The science supporting hill country and drylands sheep and cattle farming in New Zealand
Benchmarking is one of the most important things you can do. As James Burke said:
‘You have to know where you have been to know where you are going’.
So to know where we’ve been Beef + Lamb New Zealand publishes, each year, a Compendium of New Zealand Farm Facts. The new 2016 40th edition is now available.
The lastest cool facts
Did you know that there are 19.2 million breeding ewes in New Zealand!
And that 45% of the national flock are Romneys.
![Smug Romney [photo Graham Brown]](https://beeflambnzresearch.files.wordpress.com/2016/05/2016-05-01-romney.png)
And that 36% of the national beef herd are Angus.
![Angus cattle [photo PHOTO NZ]](https://beeflambnzresearch.files.wordpress.com/2016/05/2016-05-01-angus-cattle.jpg)
Did you know that most farm dogs get fed once a day and that most common diet is a combination of dry food and homekill. Yet we don’t know much about the nutrient and energy demands of these essential members of the farm staff. You can read more about this at Massey University’s Working Dog Centre.
![[photo Ross Patterson]](https://beeflambnzresearch.files.wordpress.com/2016/04/farm-dogs-on-truck-2.jpg)
This was some of the information that Massey University’s Farmer Learning Group were exposed to at their field day at Riverside farm in the Wairarapa this week. The groups focus is on growing alternative forages and how to manage them.
![A farmer ring in a lucerne paddock [photo Geoff Ridley]](https://beeflambnzresearch.files.wordpress.com/2016/04/lucerne-paddock-2016-02-21.jpg)
During the morning farmers formed distinct rings in the paddock while they contemplated how to get the best out of their lucerne pastures.
The advice was that a paddock in this shape needed to be spelled until late May or early June then grazed off when the plants will have stopped growing. Grazing off would help to prevent the over wintering of pests and diseases.
![Lucerne [photo Geoff Ridley]](https://beeflambnzresearch.files.wordpress.com/2016/04/img_1342.jpg)
The plantain had been hit by grass grub. But as one farmer said there is a cost of ownership of a fodder crop and that is you have to:
Read more about the new pasture mixes for boosting sheep growth.
Life happens in the hills. …. They’re opportunities to prove to yourself that you’re stronger than you ever imagined. …
There wouldn’t be many scenic New Zealand calendars that didn’t feature at least one photo of hill country farming. It is iconic for us. But the last 40 years has seen a lot of changes in farming as the hill country has become the centre for sheep and beef farming as the flat lands have been converted to other types of farming.
![[from calendars.co.nz]](https://beeflambnzresearch.files.wordpress.com/2016/04/calendar-hills.jpg)
This has created new challenges for farmers and rural communities. To meet these challenges 313 farmers, rural professionals and scientists came together in Rotorua for a Hill Country Symposium. This is the first such gathering for more than 30 years.
Did you know …
Five million ha or 18% of New Zealand’s land area are pastoral hill country farms.
70% of lambs are born and weaned on hill country.
Over the last 25 years ewe numbers have by 50% but lamb production has only dropped 6.2%.
![[photo Beef + Lamb New Zealand]](https://beeflambnzresearch.files.wordpress.com/2016/04/angus-5.jpg)
So what’s going to come out of this ‘talk fest’?
The scientists have rounded up all the research into one place so we know what has been done and what still needs to be done.
The farmers and the rural professions found the success stories of challenges faces and tamed.
And everyone got to have a say in the workshops on what the future of hill country farming and rural communities should look like and what needed to be done to get us there.
All of this is going to be taken and turned into a position paper covering ‘what the future of hill country needs to look like, the threats and opportunities, and the actions required to get there.’
![[photo Geoff Ridley]](https://beeflambnzresearch.files.wordpress.com/2016/04/covers.jpg)
More general reading about the Hill Country Symposium
So you want to read the Hill Country Symposium papers
All of the symposium papers can be read at the New Zealand Grassland Association website. Of particular interest are the research papers supported by Beef + Lamb New Zealand research funding. These are:
And finally, this blog made it to:
When we went out and asked sheep and beef farmers what weeds topped their list they all came back with Cali thistles (Cirsium arvense). Then they would think for a minute and say ‘all thistles’.
The latest news on mowing as a control
A new paper has been published on the most effective way to mow Cali thistle. Not only does it manage them but it can significantly reduce the weed population.
A model was developed – wish I had a dollar for every time I heard that! – looking at the effect of mowing on a Cali thistle population. In a nut shell if you cut off the leave, the plant can’t photosynthesis, no photosynthesis no food to store in the overwintering roots, so fewer roots survive to grow into new plants the next spring.
So when should I mow?
The model let the scientists work out the best times to mow. It showed that mowing once a year, regardless of the time, stopped the population growing. What the scientists called stasis.
In contrast mowing in the late spring or summer and then again in the early autumn caused a decrease in the weed population. When twice yearly mowing is done the population density will halve each subsequent year. Ultimately other methods could be used to take out the stragglers.
Don’t forget the green thistle beetle bug
One way to clean up the stragglers is through biological control. Read about the use of green thistle beetle (Cassida rubiginosa) in the hill country.
More links
Bourdot GW, Basse B, Cripps MG. 2016. Mowing strategies for controlling Cirsium arvense in a permanent pasture in New Zealand compared using a matrix model. Ecology and Evolution pp 1-10. doi: 10.1002/ece3.2090
Controlling Californian thistle. B+LNZ R&D Brief 105. May 2005.
Wet mowing kills Californian thistle. B+LNZ media release 15 December 2011.
Californian thistle control: mowing in the wet. B+LNZ R&D Brief 147. August 2012.
Thistle munching beetle research. B+LNZ research blog 10 March 2015.
Are you doing dairy support grazing?
Did you know?
A key goal for the winter period in a pasture-based system is to gain body condition prior to calving. In areas where there is very little pasture growth during winter, dairy cows are primarily fed on forage crops.
Changing diets from pasture to winter crop does have risks that need to be managed, at the time of this transition. Poor transitioning can result in ruminal acidosis, low Body Condition Score (BCS) gain and worst case scenario death.
A critical factor in achieving profitable winter grazing and targeted Body Condition Score (BCS) gain is the efficient transitioning of cows on to crop. Successful transitioning will result in improved animal health, milk production, and in calf rates … A good transition plan can help in avoiding these risks.
But what about all that urinary nitrogen?
In Canterbury and Otago/Southland, dairy cows are typically wintered on crops grown on support land and that nitrogen (N) leaching can be reduced compared to a traditional kale only crop, by planting an oat crop immediately after harvesting the kale.
What’s Pastoral 21?
Beef + Lamb New Zealand, along with DairyNZ, Fonterra, Dairy Companies Association of New Zealand and the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment are partners in the research programme Pastoral 21.
If you want to know more about dairy support grazing you should read these:
A zillion years ago Rachel Carson (Silent Spring published in 1962) talked about the other road, the one ‘less traveled by’. She was writing about biological control as an alternative to chemical control of weeds and pests.
In the 53 years since Silent Spring a lot of biological control research has been done around the world and many agents have been released. The case for funding the looking for and the testing of new biocontrol agents is often compelling as the problem is usually so obvious – crops are being devastated and animals are sickening and dying. The money to scale up the production of the agent and the distribution for release is also relatively easy to come by because everyone wants the agent. However, the follow up as to what happens, how it happens and the benefit of doing the release are seldom studied as funding is hard to find as the urgency has gone. This has been the situation in New Zealand as well as the rest of the world.
Parasitic wasps to the rescue
This situation is beginning to change. Britta Basse and her colleagues at AgResearch presented an assessment of the benefits of the release of parasitic wasp to control clover root weevil at the New Zealand Plant Protection Conference last August. The study was based on the results of the release of parasitic wasp in Southland. They found on sheep and beef farms that the return was $6.86/ha/year or $4.7 million over 719, 854 ha. This research had financial assistance from Beef + Lamb New Zealand.
A gang of thistles
The other difficulty is that we can see a problem but we haven’t quantified it to know if it’s real and how big it is. Graeme Bourdôt says that the economic management of Californian thistle in pasture has been difficult because we don’t know how the weed varies over the season and how that affects palatable feed. In a recent paper Graeme and his colleagues report on their study of season pattern of Californian thistle ground cover.
The study found that Californian thistle caused a national loss in pastoral farm gross revenue in New Zealand in 2011–2012 of $685 million ($233 m sheep/beef, $446 m dairy, $6 m deer). Something to think about.
Links
![Castlepoint Station [photo Geoff Ridley]](https://beeflambnzresearch.files.wordpress.com/2016/03/img_3520.jpg?w=840)
Last year I wrote about the “our land and water” National Science challenge. At the time a research plan was being prepared for submission to the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment to get funding. The plan was accepted and “our land and water” was launched last month.
Synergy: 1+1=3
I wrote in my last blog, “where the magic happens“, about the importance of co-development in science. This week I was at a co-development workshop looking for opportunities and synergies with other stuff that people are doing around the country. Synergies – don’t you hate that word. All it means is combining resources so you achieve more than working separately. As an aside there is a great article by Bill McGowan on overused words in public speaking and I’m surprised that synergy isn’t there.
What’s it looking like
At the moment there are six programmes
The opportunities
While these headings might seem airy-fairy when you dig in to them they contain many opportunities for research that is important for the sheep and beef sector. It has the potential to help achieve a confident and profitable sheep and beef industry and help farmers make informed business decisions the vision and purpose of Beef + Lamb New Zealand. So watch this blog for further developments.
Links
The Our Land and Water website
Bill McGowan. What’s the most overused word in public speaking? Ragan’s PR Daily 4 February 2016
A university researcher said this about the problem of having industry funding to do research:
“The problem is it also adds all kinds of diplomatic and organisational constraints in my work, which mean that it takes longer to do any research, because you have to have the ‘OK’ from the industry to publish results, or information, to start a project, to go talk to people“. (Otago Daily Times)
Really!
You’ve got to talk
Over the last twenty years or so the concept of co-development has become increasingly important in the funding of research. What is co-development? It’s where interested parties come together to co-develop a common vision and purpose and then working together to achieve it. An amazing example of this on a national scale was The Great New Zealand Science Project
“We are keen for the public and the science community to tell us what they think are New Zealand’s most important science challenges are over the next 5-10 years, so we can focus our investment on solving these challenges for the benefit of New Zealand” Minister for Science and Innovation Steven Joyce.
This going out and talking to people has resulted in the development of the National Science Challenges. A key component of the Challenges is the requirement of more going and talking to people to ensure their success. So it’s hugely important that researchers do go out and talk to the rest of New Zealand to find out what research they think needs to be done and to tell New Zealanders how their research will help to solve the problem.
For Farmer, By Farmers
However there will never be enough money to do everything and so decisions on what to fund and what not to fund will need to be made. Unfortunately some will take this personally and invoke a ‘conspiracy’.
A key priority for Beef + Lamb New Zealand is to invest in research and development that meets the needs of farmers and the sector. Only by talking to farmers can researchers begin to understand their problems and what research needs to be done. It is also important that researchers talk to farmers about their results, why they important and in farmer language.
To give guidance to researchers Beef + Lamb New Zealand is developing a strategic R&D agenda. At the moment a ‘prototype’ document is being kicked around by farmers and we should be able to get a final document out in a month or so.
Links
Carla Green. Research freedom an open question. Otago Daily Times 20 February 2016.
Siouxsie Wiles. The Great NZ Science Project begins! SciBlog. 11 November 2012
Farmers tell it all
At a lunchtime seminar today Pike Brown, Landcare Research, presented some of the findings from the Rural Decision Makers Survey 2015. The survey’s purpose is to help build a better picture of what drives the decisions farmers make and as a consequence what might New Zealand’s farming environment look like in the future.
There were 3264 responses to the invitation to take part in the survey of these 2849 completed the survey. Sheep and beef farmers were well represented at 49.9% of farmers completing the survey.
Back the truck up
The survey was online and had 288 questions! Woah, back the truck up. I’m not answering that many questions. Ah!, but the software uses ‘complex logic’ and filters the questions based on the participants early responses – so no one farmer would get asked the complete set of 288.
The results are presented graphically. For instance for the question do you participate in an irrigation scheme? – only 4% of sheep and beef farmers did compared to 29% of wine grape growers.
A look at the age of all commercial farmers that completed the survey found that by region the oldest average age was in Auckland whereas the youngest average age was in Southland.
The survey also found that as farmers got older they were more risk adverse and more likely to leave experimenting to someone else to try first. Whereas younger farmers were less likely to sell or subdivide their farms and more likely to diversify or convert to another type of production.
But amazingly age had no effect on attitude to environment and this was a flat line and didn’t change with age.
Word clouds
Farmers were asked what they saw as the opportunities in the future and irrigation and water dominates.
When asked what the challenges for the future were – water, compliance and the environment dominate.
What is the best way to give new information to farmers?
What is the best way to give new information to farmers? Massey University has a Sustainable Farming Fund project looking at just that issue.
The big question is how to help farmers use perennial summer forages so that they can farm sustainably both economically and ecologically. The project is looking at the effectiveness of ‘learning communities’ of farmers and scientists. The farmers in the learning communities are important in their local farmer grapevines.
The farmer learning group has 45 sheep and beef farmers from the eastern Lower North Island and 12 Massey scientists from a variety of disciplines. If you are interested you can read what Brennon Wood has to say.
Seeing what others are doing
This project is based on an earlier pilot project involving 25 farmers who were unanimous in their willingness to play a leading role in this as they now have the confidence to apply what they have learnt to their own farm and to mentor other who might be considering changing the way that they farm.
Beef + Lamb New Zealand is a member on the management board reviewing progress of the project.
Pushing the Boundaries 