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Proving his critics wrong – singlehandedly
01-12-2003
Seven years ago, life was looking grim for Taranaki sharemilker Paul Hardegger.
He was struggling to get work, apparently because he was single, and after he’d made the decision to buy his own farm the bank denied him a loan.
Luckily, when he thought it couldn’t get any worse a helping hand in the form of a loan was offered by family friends and he’s never looked back.
Hardegger is milking off 88ha (93ha in total) with 240 predominantly Jersey cows and milking well above the district average.
In the past four years his herd has produced an average of 99,140kg MS or 1135kg MS/ha. The district average in 2001-2002 season was 917kg MS/ha.
Last year the heifers produced an average of 350kg MS/cow and the overall herd average for 2001-2002 was 470kg MS/cow.
The first season he budgeted for 80,000kg MS but the herd of 280 cows reached 84,000kg MS (300kg MS/cow). The best year he’s seen has been total production of 103,761kg MS (that’s equal to 415kg MS/cow) in a 250 cow herd. He says the higher than budgeted production in his first year on the farm he attributes to the property being left in top condition by Donald and Sharee Caskey.
The most the farm produced previously was 77,700kg MS.
He begins calving the first week in July, which he was warned would be too early for the Toko property, 15 minutes east of Stratford. Nearby dairy farms calve late July.
But Hardegger attributes his above average production to the length of lactation, because “I don’t have flash cows.”
The number of milking days last year was 296, the average milking period for central Taranaki in 2001-2002 was 261.
The BW (breeding worth) is 122, PW (production worth)134 and recorded ancestry 96%, which has risen from 36% when he first bought the cows 10 years ago.
The top half of the herd are artificially inseminated with Livestock Improvement’s “bull of the day” for about 21 days and followed up by an Angus bull and the lower performing cows are mated with an AI Hereford because he doesn’t keep their progeny.
Hardegger doesn’t employ staff to reduce costs so he can maintain profitability if herd production or payout falls.
Average rainfall is 1650mm and in keeping with Hardegger’s meticulous records is a rain tally for each year he’s been on the property. Rain tallies follow:
1997 – 1998 1478mm
1998 - 1999 2269mm
1999 – 2000 1724mm
2000 – 2001 1544mm
2001 – 2002 1998mm
2002 – 2003 1833mm
Hardegger grew up on a coastal dairy farm where they calved early to miss droughts and he continued calving early when he began farming inland.
During the massive rain of 1998 and 1999 (see table) he decided to bring calving forward further. The heifers once calved from July 10, that is now July 4. The cows begin in July 7.
The cows are wintered in two mobs. The two and three year old cows run in a mob of about 100 and the second herd is made up of older cows.
The herds are grazed around the farm for about 110 days during the winter round, but that speeds up if it’s wet. But if too wet, the cows are fed on a system similar to a feed pad, in a section of the race where troughs have been installed. The feed pad is important especially when about 15ha were submerged in early October.
Hardegger says the farm has grazing flexibility with its low-lying contour complimented by gentle hill country.
He also rears his own herd replacements – about 40 of the heifer calves from the Livestock Improvement semen used during AI.
Calving is spread out over about 12 weeks, which helps reduce pressure during such an early calving. The cows are also milked in two herds with the younger herd grazed closer to the shed to reduce stress of walking long distances.
“It gets them in and out of the shed quickly and they are not on the concrete too long,” says Hardegger.
“Production can be let down by two year olds,” he says.
A typical day starts at 3.20am with the cows in the shed by 4am. Hardegger says the last cow passes through the shed at about 7.15am in the three-month spring milking period. But he doesn’t have breakfast until about 9.30am after washing down and feeding calves. After three months Hardegger gets to the shed at about 4am. Then it starts again for the afternoon milking at about 3pm. The cows are kept in two herds until November when the feed pressure eases.
Insemination is carried out for 21 days from early September and this year 14 cows didn’t cycle and it’s the worse year Hardegger says he has experienced. In the past he’s had submission rates of 96%.
After AI two bulls run with each herd and typically 30% of the herd comes back in cycle. Hardegger says from the three weeks AI he gets enough replacement heifers.
The heifers run with the bull from September 25 and the cows from October 1.
No cows are induced because Hardegger believes a time will come when overseas markets and consumers won’t allow it and he would prefer not to be reliant on it when that time comes.
Another reason for the lengthy calving is that “shoulder” milk is becoming more valuable. He believes dairy companies will pay more for it in the future.
Use of CIDRS is kept to a minimum, another way of keeping costs down. Last year only two were used and this year none.
Hardegger says many people don’t realise how different it is to milk cows single-handedly. But he says with patience and time anything can be achieved.
By the end of May the cows have been dried off giving him an average lactation of 296 milking days, the average milking in the Toko district is 230 – 240 days.
“It’s not a flash herd but a working herd.”
Hardegger says the days in milk means the cows don’t have to peak as high but they have the ability to hang on for longer.
The drought earlier this year didn’t have too much of an impact on Hardegger and he describes the area as a “hidden oasis” or the Southland of Taranaki (summer safe).
“I was a coastal man through and through and I gave myself three years (to settle in), it took three months and I knew I was home.”
He’s also confident he’d never match his current production on a coastal property.
Supplements consist of silage, maize silage, hay and proliq.
Silage is made on the farm in mid November from about 24ha (he usually feeds about 700 cubic tonne annually) and about 70 big round hay bales are cut.
Proliq is a liquid by-product of cheese making. Hardegger feeds it to cows in a trough while they are waiting to be milked.
He buys about 200,000litres annually at a cost of $95/1000 litres. When feed is tight he feeds it at about 10-15L/cow. Cows can consume more than 10 litres.
About 80 tonne of dry matter (maize silage at 23 cents/kg) is bought in and each cow is fed about 340kg/cow because it suits early calving and longer season.
The cows are stocked at 2.8/ha and Hardegger says he is keen to make more with less. He says by thinking smarter he can end up with the same result.
Looking ahead Hardegger’s immediate goal is for his herd to produce 430kg MS/cow on the Toko property. But he also has an interest in a Southland dairy farm where he has an equity partnership with two brothers.
But his long-term goal is to continue dairying as he is now.
“I strive to better myself all the time and it is nice to prove people otherwise,” he says.