Leasing gives economies of scale

South Canterbury Monitor Farmers John and Cara Gregan with their children Anna and Sean. The Gregans exceeded budgeted performance targets on most counts.

15-06-2003 | Gerard Hall

Leasing extra land is giving South Canterbury’s Monitor Farmers greater opportunities through economies of scale.

In April this year John and Cara Gregan took up an opportunity to lease a further 167ha that adjoins their 200ha lease block, Leggoland. Leggoland was leased from Graeme and Sheena Legg in April 2002.

The new block leased from Malcom and Robyn Hurford has a high standard of improvements, good soil fertility and a mix of new and improved ryegrass varieties. Included in both lease agreements is the requirement for a minimum 10% of each property to be re-grassed annually.

To stock the additional area the Hurford’s 500 Coopworth ewes, 400 composite-bred ewes’ 500 two-tooth ewes, and 400 ewe hoggets were purchased at valuation. The background genetics of the composite-bred ewes are Coopworth, East Friesian and Texel.

In the past six months the enterprising couple have made steady progress.

This year the Gregans will lamb 5000 ewes and 800 ewe hoggets on the 667ha they now farm. They will also winter 267 rising one-year-old bulls and 47 rising two-year-olds, as well as 500 un-mated ewe hoggets.

With rainfall for the year to date around 70% of normal the Gregans have been forced to make a number of changes to their emerging beef business. They pad-feed their ewes during the late summer in an effort to preserve feed covers on their Hunter property.

Warmer weather, associated with a relatively dry autumn, was good for stock health and meant farm work on Brookdale remained up-to-date. However there is still the need for a wet catch-up month to ensure adequate soil moisture levels are reached and a good start to spring growth.

With little rain for six weeks and little forecast, pasture covers were fast disappearing so the decision was made on March 10 to shut up a large proportion of the farm. Ewes were put on a feed pad and fed silage, mating was delayed by a week.

Feeding the ewes on the pad allowed a proportion of the farm to be spelled through March, preserving and carrying existing covers forward for flushing and mating and then into the later part of the autumn.

Before going on to the pad lighter ewes were drafted off and joined with the two-tooths on a grass rotation ahead of the hogget mob.

The ewes remained on the pad and were fed a maintenance ration of silage until three weeks before mating. While the ewes were pad feeding, 15 tonnes of urea at a rate of 80kg/ha was strategically applied to maximise late autumn pasture growth. It was not until the end of March before a much-needed 50mm of rain fell.

During the three weeks pre-mating flush mixed aged and two tooth ewes were supplemented with grain at a rate of 250gm/day. Along with the pad feeding, the pre-mating management of the ewes has proved to be a successful exercise with ewes going to the ram at similar liveweights to last year.

Despite the drier than normal conditions the Gregans are heading into the winter well stocked up, with their effective stocking rate of 16su/ha considered to be above the district average.

With the additional land and sheep numbers up on last year, the Gregans will winter 2800 Coopworth and 2200 Composite bred ewes as well as 850 in-lamb ewe hoggets plus 550 un-mated ewe hoggets this year.

This year all composite-bred ewes have been mated to Highlander rams with the remainder mated to terminal sires. Coopworth composite rams from the late Ron Cocks were joined to the Hurford Coopworth ewes.

Ewe hoggets have been mated to a selection of the Gregans’ own heavyweight ram hoggets.

Ewe hoggets went to the ram at an average liveweight of 44kg and will be mated for two cycles with the expectation of an 80% in-lamb rate.

The move into composites came last year when the Gregans purchased a line of 1850 composite-bred ewes from David Shaw of South Otago to stock the newly leased block, Leggoland.

The genetic make-up of the composite ewes is approximately 1/2 Coopworth, 1/8 East Friesian, 1/4 Texel, and 1/8 Finn. Run side by side with the existing ewe flock the Gregans say their all round performance levels over the past season have been way ahead of their expectations.

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