The transition period is the make-or-break window for your entire season. If this period is poorly managed, you don't just see a few downer cows, you see a downward spiral that affects the cow's health, production and reproduction long into the season.

Farmers can now get a more reliable view of pasture covers across their farm, thanks to a combination of three data sources.

Logan Hewlett is milking 500 cows, split into two herds on 405 hectares of land, up on a farm in Mata, fifteen minutes from Whangārei. His neighbour completely changed the way he manages his effluent.

Increased competition for water means the whole community is looking at how irrigators use water.

Analysis of decades of research has revealed the implementation of good farming practices plays a critical role in reducing nutrient losses to improve freshwater outcomes.

Dairy farmers need to be high quality partners to the beef industry, says Prem Maan, the co-founder and executive chairman of the dairy corporate Southern Pastures.

The bumpy road you travel on teachs you a lot, believes Don Watson. And that’s the message he and wife Kirsten, supreme winners of the Auckland Ballance Farm Environment Awards, aim to pass on to their three sons.

There's a common assumption that effective transition cow management is only practical for high-input farms, as controlled rations can make delivery simpler.

The transition period (typically defined as the three weeks prior to and the three weeks immediately after calving) sets the biological and productive trajectory for the entire lactation by determining how well the cow adapts from pregnancy to peak milk production.

A young man just five years out of his Lincoln University degree already has his foot in the door of farm ownership, as equity manager of a large new dairy conversion now taking shape in Mid- Canterbury.