Oh boy, how time has flown by… it’s June already!
With the onset of Winter on the farm, we enjoy clear skies and golden paddocks. The cycle of moving the cattle becomes more relaxed, as they spend more time in each paddock. This is due to the growing season being over, and allows us to get the cows to do some “work” for us without damaging the roots of the plants. Using strategic water and supplement placement, we try to get the cattle to do a more extensive graze to prepare the paddocks for the new flush of grass in the next growing season.
After selling about fifty animals in December and January when prices were at their best (the cattle market is still QUITE depressed), we currently have 75 breeders, and hope to raise that number to 80+ by the end of this year. Some of our SHCF bred heifers have calved for the first time and all is going well. Our Senepol bulls are proving their worth and fathering lovely calves that are growing well and showing great potential.
We have reached the end of calving for this season and hope to welcome more new calves come Spring.
Looking at the grazing calendar we see we have enough feed ahead of us to get through to the summer rains. It is never the best feed at this time of the year but the breeders are very good at converting it to energy. Supplementing them with free choice seaweed helps them digest the more lignified grass too. We are going to experiment with giving them free choice apple cider vinegar, as this is also meant to help with digestion of older grasses, to help them maintain condition.
Here is a lovely photo of calf # 226, at seven months old.
OUR BEST CALF YET!
Last yarded in April he weighed a hefty 210kg at five months. For us this is a first. And he is the first of many! As of last weights, we have several calves following in his hoof prints!
For our paddock-to-plate business, this should improve the availability and consistency of our product.
Here are some of the things we have accomplished so far this year:
- Many machinery repairs – replaced the clutch on the Prado, fixed the hydraulic cylinders on the Unimog crane, and electrical repairs to the Backhoe.
- We are currently not milking, which is a great break, but are already looking forward to starting again when Maple calves in early August.
- Much lantana removal in paddocks and along the creek. We have been able to only work on small selected areas – this needs more thought!
- Dead tree removal. This is a legacy from the 2019 fires, the trees are dead and falling so we are trying to get ahead and remove them before they do damage. Unfortunately, it’s a massive job.
- Another legacy from the fires was the damage done to our orchard. We have finally started to clean it up in preparation for planting more fruit trees and constructing a shaded, pest-protected, enclosed area.
- Finished the firefighting module for the Unimog and a firefighting trailer that can be towed behind a car or quad.
- Finished the utensil drawer – this has been an ongoing joke between Dominic and myself for the last SEVEN years. Now it is done!
- We installed new solar onto the work shed to provide more energy for running our market refrigeration. A 16kw system with 34kw of lithium batteries. Dropped stress levels enormously!
- We have been attending the Mulgowie Farmers Markets faithfully since September last year. We have been greatly welcomed and appreciate all our customers. We still have so much to learn about the process of paddock to plate.
That’s a short round-up of the last six months, remember to subscribe to the newsletter (see the subscribe form below in our website footer) to get more detailed monthly updates.
Below is a short video I created showcasing Winter at our end of the Mulgowie Valley:
