Friday, March 29, 2024

A different kind of dairy

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Thousands of tiny, white woollies have been reared on the western shores of Lake Taupo this year. Maui Milk general manager Peter Gatley and geneticist Jake Chardon showed Anne Hughes the milking and lamb rearing systems in place so far and explained how they plan to improve breeding, feeding and farm systems to lift production on the sheep-milking farm.
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Lambing on the Maui Milk farm is vastly different to a decade ago. Back then, it was still a traditional sheep and beef station.

Part of the Maori-owned farm was converted to sheep milking nine years ago.

New investors have since come on board, identifying opportunities for the future of New Zealand farming.

Ewes are milked twice daily from mid-late August until Christmas when, depending on production, milking drops to once-a-day until the end of summer.

While new genetics are being introduced into the breeding programme at nearby Waikino Station, Maui Milk started with a dual-purpose flock, which had not been subject to individual performance measurements.

The flock is producing more than 100 litres a ewe a year and getting closer to the 150l mark.

Maui Milk general manager Peter Gatley says a better-bred sheep with improved feeding is capable of producing 200-300l. As more data is collected, performance recording of sheep will help improve production.

Milk meters are generally used four to five times during the lactation.

Meters are useful for identifying ewes  suspected of underperforming that need to be culled from the milking flock and also to spot the better-producing elite ewes, to be given preferential treatment and be identified as a good source of replacements.

Sheep are all EID-tagged and performance measurements will help select replacements and create mobs to be treated according to their efficiency.

This year all Maui Milk ewes – a mix of Romney, Poll Dorset and East Friesian – were mated naturally to East Friesian rams (born from embryos frozen 18 years ago).

Ross Dellaway is Maui Milk's farm managerPhoto supplied

A staunch sheep and beef farmer for 30 years, Ross Dellaway says most people he tells about his new career move don’t believe it.

As Maui Milk sheep dairy farm manager, Ross runs the farm and lamb rearing, while wife Doreen is responsible for the milking shed.

Between them, they manage more than 20 staff.

The couple are enjoying the new challenge. Ross says it’s good to do something different and no matter the type of farming, stockmanship is always an important skill.

MAUI MILK FARM FACTS

  • 500ha sheep dairy unit
  • Initially part of 2500ha sheep and beef station
  • Established nine years ago by farm owners iwi group Waituhi Kuratau Trust
  • Now a joint venture between the trust and Chinese marketing company Super Organic Dairy
  • Milking 3000 ewes on six-month lactations
  • An extensive, all-outdoors system.
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