Post Drought Management

Just thought it was worth sharing some information that we found useful coming out of the drought. 

It was unfortunate really that this information was not available through NZ websites and industry and that we had to access this information from an Australian site.  Much of the information written up during and at the end of the drought was written largely around dairy farming, although some principles have parallels in both drystock and dairy.

Beef + Lamb NZ does offer the Dry Management Toolkit, which by in large talks about what is happening during the drought with little content about 'after' the drought. 

Factors that are talked about are:

• Stress - the need to talk about the situation with those close to you and also outsiders and to get off farm to realise that you are not alone and others are suffering too.  One of the most frustrating and upsetting thing for a farmer is the inability to feed their stock.  Most of us are farmers because we enjoy working outdoors and with animals, with that in mind and the fact that the animals are the source of our income, it can become quite distressing. 
• Making decisions early - having information and planning is key in a drought year, knowing what your feed profile is, what supplement you need and what stock need to go so that you can survive is key to the farming operation.  There are many operations with good records and information, but there are many without, and sitting and hoping and praying in a bad year will not pay dividends.
• Financial Support - whilst the government declared a drought in many areas of NZ this year, it does not relate to direct financial assistance.  It does provide assistance through the Rural Support and consultant support if required.   Most of the subsidies available do not 'fit' the new farming families, therefore these are not taken up readily.  This year, the IRD has allowed a review of the Income Equalisation account to assist farmers that had profits last year and are looking at losses this year.
• Feeding - the need to maintain intakes during the drought as much as possible, and following immediate rain to continue to do this to allow covers to grow and to give the plant a chance to grow.  There is plenty of information around feed allowances and different types of feed available and at what rates.
• Animal Health - there is some discussion around animal health, in relation to feed intake, worms etc but felt there was less specifics about some of the things to look out for.

The types of information that were lacking in NZ publications was the emphasis and understanding of what happens when the drought has broken and how vulnerable stock can be especially if they are under condition and the wet brings cold as well.  Animals will generally have a lower immunity, especially if under conditioned.  They will have to adjust to changing feed whether it be supplement or changes in the pasture itself and they may be suffering from vitamin and/or mineral deficiences.

Following the drought period, whilst grass growth has been pneominal this year, there has been low  nutrient and high moisture levels in the pastures and many animals have suffered.  Stock at this time exert more energy to get a mouthful and can loose weight.  Some things to watch for include:

• nitrate poisoning - fast growing plants, especially in an overcast environment will have a build up of nitrate levels and if hungry animals are moved they can gorge themselves, which can lead to nitrate poisoning.
• handling stock in poor condition can put stress on their systems and can collapse or even die.
• metabolic diseases in pregnant animals.
• increased access to poisonous plants that might seem appealing to hungry animals.

Things that you can do:

• make sure the animals are up to date with all their animal health treatments for both internal and external parasites.
• ensure additional vitamins and minerals are given if necessary (may be an idea to take bloods and/or samples at works) to ensure what these levels are.
• provide alternative feed and be prepared for stock to loose weight as they adjust to any new feed, including the new pastures post drought.

It is possibly too late now for this drought, but there are still some things for us to work on.  With cull ewes off to the works this week, we will be evaluating bloods to make sure all are acceptable.  All the animals have been on a higher than usual anthelmentic programme with the increase in worm population, especially Barbers Pole.  Most of our stock, whilst in good condition early April, lost condition following the rain for a 2 - 4 week period as the pastures have grown and the stock have adjusted to the change.

Scanning Update

A wet Sunday afternoon, a quick update on our sheep scanning that we did on 29th May.  We managed to get all our sheep shorn, thanks to the covered yards (now a year old!).  We did things a bit different this year, shearing Mixed Age (MA) and 2-tooths from the home block first on 21 - 22nd May and then shore the Terminals from the other block on 26th May.  Shearing went without a hitch, except for the ability to get the wool out of the shed.  With two bikes and two trailers, shifting 4 bales at a time, we managed to load out the 22 bales with relative ease.

Things certainly turned in May, from the dry in the proceeding months (157 mls Jan - March) to 145 mmls in April and 280 mls in May (110 mls more than we had in any other May in the last 5 years).  Another 40mls to add to the June rain chart things are starting to get soggey underfoot.

29th May we scanned all the ewes in one day rather than two separate days as we had done in the past.  The general wider talk is that scanning percentages will be back based on the drought experienced.  We were grateful that our scanning faired well, with the Terminals and MA ewes scanning the same as last year and our 2-tooths were up 18%. 

Taratahi Students and others helping out at scanning

The ewes got a dose of Cypercare as they went up the race.



The ewes were in good condition going into tupping at around 64kg and 3.5 BCS, only a tad back on previous years.  During tupping they largely held condition through the two and half cycles to 12th April when the rams came out.  The drought broke mid-April and with the rapid growth of the pastures, stock have struggled since then, so at scanning some of the ewes were back on condition. 

We have taken the skinny 2-tooths, with a focus on the twinners and treating them a bit better.  We have added grain to their diet to boost them along.  Not always an easy  thing to get sheep initially interested to grain and as a result we have lost 2 sheep, out of 200.  And to keep numbers up in our terminals we have taken some MA singles down to the terminal mob.

Twin bearing 2-tooth ewes eating barley out of the feeder and hay off the ground following scanning.

So why were the 2-tooths up?  It wasn't to do with their condition, as on the whole they were probably lighter than last year as we had a higher number in lamb as hoggets last year.  We did put teaser rams out for the first time, as we had high dries last year.  So pleasing that we dropped that from 7% to 3%.

Whilst grass has grown, feed on the farm is still tight.  Currently in the process of getting rid of the last of our lambs, before sorting out all  of the cattle before hunkering down for the winter, which so far has been wet and mild.

It was a pleasure to get wet this morning!

It was a pleasure to get wet this morning but it seems that our rain was short lived.  We have been getting pretty dry, as has the rest of the North Island.  We were fairly late in being impacted by it with rough feed on board and the grass hanging in, but over the last couple of weeks things have certainly changed.  The base pasture in the hill paddocks has basically gone, cracks opened up, leaving only some pickings for the stock.

So far today we have had 15 mls.  Looking back at our rainfall records, it has been the driest quarters since we have been here:

• Nov - Jan 172 mls v's 304 average (56% rainfall)
• Dec - Feb 245 mls v's 344 average (71% rainfall)
• Jan - Mar 157 mls v's 295 average (53% rainfall)

On Sunday we drove from Auckland to home in the rain, but the rain and the puddles stopped one valley before home.  So whilst Auckland had 15 mls, Onewhero 10 mls, we had none.

We have been feeding out since the beginning of March, and based on our feed budgets, would expect us to continue this into May.  Our target priority mobs to feed are our Dairy Grazers, getting silage, and the R2s getting poplar.  They are all due to be weighed this month.  Our Ewes went to the ram 1st March at condition score 3.5 across both maternal and terminal.  On the whole they seem to be holding their own.  The rams will come out next week.  Our beef cattle are fared ok with 0.4 kg/day.  They have been grazing the rough stuff and doing a bit of cleanup so hadn't expected any better than this.

Our lambs have struggled as quality feed as disappeared.  So far we have managed to meet all the contract targets but with the dressing out % being down, our carcass weights haven't been the best.  We are probably carrying a few too many lambs on and will need to shift them in the coming months.  Lambs will all be weighed on Saturday with a pick going out the following week.

Our focus now is to ensure key stock are holding or improving, with our beef cattle being the buffer.  Focus turns to giving the grass opportunity to grow.  The new grass paddocks are holding their own and bouncing back well after rain.  Key paddocks on both blocks have been targeted with lime at 1.5 t/ha via aircraft.   This was applied 2 days before we had rain in mid-March - perfect timing!

This time of year also brings challenges of FE, with all our dairy grazers given a Time Capsule and their 2nd capsule going in next week.  We do spore counts on each block on the dairy grazers rotation.  One block has been holding around 10,000, whilst the other has been sitting 40,000 +.  We are awaiting this weeks results.  We are not worried about the sheep as all sires purchased have high FE tolerance. 

It is that time of the year when budgets are reviewed through to end of June and for the following 2013/14 year.  Lamb prices have certainly played a hindrance in this years budget and we are back quite significantly.  Going forward, conservative prices have been adhered to in the budget - anything over and above is a bonus.  We are expecting a few less lambs as we are not mating the hoggets and keeping scanning/lambing figures realistic as not sure what the impact of the dry will be in the long run.  To counter that though, we have managed to get rid of all the 'old' ewes that were originally bought on the farm, and now all ewes on the place we have bred ourselves and have the potential to do better lambing percentages.

Fingers crossed we get a bit more rain ... ideally need at least 100 mls to make a difference and some warm days to get the grass growing.