WORDS AND IMAGES PROVIDED BY BARENBRUG
There’s a new way to make money this season that could add thousands to the bottom line for dairy farms nationwide.
It’s like carbon farming, but better – no pine trees!
Four years of research has just proved what we have long believed – every kilo of homegrown feed eaten directly by cows cuts farm emissions intensity.
Milk with low emissions intensity is now worth serious money – up to 25c per kilogram of milksolids.
On an average South Island dairy farm, producing 281,000 kg milksolids a year, a low emissions premium of 15c per kg adds up to $42,000 extra income. The same premium for an average North Island farm producing 136,000 kg milksolids a year is $20,400,
The best part, says a leading pasture expert?
“This is something hundreds of farmers can achieve, without a lot of disruption, using resources they already have. In fact, they can start working towards this straight away.”
Graham Kerr, pasture specialist for Barenbrug, says key findings from a big new study on emissions and profitability in New Zealand dairying show you can have industry leading profitability while keeping emissions low.
Better yet, the effect holds true regardless of farm system, or herd size.
The study found top performing farms for both emissions intensity and profitability had three things in common.
They all grew more feed, of higher quality, with more efficient use of nitrogen, than the others.
With spring here, there’s no better time to act on this knowledge, Graham says.
“To grow more, first up, do a really good job of this season’s pasture renewal and spring cropping.
“That means getting the right level of renewal or crop across the farm; identifying how many under-performing paddocks you have, and ticking all the boxes to get these back up a high level of production.”
Spring’s also pivotal in maintaining high feed quality.
“Eighty per cent of feed quality is influenced by management. That includes identifying and managing surplus pasture, and creating a culture of achieving consistent post-grazing residuals, day in, day out, to set up quality at the next grazing.”
What about improving nitrogen use efficiency?
“Clover is king, for its nitrogen-fixing ability. When renewing pastures, remember clover seed must be sown shallow, no more than 10mm deep. So much is wasted every year because it never emerges.”
Other options include sowing Array perennial ryegrass, which can extract more nitrogen from the soil in deficit periods; and introducing tetraploid ryegrasses.
“On their own or mixed with diploids, they can be grazed half a leaf stage later than straight diploids, so you effectively harvest more feed from the same amount of nitrogen.”