Scope is good but being efficient and sustainable is even better.
Alfons Zeestraten with chipped beet ready to go in the mixer wagons to be fed to lactating cows.
Thriving on a hybrid system
Southland’s Zeestraten family has developed a hybrid system for their farms, combining the strengths of pasture systems and cow housing to create a manageable and sustainable operation. The owners talked to Karen Trebilcock about the benefits of their system for the cows and for their family.
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“We have a person on the pump at the pond and a person on the tractor and if anything goes wrong both of them can turn it off.”
The company’s new operations manager, Adam Davis, who has a background in sheep and fertiliser industries, says the soil fertility levels on the farm are well-balanced and efficiently maintained.
“With what we’re doing I think we could turn around an old sheep farm in a year or two to top fertility, which is impossible using chemical fertilisers,” he says.
“And it’s sustainable.”
He’s enjoying the challenge of the new position after working part-time for the company for the past few years.
“Everything needs to be watched and little problems can become big problems very quickly if you’re not on top of it.”
About 10% of the farms are planted in fodder beet each year, soaking up excess potassium from the soils.
“We feed it to the cows that are milking at a total cost of 22c/kg DM. That’s grown, lifted, cleaned and chipped, then it’s mixed with everything else in mixing wagons,” Alfons says.
Lactating cows get 5kg DM of beet a day and it’s reduced to 1kg DM/day when cows are dry.
“Beet is a high-energy feed so it’s a good feed for cows when they’re milking but it’s full of potassium and that is the one mineral you need to be cautious about when giving it to cows before they calve because of metabolic problems.”
Part of the lactating cows’ diet is locally grown under contract – wheat and straw – as well as silage made on the farms, palm kernel, dried distillers grain from Australia, and molasses.
“We try to be as self-contained as we can be. About 85% of what our cows eat is grown on our farms.
“And we give the cows exactly what they need – the correct ration of protein, energy and fibre. Everything goes into the feed including all the minerals. We don’t need to put a lot of lime on the farm because every day the cows are getting calcium which is then passed on into the organic matter which goes back to the paddocks.”
The cows have few metabolic problems, and if there are any they start looking at what’s been fed.
“We can fix it very quickly.
“There is also a huge opportunity for us to balance high-protein grass with the right supplements. Protein is expensive so you don’t want to waste it.
“A milking cow only needs 18% protein and grass can sometimes go up to 28% protein. And where does all that extra protein go when cows are grazing on pastures? Where it shouldn’t.”
AI is for six weeks using Friesian genetics mostly from overseas.
Bulls follow AI for 12 weeks, going from farm to farm with breaks in between and don’t seem to mind the barn environment. No CIDRs are used. The empty rate is 3% to 4%.
“You can’t get it any lower than 3%. We use a lot of frozen sexed semen and our conception rate with it this year is 65%, which is a good result.
“And because our in-calf rate is so good we have less wastage, so the average age of our cows is a year older than the national average so we get more productive years from them.
“We don’t want a large cow but we want a productive cow with a large capacity. Our cows still need to walk so they can’t be huge.”
Almost all heifer calves are reared, using robotic feeders. Surplus heifers have gone to the Chinese market in past years. Local beef farmers buy the bull calves at four days old.
The farm has moved between sugar beet and fodder beet and now grows a hybrid between the two.
“Sugar beet has very deep grooves so is hard to wash and we don’t want our cows eating dirt. It’s not good for them so this new beet works because the bulb is more uniform and smooth.”
The beet is lifted every three or four weeks, when the weather allows, and stored in heaps on concrete. It is then chipped every two to three days ready to be mixed with the other feeds.
The three farms could be sold separately and were set up that way in case debt levels became unmanageable.
“We don’t want to grow any bigger, we just want to do things better and bring in the children if they are interested and give them opportunities as shareholders.”
Besides improving per cow production, Alfons this season wants to start measuring how much grass they’re growing after using the new umbilical effluent system for a year.
“I believe we’re getting between 10% and 15% more growth but at this stage we’re only guessing. I want to measure it.”
Going to a fully housed system, as used in North America and Europe, is not where they’re heading.
“We love and thrive off our hybrid system. When the conditions are right the cows go out to the pasture and they’re on a mission. They don’t run but they do walk very fast, and when the weather is bad or the sun hot, even if we opened the doors of the barns, they won’t leave.
“It’s a win-win situation.”
Breaking down the costs
- Cows dry for 45 days fed 11kg DM:
- 3kg straw @23c/kg DM
- 4kg silage @35c/kg DM
- 3kg palm kernel @25c/kg DM
- 1kg beet @23c/kg DM
- Total feed cost $3.07/day, $21.49/week
- For 45 days = $138.15
- Barn cost $2000/cow, $2500 including effluent system which is also used by the dairy.
- At 7% interest rate, paid off over 30 years = $137/cow/year
- Barn maintenance costs (electricity, rubber scrapers etc) $25/cow/year = $162/cow/year
For more information go to www.southerncentredairies.com
