Pukeatua, groundln [at] reap [dot] org [dot] nz
When we arrived on a stunning spring day at Maungatautari, a van from the Taranaki Environment Centre had just arrived and was busy with Jeff loading compost. Fiona was fixing a blocked drain from the dairy shed, the goats were munching piles of fresh green cut feed and it was all go. You would never have guessed that Jeff was only a few days out of hospital.
Fiona milks 400 does plus 80 replacement kids and 20 odd bucks, mostly Saanen goats with some Nubians. Most of the milk goes to the Dairy Goat Co-operative, supplied by 58 farmers, which produces high quality baby food products, mostly for export. Last year they produced 31,000 kgs of milk solids and want to do more like 35,000 kgs this year. Quality is essential in that market.
Goats are high producing animals - the best does produce twice their own weight in milk each year - and have to be kept in peak condition. A poor batch of brought in feed can see them lose weight rapidly and they are very susceptible to worms. When they were grazed outside the worm problem became unmanageable without drenches, which are not acceptable in baby food production and long withholding periods are required. So now the goats are housed in light, airy, open sheds on untreated sawdust bedding with constant access to feed through a railing, so it is not trampled.
Of the 97 ha, 40 is flat enough to mow, and one hectare a day provides the fresh feed they need between September and May. In winter the grass is not mowed but left to grow longer. The mower is set around 50 mm above the ground so there is always good cover left on the pasture to insulate the soil, encourage deep rooting and ensure the cut grass is free of worms. The worm cycle has been broken with the goats inside. They can be allowed out to graze in good weather for short periods during the winter months and will neither drop nor pick up worm eggs, although faecal egg counts are done to monitor this and if necessary they can be drenched prior to milking starting.
Haylage and high carbohydrate feeds are brought in to supplement the high brix grass. The grass makes up 80% of their ration, and 170,000 kgs of dry matter haylage is made on farm, and is used as a tool to keep control of quality in the spring. Depending on the season it may be necessary to purchase extra but they are looking to become self-sufficient as the quality is not as good from other farms.
The rest of the farm is too steep to mow and is harvested by some beef yearlings and the goats on a part time basis.
A collaboration with Sue Arthur at Over the Moon dairy at Putaruru has resulted in some 2-3,000 kg milk solids being made into five specialty goats' cheeses - fetta, haloumi, camembert, blue and hard cheese - which Fiona sells at nearby markets. This is a top end of the market product and customers like knowing the whole story from pasture to goat to cheese, and meeting the people responsible. One kg of milk solids makes one kg of cheese.
A 'cut and carry' system always poses the problem of how to replace the nutrients removed in the grass, and this is where a waste disposal headache has been turned into an asset, rivalling the milk as a commercial product. Last year the farm did $400,000 worth of milk to the Dairy Co-op and did $100,000 of compost sales. This year with the custom blend mixes it will be more.
Three times a year the deep litter bedding of manure and sawdust is removed and windrowed. In six weeks it is compost ready to go, and just needs screening to achieve a consistency that will go through a fertiliser spreader. Covering the rows from rain and to control moisture levels has been a major expense, using heavy breathable covers rather than polythene which blows away. Concrete pads and block wall shelters contain the mature compost and the area is sloped and bunded to catch any leachate, which makes excellent compost tea. However the aim is to keep the moisture content at a level where it will not leach. I have never seen so much compost, and it is a very tidy operation, as you can see from the photos. It has a fine crumbly consistency and no smell I could detect.
Jeff takes care of the composting side of their operation. Initially he put the whole 500 tonnes on the farm at 9 tonnes to the hectare. Now he mixes 1 tonne lime, 250 kg dolomite, 300 kg compost and 4 litres of molasses plus trace elements to achieve the correct balance for his own farm, applying up to four times a year. Grass growth has leapt ahead, with the long pasture cover at all seasons encouraging deep root growth; the lack of pugging with few animals; and the return of nutrients in a form that builds soil carbon. Over the past three years since this program has been going the grass yield has gone from 8000 kg/ha to 14000 kg/ha. Even in the drought of 2007/2008 12000 kgs was achieved.
Brix levels were 7-8 on a good day and 3-4 on a cold rainy day when they first started measuring them; now they are 16-17 on a good day and don't go below 8-9. When the brix level is high the goats get a higher percentage of their carb requirements from the green feed and are less hungry for the grain.
One paddock has been sown in lucerne for the goats. At this stage it can't be managed without one herbicide spray but there is a hope that after a couple of years this won't be necessary any more.
Jeff is now selling the compost mixed with dolomite, lime and trace elements to order for the individual needs of his customers, at $250-280/tonne depending on additives. Two of the other farms we visited were using it, and would like to use more when they can afford it.
The Grahams are clients of eCogent, a consultancy which emphasises fully feeding animals for top production, and keeping a thick cover of grass over the soil at all times. Like fellow eCogent members, Kathy and Dave Harris, they are exploring the possibility of carbon farming, hoping to demonstrate farming methods that increase the carbon stored in the soil to the extent that it can be marketed as carbon credits. They benchmarked their carbon levels last year at 200T/ha on the sidlings, and 174 on the top paddock which is mown. If this is shown to increase over time, it will show major potential to mitigate climate change through better soil management and may go some way to offsetting methane and nitrous oxide on some farms.
It is unlikely that this could generate credits in the Kyoto compliance market, where NZ has not signed up to article 3.4 which counts soil carbon, for fear of a huge deficit from our highly eroding young soils in places like East Cape and Manawatu. Under Kyoto, NZ can't count carbon gains in soil without also counting carbon losses.
However there is also a voluntary market where firms and individuals wanting to establish the green credentials their markets are looking for, or simply to "do the right thing" are prepared to pay for verified carbon sequestration that is outside, and additional to, the Kyoto agreement. The important thing will be robust measurements and accurate verification, and willingness to take responsibility for carbon losses if they occur later. Whatever the carbon market does, increasing soil carbon has got to be good for the sustainability of the land, the pasture and the animals, and so for farmers' profits.
This farm demonstrates the connections between high quality soil, excellent pasture, healthy animals and food meeting the demanding standards of a top end market.
Listen to a conversation between this farmer and Jeanette
