For Steve and Andrea Mills it’s all about options. They signed up for their first farm, a 65ha property at Ngatea in August last year, but took over at the end of May.
And they’ve retained their 50:50 sharemilking position on Grafton Downs, Wesley College’s farm, at Paerata.
With this year’s drop in payout the farm group involved at Grafton Downs took a hard look at their farm system and came to some conclusions.
“Our system isn’t broken, there just isn’t a lot of money coming in the top end,” Steve says.
While it has been more profitable in recent years the cost of production on their Hauraki Plains farm will be cheaper than at Paerata. That’s an important factor looking forward, and there’s the potential to grow a lot more grass. Added in is the Auckland Housing Accord which covers all the Paerata farm, which will be required as Auckland expands southwards over the next 20 years.
“There are a lot of unknowns which we have to factor in,” he says.
“You’ve got to stay focused on what you can do. An example is we may lease in cows for a few years as we build numbers rather than adding to our debt.”
The present herd of 460 cows they own could be boosted to 760 in this way.
Jacob Jenkins is learning the art of platemetering.
“Over a year the total amount of grass you grow must improve,” he says.
“It’s better to be looking at feed than looking for it.”
Balance date is September 10. By February or March with the usual summer dry conditions their cows will be getting only bought-in feed but they’ll continue to be milked rather than dried off.
“Our policy is to feed 15-16kg of supplement to a milking cow which is still more efficient than giving a dry cow 8-10kg, then having to feed them more later to improve their body condition score before calving,” he says.
“With this policy we can cover the cost of the feed and depending on the payout make a small profit on top. When we are growing less than 10kg DM/day for 90 days there is a big hole to fill.”
A winter milk contract was operating when the Mills came on to the farm so they bought some of these cows to boost their herd of 400 which they gradually built up to 460. They stuck with the contract for the first four years in the job then the farm group, as a review on practices and profit, came to the conclusion that seasonal production would make the farm more profit consistent.
“You need grazing off for 150 cows in the winter then the same in summer for the winter milking herd,” Steve says.
“As well as the expense there was often the issue of light cows to calve.”
So the board made a decision to replace the winter milk cows with spring-calvers.
“Six years on it’s made life a lot easier,” he says.
“It used to be that from March 20 all the way through to Christmas it was calving, mating, feeding crops and making silage.”
Building up cow numbers was made easier by a history of herd testing so culling decisions could be made on production, with any older cows also shown the door. Their herd’s Breeding Worth is now 98/42 and Production Worth 108/67 with a recorded ancestry of 75%.
The Mills’ herd is 70-80% Friesian-based and 20% Jersey.
Calving date is June 25 for heifers and July 4 for the rest of the herd. Heifer mating is from September 20 with only Jersey semen used, meaning they only have to calve about one cow a year. Previously they’ve been synchronised but this year as a cost-saving measure Steve will drive over to them and cut out those showing signs of heat. And by using bull of the day rather than nominated sires he believes he’ll save about $60/animal.
Their herd’s three-week submission rate was 83% last year and six-week in-calf rate 68%, with improvements in recent years coming from putting a few of the late to get in-calf cows on once-a-day milking and running them with the bull to be picked up.
Andrea is in charge of calf rearing and then they go to a grazier at AkaAka after weaning. The heifers go to Clevedon, nearer Auckland, returning after regular weighing and drenching when they’re due to calve. Steve doesn’t stint on his instructions to buy in palm kernel if necessary.
“You’ve got to put the feed in to grow good young stock, it costs very little more to have a good one rather than a poor one,” he says.
This cost is shared three ways between the Mills, Wesley College and the grazier.
The Mills reared and sold 20-30 Friesian bulls every year for a time before switching to rearing extra heifers which Steve says makes them more money. They also saw the potential in the prices paid in the early market for Hereford calves they could take to the 100kg mark.
“Beef’s doing well at the moment and there’s a margin in there now,” Steve says.
This 50:50 beef calf venture with Wesley College is a win:win proposition for both.
Soil testing is carried out on the farm every two years.
“We go off the recommendations but always with dollars in mind,” he says.
When it comes to nitrogen applications he describes himself as “a little and often guy”.
“We’ll often go round three or four days after the cows graze a paddock and on the shorter rounds three or four days ahead.”
About 130-150kg N/ha/year goes on in line with Auckland council recommendations.
“The farm always is a good colour and the pasture growth and quality more consistent.”
Effluent goes into a sump then is spray irrigated on to 30ha from which the farm aims to take one or two cuts of silage a year.
A pasture renovation programme has been completed on about 70% of the farm, with Steve drawing the areas on a farm map which needed the most urgent attention.
“We had a lot of kikuyu and it was a case of do we tackle it or do nothing and learn to farm it,” he says.
And he’s acutely aware of the way the farm could be seen as a role model for dairying with a two kilometre stretch of busy road between Auckland and Pukekohe on its boundary.
“The first thing I see when I open the curtains in the morning are street lights,” he says.
That means everyone wears helmets on their bikes at all times and they are extra safety and security conscious when it comes to removing keys and locking them at night.
The Mills also do their bit to close any urban-rural divide by allowing pupils at nearby Karaka School to take one of their calves for its calf club day, so long as they have an adult involved.
“If there weren’t any calves it would just become a gala day.”
Many steps to farm ownership
Steve Mills, 48, has simple advice for youngsters in the dairy industry dreaming of farm ownership.
“You can buy your own farm,” he says. “Keep the aim there and it can and will happen.”
He kept records of the cows on his parents’ Kaipara Flats farm from an early age but it was on a neighbour’s 120-cow operation where he first worked, also helping out in the owner’s small contracting business. That meant between milkings he would be out raking hay around the area, an hour north of Auckland, for his employer to bale in the evenings.
That job lasted for two years before he moved to another neighbouring town supply property as full-time manager. He then took a break from farming, working in town and fencing before coming back into the industry on Hugh Kirton’s 280-cow Kaipara Flats’ farm.
Joining forces with another young local farmer, Danny Woodcock, they applied for two 550-cow positions on Allan and Frank Crafar’s farms in Reporoa. But when Danny and wife Heather secured a Tapora sharemilking position, on which they were to take out their title of Auckland Sharemilkers of the Year in the 1990s, Danny’s father Brian stepped in. He and Steve went 25% sharemilking on the 370ha farm, milking 1100 cows with the help of three staff.
“We convinced them to run it as one unit rather than two separate positions because the cows were all milked through the 104-aside dairy and there would have been problems around the milkings,” he says. In the 1994-95 season they produced 325,000kg milksolids (MS).
“I learned a lot about myself and worked a lot of hours.”
While Brian stayed on to work on another of the Crafar properties, Steven milked 280 leased cows on a Hauraki Plains farm as a 20% sharemilker. By this time he’d met Andrea, who lived in Leigh, near Warkworth, and they married in 1997.
From 1996 to 1999 they were 27% sharemilkers at Ohinewai, increasing cow numbers and milk production. For the next three seasons they were contract milking 520 cows on 180ha at Arohena. LIC consultant Ken Bartlett gave Steve some invaluable advice at this time, telling him that to be considered for the top sharemilking positions he needed to get more training.
“Without that on my CV he said I would always be considered for the 700-900kg MS/ha jobs, not the higher ones.”
The result was Steve gaining first place in the Waikato Farm Business Management course he took for two years running.
The couple’s first 50:50 job was at Mangatangi, where they were employed through consultant Scott Montgomerie, milking 370 cows on a winter milk contract on 200ha. They lifted milk production by 11,400kg MS in the first year to 121,400kg MS, but the owner wanted to retire and sold the property at the end of the 2003-04 season.
“That was the year only five 50:50 sharemilking jobs were advertised and they were all smaller than we had,” Steve says.
But through good networks they found the Grafton Downs farm group at the eleventh hour.
“Communication was the key and we all took each other at our word,” he says.
So they and their children Cameron, 14, Shaelyn, 12 and Rhianna, 10, are settled and happy to stay.
Key points
Millslands farm
Location: Ngatea, Hauraki Plains
Owners: Steve and Andrea Mills
50:50 sharemilkers: Brad and Abby Silvester
Farm: 65ha
Herd: 180 crossbreds, aiming to lift to 200
Production: Previous average of 50,000kg MS, aiming for 70,000kg MS.
