Sharing some NZ farmlife with others

As you may have gathered reading some of our historic blogs, we have a tendancy to have a number of foreigners coming to stay.  This year we have had 4.  Although it is great to have foreigners here and share in our story and life, and hear about theirs, we would also welcome NZers to take part!

In February we had Priscillia from Montreal.  Main tasks while she was here was to do a bit of spring cleaning in the house which was well overdue and to do some child care, entertaining Alice after school, but I am not sure whether it was the other way around, and some farm stuff.  The things we did included:



Priscillia and her helper Alice feeding Mal Time Capsules
 (Zinc Bullets for Facial Eczema protection)

Blackberry picking ... we all managed to fill our containers up but
 Alice ate most of hers!

Priscillia had a go at crutching some lambs.



















Then we spent a day at Raglan beach enjoying the sand and surf.

Then some pre-tup ewe drenching ...












And putting them away, note we were in February, and yes
it was dry!

 

Then we had Thomas from France.  We did a bit of sheep work (first time for Thomas) and lots of feeding out as we were in the throws of the drought and we put lime on a chunk of the farm, using the neighbours strip

Weighing lambs - Thomas got the hang of it
reasonably well.

Thomas having a go at drenching ... bit of hard
work!





Did lots of feeding out, with Thomas loading the trailers most
mornings.  Near the end he was left to feed out to one or two
mobs.  This is the R2 mobs of heifers being fed.







The fertiliser plane being loaded with lime

Dumping its load.

Just recently we had Chris-Ann and Shaun from Toronto.  We had the local cluster schools Arts Festival.  Te Akau did a Pacific Theme where they sung, danced and played the ukelale and doing really well at it.  Links to their performance are http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLaZv35jsUoEsUYvwJuco9g?feature=mhee.  Here you can see the dances and also go through Room 1s Gobble Gobble Moo Tractor Book that the kids have narrated. 

 

Room 1 doing the Gobble Gobble Moo Tractor Book at Te Akau School

 We then travelled into Hamilton to take Alice to her dance lesson at Dance Effects (http://www.danceeffects.co.nz/), where she is doing Jazz Intro 1.  They are currently learning their exam moves, with exams in August.

Jazz Intro 1 class at Dance Effects

Shaun testing his drenching skills on the rams

Chris-Ann getting up close and personal with one of the rams

Then we caught a possum - so far at a rate of 1 per week

And then we plucked it ...

Mustering in the 2-tooths for their 5 in 1 vaccination before set stocking for lambing

 Our main project for the week was to start planting up the garden with natives.  Below are the before and after shots and there is still more plants to go.  Their help was greatly appreciated.

 

 

Before

Before





After



After

And the chook lady ...

 

 So, if keen to help out check out Help Exchange (http://www.helpx.net/) or contact us directly.  We will be seeking some extra help for docking in September.

 



New Season Lambs

With a week to go now till the start of weaning, all the lambs on the property have been given their pre-weaning drench.  That means approximately 2100 lambs have been through the yards for the week starting 6th November. 

The terminals, which are primarily Romney/Suffolk crosses appeared to be doing well, with our first contracted load to be trucked out identified.  We did these in 3 separate mobs, just to make the days smaller.  Also, on the first day, the weather turned for the worst, making everything and everyone a bit wet.

Fridolin had his first go at drenching.  A little harder to do than it looks like.  As seen below, Fridolin's technique needs a bit of fine turning.  Two things wrong is the pulling of the head back and the closing of the mouth with fingers.  Later on he got to do some more and we have worked on the technique to make it comfortable for both the drencher and the lamb.  The aim is to get the nozzle on top of the tongue so that the dose of drench goes down the throat and is not wasted by either getting squirted out or spat out. 

Fridolin's first attempt at drenching.

Alice keeping an eye on Fridolin

This year we have used Startech on our Terminal lambs.  We also weighed and marked a sample mob of lambs under 30kg that were given Startech and the other mob First, to see what weight gains have been achieved in 15 days time when the animals are weaned.

Lamb in the weigh crate - this one is 36 kg

All lambs that look to be over 30 kg were weighed.  This is done by self as we drafted off the ewes and the two lines of lambs (above 30 kg and below 30 kg).  This means that drench can be applied at a more relevant dose rate to their weight and also saves time in putting lambs over scales.

Coming up in the next couple of weeks we have weaning, lamb picking and shearing on the horizon.

Meanwhile Fridolin will take his first extended break by heading off on his bike around the Waikato from Tuesday - Sunday.

Fridolin's first week

We started the week with mustering the dry hoggets.  This task wasn't as easy as first expected due to the number of lambs in the mob.  Luckily though things went our way and we managed to get them all on the road for the trip home.  We had the trailer with us, so for any lamb that was struggling, they were able to get a ride on the trailer.

Dry hoggets on their way home

Some of the stragglers getting captured for a ride the rest of the way

Fidolin has been having a bit of driving practice on the ATV.  At this stage only on flat terrain, going slow and well supervised.  An example was driving the bike home behind the hoggets, towing the trailer of lambs.

Fridolin with the trailer of lambs

Once we had the hoggets home, we took a Faecal sample and did a Faecal Egg Count (FEC), to see if there was a worm burden.  These hoggets were given a LA Cydectin injection on 3rd July.  After 100 days, by giving them an oral drench it cuts of the tail, which is when worms can become resistant.  Our FEC showed 0 epg (eggs per gram) indicating that the drench has worked to date.  We also weighed a sample of the hoggets before we drenched them, so we knew the amount of drench required to cover the heaviest animals.  The average was 45kg, which was a little disappointing, with the range 35 - 58.5 kg.

We then drafted off any hoggets with a lamb and any with dirty bottoms.

Calling for wet and dirty hoggets for drafting

We then docked the lambs.  A full detail of what is done at docking is found under 1st day of docking blog.

Fridolin getting first hand experience at docking

The wet hoggets and lambs were then reunited.  The dry hoggets were taken back to their paddock.  Finally the dirty hoggets were crutched.  We pulled out 7% of our hoggets - which equates to 22.  Of these approximately 16 were classed as daggy.  All 22, rather than be culled, have been transferred to our terminal mob so that we do not keep any of their progeny in the future.

Mal giving the 20 hoggets a bit of a touch up

Other tasks for the week have been shifting all the bull mobs on their rotation.  The spring grass is certainly beginning to kick away now.  We have on and off rain since the 10th - totalling 117.5 mls to date.  Have started on some fence repairs and maintenance (R&M) jobs.