The Animal Health Board (AHB) has successfully prosecuted a Waiuku farmer for the illegal sale of cattle from a bovine tuberculosis (TB) infected herd. Geoffrey William Muir pleaded guilty at the Pukekohe District Court today to moving and selling cattle in breach of a restricted place notice imposed by the AHB in June 2008.Muir was fined $30,000 and $140 court costs. The AHB was awarded $10,454 in costs and $2,500 in legal costs. Muir was convicted on four charges of failing to notify the movement of an infected herd, making a false and misleading declaration, moving cattle to a third party’s farm and knowingly selling 157 cattle from a herd that was suspected of harbouring TB reports Scoop.

AHB chief executive William McCook said the prosecution showed the AHB would take action against farmers who fail to abide by livestock movement regulations. “It is clearly unacceptable that one man put his fellow farmers at risk for his own pecuniary gain. Selling cattle from a herd that is suspected or known to harbour bovine TB could have serious consequences for the national TB control programme. “We know a vast majority of the 73,000 cattle and deer farmers in New Zealand willingly comply with movement control restrictions and expect us to come down hard on those farmers who do not.

(more…)

Hill country farmers are changing their attitudes to their erosion-prone country, says Agriculture and Forestry Minister David Carter. He was flown in a helicopter by Horizons Regional Council to check out flood protection in the lowland area and hill country. Mr Carter went to stopbanks on the lower Manawatu, Moutoa floodgates, Kopane Bridge and Pohangina and Turakina Valley hill country.

He said two hill country farmers he spoke to said there seemed to be a greater awareness of the erosion problem coming from the hills reports The Manawatu Standard. The sustainable land use initiative (SLUI) programme was developed around voluntary whole-farm plans which assess the farms’ physical, environmental and business resources in a structured way. They are funded by Horizons in partnership with the Government on a dollar-for-dollar deal, through MAF’s hill country erosion fund.

(more…)

A Manawatu dairy farmer believes he is the only farmer in NZ leaving heifer calves on cows reports The Manawatu Standard. Jeff Williams and his wife Janice have a farm on No1 Line, near Longburn. They recently hosted a field day looking at the biological farming system they use. Mr Williams said biological agriculture works on organic principles but uses modern science and technology as well. It aims to have healthy soil, which is the basis from which all plants grow, and provide for the wellbeing and sustenance for the cows.

About 50 people attended the field day, including dairy farmers, biological agriculture staff and Massey University staff. Mr Williams said he and his wife have 400 cows, of which half calve in spring and half in autumn. This autumn is the first season the Williams’ have kept their replacement heifers, and a few calves being raised for beef, on their mothers.

(more…)

Mr Kemp, who uses about 200 bales of silage a year on his 115-hectare farm, has been recyling wrap for about three years, and is surprised that more farmers don’t do it reports the Taranaki Daily.”I thought more farmers would have taken it up. It’s such a hassle to get rid of it. .” He said he recycled the wrap because it meant he no longer had to deal with the mess it made, and because it saved him time. ”The greenies mightn’t like it, but 80 per cent of the reason is the mess.”

Before buying his Agpac bin, he used to throw the wrap in a heap, hoping it wouldn’t blow away. When he went to clean it up six months later, the stinking pile was always full of water. He burned the wrap because he had no other way of getting rid of it.”It didn’t matter what you did, you would still have piles of silage wrap. It’d take a whole  day in spring or summer to clean up. It’s dirty, wet, s….y stuff and it blows all over the place.”

(more…)

Improved productivity could reduce on-farm greenhouse gas emissions from sheep by up to 12%, according to the author of a study which calculated the carbon footprint of sheep. Stewart Ledgard, a principal AgResearch scientist, said a higher lambing percentage and faster lamb growth rates offered the best options for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from sheep, as opposed to reducing fossil fuel use, which was low on sheep farms compared with other intensive agricultural systems.

Dr Ledgard said the 1.9kg of CO2-equivalent produced for each 100g portion of lamb exported to Europe, was “broadly consistent with other international studies of products derived from farmed, ruminant livestock reports The ODT. His study found 57% of the sheep carbon footprint was generated by the natural process of animals utilising pasture and producing methane during digestion, but it was a figure that has been decreasing.

(more…)

A two-day soil management workshop taking place in Cromwell at the end of June will be the biggest event of its type in the South Island in recent times. Co-organiser Cherryle Prew of the SoilFoodWeb Institute said it was a coup for the South Island to secure key note speaker Dr Christine Jones, an internationally renowned soils ecologist and founder of the Australian Soil Carbon Accreditation Scheme reports Scoop.

“Dr Jones is booked years in advance, so having her speak for a whole morning at the ”Farming Soils – Starting Today” workshop is a real honour,” she said. “She will be talking about the big picture; how the carbon, nitrogen and water cycles are intrinsically linked.  I think farmers will respect her years of experience working with landholders to restore water balance, increase biological activity and improve productivity”.

(more…)

Drought has closed most of Fonterra’s 86 dairy processing plants around NZ this season several weeks earlier than usual reports Stuff. The dry weather has pinched supply to 70 per cent of Fonterra’s factories – most north of Taupo – forcing them to stop processing before the usual winter shutdown for maintenance, said general manager milk supply Tim Deane.

However, the farmer-owned co-operative and NZ’s biggest company, which processes 92 per cent of the country’s raw milk, said national milk production for the 2009-10 season would still be “a fraction ahead” of last season’s collection of about 14 billion litres of milk – thanks to South Island production. Drought in the upper North Island – Northland and Waikato – had cut daily milk production for this time of the year back 45 to 55 per cent on last season, Mr Deane said.

(more…)

It had been another tough year for many of the region’s farmers, Mr Evans said in his annual report in the Marlborough Express. A cold, wet spring had produced insufficient growth in areas, in particular the high country, but other parts of Marlborough had seldom had a better run into summer. However, the good times had come to an “abrupt end” with a very dry autumn. The emissions trading scheme was a major issue for farmers and nothing less than “workplace bullying”.

 Meat and Fibre chairman William Grigg said the demand for both beef and lamb was up on last year in international markets. Mr Grigg said Australia and the United States were in a herd-rebuilding phase and a looming shortage of beef, domestic and imported, had seen prices soar in recent weeks.

(more…)

Marlborough farmer Doug Avery has a revealing story about commercial greed and the perception that farmers are made of money. Don’t pay what you don’t owe. In his case, it is the way the Government will run the emissions trading scheme reports Stuff. In its efforts to keep administration costs down, the Government is proposing to take farmers’ share of the scheme from the companies that process a farmer’s produce.

In the case of Mr Avery, and all other sheep and beef farmers, it will be based on the weight of meat from their slaughtered animals. He thinks that is unfair. It makes no allowance for the way he, and many others like him, farm, which he maintains emits less greenhouse gases than others and stores more carbon. There is another reason why it is unfair. It punishes innovation. Mr Avery has worked out an innovative way to keep farming on drought-prone land.

(more…)

Feed shortages and a surplus of in-calf heifers in Taranaki are affecting the market, but buyers may face higher prices in the spring.Farmers with feed and good cash flow may be able to buy stock at favourable prices now reports The Taranaki Daily. The current market for in-calf heifers was not good, longtime stock dealer Eric Sole, of Stratford, said at Tuesday’s Stratford stock sale.Some farmers were having to sell their animals because they were short of grass, and those who had money and grass were likely to pick up bargains, he said.

A Rahotu sharemilker, who identified himself only as Ross and who was selling his budget cows, said animals were not making what they should, considering the payout and the money spent on grazing.”Sellers are not making much. It’s because there’s not the movement in farm sales. Sharemilkers are not moving, so stock are not moving,” he said.PGG Wrightson regional manager Don Newland, of New Plymouth, said dairy heifer buyers were being cautious and selective on quality.He believed some buyers were reluctant because they were struggling to feed existing stock.

(more…)