Finishing unit targets 200g/day in lambs
      14-11-2005

During winter the 440ha (effective) property only carries cattle, but over summer up to 14,000 lambs and 1200 cattle are finished on the North Canterbury farm.

Glenellen is one of Mt Linton’s finishing farms, set up primarily to finish stock sent up from the Southland station.

Lambs start arriving on Glenellen after weaning begins at Mt Linton from the start of December, and farm manager Gareth Finlayson is charged with finishing the lambs to a carcaseweight of between 16-18kg over summer. He aims to have all lambs gone by May when the farm can be loaded up with cattle.

Mt Linton set up the farm (which is leased) as a specialist finishing unit four years ago, complete with a 880m centre pivot and rotorainer irrigator, an absolutely essential piece of equipment for grass growth during Canterbury’s notoriously dry summers.

The layout of the farm, similar to that of a dairy conversion, is impressive. The 32 7.5ha paddocks under the centre-pivot irrigator are in pie configuration, and polywire electric fences allow the paddocks to be sub-divided into 2.5ha blocks over summer for lambs and 1.25ha blocks for dairy bulls over spring and summer.

The lambs arrive in unit loads of 500 from the beginning of December and are moved every two days earlier in the season, but as more lambs come on board the rotation is extended, so the lambs get a fresh block every third day.

The top lines of lambs are brought into the yards once a week and drafted off, while the medium lines are brought in every fortnight to be sample weighed over Racewell scales, sorted and drafted.

Gareth aims to achieve an average lamb growth rate of 200g/day and for a short period last summer the lambs were gaining an average 260g/day on the high quality pasture.

Apart from one block of chicory, pastures are a mix of novel endophyte ryegrasses including Concorde, Maverick, Quartet and red and white clovers.

None of the pastures are more than four-years-old, so pasture renovation has not been necessary until this year, when 30-60ha will be put through winter-feed crops.

The lambs go onto pastures of 2200-2300kg DM/ha and graze covers to around 1500kg DM/ha, although Gareth says this is debatable.

“I like to leave a bit more behind for safety, but it depends on the size of mobs.

“I try and keep pasture quality and keep a nice even graze.”

Gareth uses a sward stick to measure covers at the beginning of the season, just to get his eye in, after which he works solely on eye appraisal.

Urea is used to boost grass in the growing season and is applied at a rate of 100kg/ha every six weeks.

Water is an essential element on Glenellen, and is possibly both the farm’s greatest strength and weakness. While the irrigation enables them to grow grass when most other Canterbury farms are drying out, the water drawn from the Waimakiriri Irrigation Scheme can be restricted as river levels drop. This has the potential to seriously disrupt the finishing programme with so many lambs on board. Restrictions were placed on the water for a couple of days last summer and these proved to be a nerve-wracking couple of days for Gareth.

All going well, the centre-pivot applies 14.5mm of water to 240ha of the farm every three days and the rotorainer applies 14.5mm to 167ha on an 18-day return.

Gareth monitors soil moisture levels simply by grabbing a handful of soil to check the soil’s viscosity. If soil moisture levels fall below 50% the soil crumbles, indicating water is needed.

This year a 33ha dryland block was used to grow winter crops, and was put straight back into permanent pasture.

Because of the farm set-up, the irrigators pretty much take care of themselves, which is just as well as summer is a very busy time for Gareth and one other shepherd.

Because of the volume of lambs they are working six days a week, twelve hours a day over January, February and March, shifting lambs, drafting and sorting, drenching and shearing.

Gareth uses Faecal Egg Counts to monitor worm burdens and drenches accordingly with a high mineral drench.

Because no sheep are wintered on Glenellen, the pastures do not carry high worm burdens and this enables Gareth to stretch drenches out beyond the traditional three weeks.

The first 2000 lambs to arrive at Glenellen will need shearing in January, but Gareth hopes subsequent arrivals will be shorn at Mt Linton before being sent north.

To help with pasture quality and internal parasite control, one-year-old Angus cattle are carried through summer and rotated around behind the lambs.

Up to 400 Angus weaners are sent up from Mt Linton in autumn and these, along with 495 dairy bulls and 240 trading steers are wintered on 40ha kale, 33ha turnips and grass. Straw is used as a high fibre supplement for the cattle grazing the kale crops.

This year they are also intending to make 100ha of baleage to be used to supplement grass over winter.