OAD arrives early in Southland
Some dairy farmers in Southland are already moving to once a day (OAD) milking because they don’t have sufficient good pasture on which to graze their stock.
Ross runs the Tutira farm of John and Jocelyn Crystal who live in Taradale. Tutira is a small area of nine dairy farms off SH2, 45km from Napier on the road to Wairoa.
Says Ross, “Members of my family have been sharemilking on this property for 30 years since it re-converted to dairying; firstly an uncle and then a cousin before my arrival 12 years ago.” He has been sharemilking for 12 years.
The farm is 96ha (eff) of 70% flat, the balance rolling, land. Annual rainfall is 1000mm with the area prone to spring dries and in one out of three seasons a dump of snow. It has a 185m difference in altitude from top to bottom.
This season the herringbone dairy has been extended to a 28-aside and he milks 390 crossbred cows mated to crossbred bulls. Some cows are mated to a Taurindicus bull and their calves are reared under contract to PGG Wrightson.
It is a one man operation with a seasonal worker to rear calves.
He rears 100 replacements annually and because of his low empty rate, last season only 2.1%, he was able to sell 51 yearlings. “They were all DNA profiled, 100% recorded and with production figures and they sold for $1000 each.”
Ross has been once-a-day milking since he started sharemilking. “I do it differently: after the start of the season they are divided into two herds and I milk the heifers and Jersey cross herd in the morning and the older stock in the afternoon.”
The heifers are run with the older cows at the start as Ross finds it helps them get used to being milked before they are transferred to the other herd. “All stock have EID tags so they are easy to draft with my Protract drafting gate.”
The proof of the pudding is that production averages 85,000kgMS; his best season was 90,000kgMS, and last season 76,000kgMS because of the drought.
Milk is collected on a skip-a-day routine all season; milk is sent to Pahiatua or via Oringi by train to Whareroa.
Thirty per cent of the farm is cropped annually as Ross says the extra feed helps to even out production during the season. Turnips are grown for the summer, sorghum for the autumn and kale and ryecorn for the winter. As well, 12ha of wholecrop or a pea/barley mix is grown for pit silage and the balance of the farm is fescue, undersown with an annual ryegrass.
Each summer he feeds 300 tonnes of wet corn waste from McCains. Hay is only made if there is adequate surplus.
Effluent goes through a two-pond system which gives storage in wet weather and is spray irrigated to 35ha. Ross tries to use some of that land for cropping to utilise the extra nutrients available.
He says the farm has a good cell count figure and chances of mastitis are monitored with a DAL unit installed in every fifth bale. “Over the space of a week I believe I will have checked all cows.”
Ross enjoys an excellent working relationship with the farm owners as they allow him to manage the farm as if it was his own.
“If I have a weakness it is a liking for good machinery and I enjoy the cropping work.”
Dairy News: “Where do you want to be in five years?”
Ross: “I am doing very well here, and happy with the farm’s situation, the owners and where I am, so why shift?”
He is considering employing full time staff next season.
