha milking platform to the steeper surrounding hillsides that have been planted in forestry over the years. Taking a snapshot of their background, Catherine was a farm adviser through the 1980s and had a stint on the Irish Farmers’ Journal before spending 24 years on the family dairy farm near Whakatane. Sally had retrained after nursing and was working in human resources by that stage, plus helping out on the farm for a couple of years. When the family farm was sold, they headed to the Rai Valley, teaming up with two other couples who Catherine says brought not only capital to the business, but a range of complementary skills. Together they set a goal of hitting 255,000kg milksolids (MS) in five years, but surpassed that in their first season. Now their production is close to 300,000kg MS and this year just 87 calves went on the bobby truck. One of Catherine’s pet hates is seeing perfectly good calves go on the bobby truck and to avoid that, they have teamed up with a beef breeder in the North Island to produce the type of calves he wants to finish. They are all born in a tight time frame, thanks to the Why Wait programme which condenses calving. They began using Why Wait four years ago after inductions were banned and their vet suggested using the programme. It brings the later-cycling cows forward and hence more days in milk, plus better early submission rates the following spring. Pre-mating heats this year indicated a submission rate of 93%. The programme requires a single
Dairy Exporter | www.nzfarmlife.co.nz | November 2020
