Multi Systems Enlightened Approach to Worm Drenching
By Barry Easton, September 2006.
Kerry Anderson and Fraser Pallin-Simmonds
A grazier’s $1500 investment in a FECPAK is the best $1500, he claims, he has ever spent! South Auckland grazier, Fraser Pallin-Simmonds, bought his FECPAK (FEC being an acronym for faecal egg count) five years ago, and he says, it paid for itself in the first six months.
Fraser grazes a range of cattle – 180-200 weaners, plus 150 winter milk heifers and 120 spring heifers – on a 174 hectare flat, rolling to steep hill property at KawaKawa Bay in South Auckland.
Fraser, who has lived and worked in the area since 1997, manages the property for Multi Systems Investments Ltd., a company owned by former Cathay-Pacific flight engineer, Kerry Anderson.
No unnecessary drenching
Faecal egg counting, says Fraser, means that cattle are not drenched unnecessarily and helps to slow down the resistance build-up to drenches.
“For example, we get some lines of heifers which don’t need drenching for six months, and then we get other lines which have to be drenched at monthly intervals,” he says. “It’s an extra tool for us.
Cattle can have worms but if they are getting sufficient feed, they will still put on weight. It’s when they get a feed pinch that they will collapse. When you feel the feed pinch is coming, you need to drench them.
“Anything over 80 eggs per gram and I would drench, although 50 epg is at the top end of the low range. It’s also worth noting that I drench all stock when they arrive on the farm, regardless of whether the farm owner has previously drenched them.”
The property managed by Fraser Pallin-Simmonds gets very dry in the summer and wet in the winter, when pugging can become a problem.
“But the winter wet can be more of a problem than the summer dry, especially with pugging and in trying to maintain the weights of the heifers destined for the winter milk herd, which are mating at the time,” he says.
“We get our weaners at four months - 180-200 annually – and we carry them through to 18 months. We carry our winter milkers for a local farmer, who runs a spring herd and a winter milk herd. This means that we are mating his winter milkers during the winter, when they are 15 months old and weigh around 300 kg. They are mated to a Jersey bull.
“This is a split mob. We also get spring heifers which we mate in October to a Jersey bull.”
Mob Size
The secret of doing the respective mobs well, regardless of class, is to keep herd numbers small, says Fraser.
“I run them in mobs of 50-60, and I prefer this for ease of management. When it gets wet there is less pugging and when it gets dry, they don’t chew the pastures down as hard. When there is good grass growth, they can stay in a paddock a lot longer.
“Also, I find that I don’t get a tail end of weight loss. I keep a close eye on an animal if they are getting sick, but I don’t run sick cattle as a mob. If I get a sick animal I just treat it and then put it back in the mob.”
Three wire electric fences are used over some of the farm, with a mixture of netting and batten fences. Shifting stock takes around two hours daily.
The preferred rotation lengths are 12-17 days. “But all classes of stock have their own rotation lengths,” explains Fraser.
“The weaners are on the better country and the older stock are on the poorer country. The maximum that I get out to is an 18 day rotation. I don’t know how some people can get 60 day rotations.
“Stock are constantly getting moved with a maximum of three days in a paddock, but more often, this is reduced to two days. A fresh bite every second day has worked well for us
”Spring, for most farmers, is the busiest time of the year. Paradoxically, that’s when Fraser gets to take things a little more easily.
“Because of the diversity which we have, it’s the only time of the year when I can slow down, even though I am still busy. Mentally, I don’t have to keep studying the animals and watching their weights, whereas from February 1 right through until September 1, I am consciously watching for weight variations.
“We have stock coming and going four times a year, and we have bulls on the farm for six months of the year. It can be quite challenging trying to keep the bulls in their respective mobs, which vary in number according to the mating requirements.”
Deferred Grazing
Deferred grazing – pasture saved over from the spring for use over the summer and autumn months – is another tool of management.
“But I use it only for older stock – nothing under one year old can handle it,” says Fraser.
“Weaners, for example, don’t have the ability to digest deferred grazing because it’s mature grass, but there is good quality pasture underneath where there are clovers and fresh grass coming through.
“Deferred grazing has a higher ME (metabolisable energy) value than hay, and is a cheap form of supplement. All you do is shut up the paddocks in late November-early December, and leave it there until January, February and March.
“The key thing is simply not to let the stock loose in a paddock. It’s a crop, just like pasja or turnips, so hot wire it and set it up in order that you give the appropriate volumes to stock.”
Silage
Fraser makes around 28-32 hectares of grass silage annually, depending on the season. This is usually fed in the autumn.
“But we did have trouble with our weights last year, and we ended up buying four tonne of copra,” he says.
“We found it very effective. We fed it with molasses, and the cattle took to it very quickly. Within a day, they were following us around the farm.”
Sheep
Pasja is also grown, but this is reserved for the fat lambs, which were introduced to the regime for the first time last year.
The 300-strong Romney ewe flock, which is mated to terminal sires, was tried as a means of minimising gorse control, and it is a plan which worked admirably.
“We have doubled our income on the area grazed by the sheep, and halved the cost of controlling gorse,” says Fraser.
“We run the lambs on our ewes until January 1, by which time we have sent off two drafts of lambs, averaging 16-18kg. About a third of our lambs remain after January, and these are put on to pasja. We finish them on that within three weeks, and then buy in a further 100 lambs to utilise the crop further.”
When Flying Days are Over...
Kerry Anderson, who owns the 174 hectare farm managed by Fraser Pallin-Simmonds, bought the property to indulge two of his passions – farming, and restoring classic automobiles.
A former flight engineer for Cathay Pacific Airlines, he was made redundant in 1999. He had earlier bought the farm in order to pursue a lifestyle which he enjoyed once his flying days were over.
“Most guys, when they finish flying, don’t do very well at all if they have nothing else to go to,” he explained.
“Many find it difficult to do something else, because flying is not an occupation – it’s a pleasure to go to work.
“The farm, which I love anyway, was to take care of that situation so that when I finished flying, I still had something that I really wanted to do.”
From Ferraris, to e-type Jaguars and early model De Sotos, Kerry has them all. “Don’t get personal!” he quips when asked for the precise number.
“There’s about 40 classic cars here, but my racing cars are all in the South Island. There’s about 15 of those!”