Weekly Farm Summary as at 17 Mar 2022

Business Area	Current Status
Feed	Rotation length is out to 40 days for all herds; increasing supplementary feeding for all herds – 3kg inshed and 3-4 kg DM/cow as baleage (lucerne & pasture); Holding APC at current feeding levels
Milk Production	Have not held milk yield this week indicating insufficient energy intake across all herds hence the increase in supplementary feed
People	Team managing really well through the rostering complexities of COVID cases in our HUB families; Performance assessments for all staff underway, including some 360° feedback for our farm manager
Animals	BCS either holding or slightly increasing for all herds and fewer below BCS 4; No culls away this week
Environment	No nitrogen fertiliser as conditions too dry; targeting effluent to paddocks with lower applications season to date
Wintering	Italian paddocks due for harvesting; Fodder beet to be sprayed for fungus and brassica’s for aphids and white butterfly
Research	Currently working through behaviour data collected between June and September this year; Kale cows averaged 9.3 and fodder beet 9.1 hours lying/day during winter

Pasture Quality	Limited options for influencing pasture quality under the current dry conditons Lucerne baleage is still being fed to all farmlets as a way of increasing the protein content in the diet New grass paddocks are still greener and leafier than others and are still higher in protein
Growth rate Management	Have increased supplementary feeding to all herds to prevent overgrazing of pastures with the aim to leave more leaf for regrowth. Supplement to be fed out across the whole paddock ahead of grazing with additional supplement added if required at each grazing
Nitrogen Strategy	N applications remain on hold. A strategy is being worked on to ensure that the LI farmlets get their total allocation before the 10th of April and the Std farmlets get as close to their allocation as possible.

	Standard Kale Pink	Low Impact Kale Blue	Standard Fodder beet Green	Low Impact Fodder beet Yellow
Quantity	Growth only 57% of demand	Growth only 43% of demand	Growth only 61% of demand	Growth only 60% of demand
Quality	New grasses holding quality, others very dry	New grasses holding quality, others very dry	New grasses holding quality, others very dry	New grasses holding quality, others very dry
Surplus Management	None	None	None	None
Deficit Management	3.0kg inshed (down 0.3 from last week) 1.4kg DM baleage	2.2kg inshed (up 0.2 from last week) 0.9kg DM baleage	2.2kg inshed (up 0.2 from last week) Baleage 1.8kg/cow/day	2.0kg inshed (up 0.3 from last week) Baleage 2.3kg/cow/day
Rotation Length	42 Days	40 Days	42 Days	40 days

Milk Production	Milk as many cows to the end of season but not at the expense of BCS gain; cows will be dried off early if required Keeping milk production at a level that will allow us to milk into May without SCC issues
Key influences on milk production	Total energy intake is likely the biggest contributor to milk production this week; kale herds with a higher proportion of inshed feeding have fared better Increasing inshed feeding to 3-3.5 kg DM/day across all herds, limited to feeding any more than this on 3n2 due with the single day milking and the impact of PKE on FEI
Cow Management	Light BCS, early calving cows continue to receive priority feeding inshed at milking Average BCS has increased in the Std FB and LI Kale herds and decreased slightly in the other two

	Standard Kale Pink	Low Impact Kale Blue	Standard Fodder beet Green	Low Impact Fodder beet Yellow
kg Milksolids per cow this week / (last week)	1.52 / (1.62)	1.48 / (1.54)	1.37 / (1.48)	1.36 / (1.52)
kg Milksolids per ha this year / (this time last year)	1063/ (1103)	934 / (893)	991 / (1051)	883 / (863)
Season to date compared to last year	Down 3.6% total milk Half paddock extra in grass this year affects KPI	Up 4.5% total milk One paddock less in grass this year affects KPI	Down 5.7% total milk	Up 2.2% total milk One paddock less in grass this year affects KPI
Cows needing OAD BCS<4 (% herd)	40 cows (24%)	30 cows (22%)	12 cows (7%)	20 cows (15%)
Animal health peculiarities	None	None	None	None

Reviewing Performance

The farm team are utilising some of the extra time during the day from the reduced milking frequency to complete 6 monthly performance assessments.

Billy is meeting with each staff member individually and talking through what is working well, what things they would like to start/stop doing and why and what their goals are.

This time round there is also a discussion on team goals and how the individual team members can contribute to this.

As someone relatively new to people management Billy is also seeking feedback on his performance as a manager and what he could be doing differently to support them and the team. This is a great demonstration of real team leadership and there have already been some really good suggestions come through.

The staff having confidence to give open and honest feedback on the performance of their manager demonstrates the trust within the team.

Having a robust system in place for managing staff performance helps employees stay on track and allows you to get the most from your team

Farm system impacts: of Kale vs Fodder beet for winter AND Reducing N loss to water by 30%.
Kale, Winters on kale - in-shed feed available. Fodder beet, winters on Beet, Beet as lactation supp. Low impact (LI) limited Max 50kg N/ha/year vs Std 193kg N/ha/year

Weekly Farm Summary

Cows & Milk Analysis

Feed

Milk Production

People

Farm-system impacts of: Kale vs Fodder beet for winter
AND Reducing N loss to water by 30%.