A couple of months back I wrote about the tough going this year with a payout forecast of $5.30. Oh, the agony, if only……Today’s announcement of a drop to $4.70, although not hugely surprising, given the low prices at the recent GDT auctions, has added a bit more gloom to an otherwise promising start to […]
After 12 years or so of re-fencing and rearranging our farm we now want to start planting trees and the stream that runs through it. I have talked about doing this since we first came here. For a long time I was unsure how to tackle this project, not wanting to start and have to […]
Our Journey We farm 74 effective hectares of consolidated peat at Tauhei, north of Hamilton, Waikato. We started with an all Friesian herd and have progressively moved to a crossbred herd since then. Over the years we have tried many different farming practices, from TAD milking and achieving great results, then venturing into OAD milking […]
I guess for most of us farmers this year, the huge crash in forecast payout is making us look hard at our systems and justify any spending we do. I’m quietly grateful that we took the opportunity last year to get into a stronger cash position, taking advantage of the higher payout to reduce debt […]