Focus on growing dairy heifers

Located in Waikato, Northland, Manawatu, and North Otago, the farms will aim to provide graziers with the tools, knowledge and resources to grow dairy heifers more effectively.

DairyNZ is organising open days at each farm over the next four weeks.

It is encouraging both graziers and dairy farmers to attend with key topics including target weights and feed planning, animal health issues, managing the grazier-dairy farmer relationship and setting calves up for the run-off.

DairyNZ productivity team leader Rob Brazendale says that while DairyNZ has done a lot of work to help dairy farmers improve herd reproduction, working with graziers on growing heifers was a gap that needed to be addressed.

"Graziers as a group of farmers have been largely left to their own devices and we want to change that by providing them with a forum to share knowledge.

"Heifers are the future of the dairy herd, and with the ban on inductions from next season, heifer rearing has become even more critical to improving a herd's reproductive performance," says Brazendale.

"The grazier-dairy farmer relationship is key to growing great heifers and they both have to get away from a 'them and us' situation. We want to create a win-win relationship where everyone contributes."

The focus farms will showcase good practice, provide a forum for sharing experiences and be actively involved in the development of knowledge, tools and resources for both graziers and dairy farmers.

DairyNZ is establishing the focus farms in collaboration with dairy farmers, graziers, grazing companies and industry organisations Beef + Lamb and LIC.

For details on the farm focus days, visit www.dairynz.co.nz