Soil matters with Peter Burton Functional Fertiliser Ltd I remember my father’s comment regarding my assertion that the quantity of pasture grown now in the Central Waikato may have declined since the late-1970s early-1980s. His...... Read More

Beneath the surface with David Law Forward Farming If you think us humans have been suffering in the midsummer heat, spare a thought for the cows. By February, the heat from the New Zealand sun is so strong cows are very uncomfortable...... Read More

Better soils with Brett Petersen Kiwi Fertiliser & Golden Bay Dolomite In 1983 Massey University research suggested 1.8m tonnes of lime were required on New Zealand soils each year. Just 1.3m tonnes are applied annually. Lime...... Read More

Your land surveyed with Brent Trail Surveying Services Ltd Following the recent public notification of their proposed District Plan, Waikato District Council received hundreds of submissions from the public, government agencies...... Read More

Vet's vision with Phil Rennie Tauranga Vets Research has thrown up the common pit falls of facial eczema control in New Zealand. The DairyNZ-funded study conducted in 2015 raised a number of key points as noted below. It...... Read More

Outlook with Bill Webb Bill Webb Feed Solutions After a wet December we’ve all had a bit of surprise. In December we had 265mm here in the Bay of Plenty. For the first three weeks of January we’ve had 17mm. A farmer...... Read More

Fert Options with Robin Boom Agronomic Advisory Services In 1994 an article in ‘Straight Furrow’ covered a sharemilker on a peat soil near Hamilton had been losing nearly 10 per cent of his herd for three years running...... Read More

Abundant living with John Arts Abundant Health Curcumin extracted from turmeric is possibly the most studied natural compound. There are research papers covering everything from its anti-antioxidant capacity, to it helping cancer...... Read More

DairyNZ Farmers Forum with Sue Edmonds Having written mainly about mostly grass dairy systems for years, I was astounded at the complexity of running a System 5 farm on my first visit to one recently, which was demonstrating how they’ve...... Read More

Vet's vision with Phil Rennie Tauranga Vets   Already this summer period we’re seeing cases of fly infestations on livestock, and at times even our companion animals. The main culprit is the Australian blow fly,...... Read More

Better soils with Brett Petersen Kiwi Fertiliser & Golden Bay Dolomite Kiwi Fertiliser caters mostly to deeper-thinking farmers and growers who want to produce a healthier, better quality product while increasing their profit....... Read More

Hort Talk with Mike Chapman HorticultureNZ CEO From May 2019, New Zealand’s employment law will be very different from today –and unfortunately, there will be unintended consequences. There’ll be a greater...... Read More

Soil matters with Peter Burton Functional Fertiliser Ltd At a recently held farmer information day on the coming changes to soil fertility programmes, soil tests from a highly productive intensively farmed pastoral property were...... Read More

Finance with Don Fraser Fraser Farm Finance The New Year is here – so my advice is ‘just do it now!’ Do it while you can. Do it while you are alive. Do it because you can. I’ve spent my whole business...... Read More

Raewyn Ensor Blue Ocean Fishing Charters Lately we’ve had nice spring fish conditions with lots of action on Blue Ocean Charters’ Te Kuia vessel. The weather is warming up finally and sea conditions have been...... Read More

Outlook with Bill Webb Bill Webb Feed Solutions The weather has certainly been challenging us. Farmers are probably laughing all the way to the bank – but maybe not after the forecasted drop in their payout. They’re...... Read More

Better soils with Brett Petersen Kiwi Fertiliser & Golden Bay Dolomite There’s been recent press  about the combined cost  of damage caused by insects. An AgResearch study  estimates $2.3 billion worth of...... Read More

Hort Talk with Mike Chapman HorticultureNZ CEO  Harvest for some crops is well underway and for apples and kiwifruit it’s but a few  months’ away. Already the signs for labour are very grim. Reports from...... Read More

Soil matters with Peter Burton Functional Fertiliser Ltd At the meeting on regenerative pastoral farming held recently in Gore, the topic of appropriate Olsen P levels was raised. A farmer participant was a little disturbed that...... Read More