Farmers don’t need to buy in solutions to get the best from their pasture and cows over summer – the answer is often homegrown nutrition.
When the sun is blazing and the temperature is soaring, most people crave cool refreshments and opt for light meal options. Cows are no different.
On-Farm Excellence Programme Manager (Environment) Louise Cook says temperatures very much affect cows’ eating habits and, in turn, their milk production.
“On a hot summer day, would you rather sit down for a hot roast or would you prefer a salad? High density foods heat us up from the inside, which is not want you want on a hot summer day – the same is true for cows. Silage-based feeds with higher fibre content will make cows heat up, which is not ideal. The hotter she feels, the less likely she is to want to eat. Instead she’ll seek shade trying to cool herself off rather than feed, which will affect her intake and milk production,” Louise says.
“The better option is to feed the silages in the night breaks and to opt for ‘cooler’ feeds during the day where possible. ‘Cooler’ feeds include most concentrates and fresh crops such as chicory and brassicas – less fibrous options that can help cows manage heat stress. This is particularly important in the North Island, where humidity is a greater factor and farms are more reliant on supplements and additional feed options over summer.”
Identify opportunities
Thinking ahead and identifying ways to minimise stress on your herd over summer and optimise nutrition will pay dividends for farmers.
“The critical principles here are to get the nutrition right from the outset and maintain production levels and body conditioning scores during summer. Otherwise production will drop to a level that farms will find it hard to recover from and this can greatly impact autumn’s production. Summer can be ‘make or break’ for the rest of the season in terms of lactation,” Louise says.
Explore your options
Over the past few seasons New Zealand farmers have faced erratic weather patterns over summer.
“Weather can be very hard to predict. Farmers are best to plan for it to be dry and for there to be a feed deficit at some point. If you don’t have a feed management plan in place, then you’ll be stuck in a reactive mode, which can be very stressful,” Programme Lead – Animals Tim Johnstone says.
Farmers need to explore if they have the correct feed for the conditions and ascertain if they need to supplement or substitute feed options.
“It’s important to evaluate where your feed might be falling short - is the issue protein or available energy? For instance, if you’re feeding significant amounts of maize, your cows could be lacking protein. However, if energy is the limiting factor, investing in high-protein supplements won’t address the problem. In our pasture-based systems, energy is often the primary constraint. Consider how much energy your cows are expending and adjust their feed accordingly to meet their needs,” Tim says.
Take action
Both Louise and Tim acknowledge pasture management and milk production over summer is a juggling act.
“You want as many cows milking right through the summer as you can, after removing underperformers to reduce demand, so you can get the benefit of a flush in autumn. It’s that balance between maintaining body condition while they’re milking and avoiding having to dry off cows. It’s a juggling act but there is plenty of support out there from advisors and potential strategies to help manage that,” says Tim.
Farm Source has a wealth of knowledge and support available to farmers to call upon including the On-Farm Efficiency Hub that provides information on how to be more productive and profitable, while helping the Co-op to be more sustainable. The Hub includes links to a range of industry resources and insights.
In addition, DairyNZ’s online tools FeedChecker and Supplement Price Calculator can help farmers compare energy supply and demand of the herd and look at the potential profit margins from different feeds.
“The key is to monitor everything, cow condition and pasture, and how much feed you’ve got. If you’ve put in or putting in a crop , look after it and invest in it. You want to make sure you get as much tonnage out of a paddock taken out of the system as you can,” Tim says.
Check your progress
One of the biggest influences on milk production season-wide is the quality and quantity of feed, in particular homegrown feed, and it pays to see how you’re tracking.
“Around 85% of a farm’s feed is homegrown. You may not have perfect grass right now, which is where I challenge people to say, so how could you have better grass next year?” Louise says.
“We feed our cows and they sort-of take care of the rest of farm performance for us. We have 100% control over what our cows are able to eat. If we want to get the best out of our cows, what energy and attention are we putting into building the best quality diet we can? When did we last review how it’s playing out and whether the balance is where we want it to be? What’s the production coming off your farm? What are the things you could do about it and who do you talk about it with?”
Crucially farmers do not necessarily have to buy in new feed solutions.
“There are so many ways to get a different outcome from what we grow at home, which has a far bigger impact on our performance than focusing solely on the feed we buy in. Your milk data holds the key to a lot of information on the performance of feed in the farm system. I thoroughly recommend farmers look through their Farm Insights Report and see where the opportunities might be. If you’re having trouble interpreting that information and not sure who to ask, reach out to one of our Farm Source Sustainable Dairy team for a fresh set of eyes. Keep asking questions and seeking solutions to focus on profitable systems for your farm,” Louise says.
Talk to your local TSR or drop into a Farm Source store to find out more about pasture management over summer.