Drought and the COVID-19 lockdown are adding further complexity to sheep and beef farm systems, but there are practical steps farmers can take to protect next season’s production.
In a B+LNZ Scene + Herd Podcast, Tactics for Tight Times, Tom Fraser from Fraser Pastoral talks to B+LNZ’s Product & Development Manager Aaron Meikle about what sheep and beef farmers can do now to set their farms up to maximise production next spring.
Tom says spring is the most important time to make money on a sheep and beef farm and all the decisions made now should be around maximising late winter and spring feed supplies to drive lamb survivability and pre-weaning growth rates.
He says late autumn is the ideal time to carry out a feed budget and in the podcast he talks farmers through the fundamentals of putting together a feed budget and the importance of setting pasture cover targets for spring lambing or calving platforms.
Tom also discusses the use of Body Condition Scoring as a way of making the most effective and efficient use of feed resources and using nitrogen in autumn to help build pasture covers to carry through winter.
Tactics for Tight Tights can be heard here: https://beeflambnz.com/knowledge-hub/podcast/tom-fraser-tactics-tight-times
Other podcasts that will be of value at this time are:
Further B+LNZ podcasts can be found at https://beeflambnz.com/knowledge-hub