Good evening, everyone. My name is Brett Littler. I work with the Local Land Services.
I'll be one of the presenters and also the host this evening. This workshop this evening is
brought to you by the Drought Adaptation Officer program. The drought adoption officer program received funding from the Australian Government
Future Drought Fund through the Southern New South Wales Innovation Hub in the Southern Queensland, Northern New South Wales hub.
And they're bringing you this here this evening. Just like to acknowledge that Local Land Services acknowledges that
it stands on Country, which always was and always will be Aboriginal land. We acknowledge the traditional Custodians of the lands and waters,
and we show our respect for elders past, present and emerging. We are committed to providing places
in which Aboriginal people are included socially, culturally and economically through thoughtful and collaborative approach to our work.
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So this evening, the presenters, obviously, on one of the presenters.
But we've also got Matt Lieschke. Matt Lieschke is a Senior Land Services
officer with the South East Local Land Services. Matt's blaming the job market
for a little bit of time kicking around, and has a lot of experience in, in, so for our fading drought advice, but also in this,
looking at, at the pasture outlook in the farming forecaster and the like.
I'm with Local Land Services now for, for a few years, specialising in livestock, feeding management and the like.
And and we'll be the presenters co-present this this evening. So as we kick off, really,
and the purpose for this webinar really was, Matt and myself had been speaking and, and through our travels and going out
and on the farms and through the inquiries that we've been getting, we've been seeing, huge variation in different,
systems at the different pastures and the like. We've seen a big, big, big variation in caring condition.
And that's pulls back to the, the, the draw that we've had in that,
sort of last year, running through into that summer into the autumn and, and into the winter.
And it's also something that we've seen some of these pastures were very slow to get away after we did get the break in some of those regions.
And, and look, one of the things we where two of the where of in some of the discussions that we've been looking at this year, how
that kind of line up and what that actually means for producers and particularly with some of the is chaos in our experience
going back to seven and nine, I don't know, one time when we know how important it is to managing the chaos.
Now to ensure that I join up and perform going forward.
And we also fully aware that, yeah, we're going to see some big variations depending on stocking rates, all fertility and the like as well.
So, it's one of those ones that we're very aware of. So reason for tonight's webinar, as we just saw, was a good chance
to catch up and chat about the season ahead and some of the ways we can look at managing these animals, particularly when we look at some of the
the information that we've learned from the past and also some of the science that's backing up some of our our work.
So I'll hand over to Matthew. Thanks, Brett, and good evening, everyone. So just thought I'd start with a quick recap
on what's happened over the last two months. Largely, last two months in terms of rainfall,
as this is really shaping up, and having a big impact on the variation
that was sowing which, which brought sort of outlined, and, and really having a big impact on current soil moisture
and therefore the amount of, pasture on the ground and projected for this spring and spring outlook.
So on the left hand side, that's the August rainfall totals in millimeters from the bureau's website.
And what we saw in August was a really strong east to west pattern
that's been pretty, pretty consistent for the best part of of this year
with a lot of rain on the eastern side of the Dividing range, and in northern New South Wales.
But really struggled to get moisture over the hill, out into the western parts
of New South Wales and down south, and through into Victoria as well.
Thankfully, in the last, sort of like the ten days of August, that trend did break a bit. We actually did get some rain over the divide and out, to the west.
And we can say there that there was some, some pretty good and really valuable moisture,
particularly on the eastern half of, of the state. But, unfortunately, the rainfall really did tend to fight off
moving east to west and east, sort of west and sort of, wobble and divide.
It really did sort of carry up, unfortunately. So that was August and,
and then we moved to September, which is on the right hand side. That screenshot, there's rainfall totals between the 10th and the 16th,
which is largely where the bulk of September rainfall occurred, and that was much more widespread rainfall.
As you can see, really valuable moisture in the system. And it has been a little bit more extra rainfall
last Friday, Saturday around the ACTU and then moving up through into,
towards Dubbo as well. So that sort of paints a picture of what we've seen over the last sort of eight weeks.
So for those of you that might not be aware of this website, farming forecaster Aecom that I you
it's a website that's been around for a few years now and the coverage of this website has gradually increased across the state.
And so when you go onto this website, you'll see a map and of New South Wales,
and there's some blue shaded areas there which are the regions, the MLS regions which are currently have.
Follow me forecaster. Up and running and what farming forecasts are does
is it provides real time information on current soil moisture levels in pastures
and also what that means in terms of future pasture growth and supply for the next 3 to 4 months.
So if you haven't been on to this website, it's freely available and really encourage you to go along and, have a look at it.
So when you go onto this website, you can pull up a map, which looks like this.
This is a screenshot of the soil moisture sensor network in in the south east region.
It's not unfortunately, I couldn't quite get all the sites in the south east. There are a few more further south down along the Monaro and far south coast.
But those round pins are all where we have the persistence probes in the ground measuring
real time soil moisture levels. So that's a screenshot for South East.
And what I did here is I actually went into Riverina and grabbed another screenshot and tried to sort of stitch them together
to paint a bit of a picture of what was seen, more broadly. So we've now grabbed the screenshot from the Riverina and you can see there,
that's the network of probes, through the Riverina Inlets region.
And finally, we have a screenshot in the bottom left hand corner which shows
the network of moisture sensors which are in the Murray region. And, once,
once you sort of start to pull this together, I'll just the Brett might need to click a button to bring that last one up.
Thanks, Brett. So it's a bit messy trying to stitch those images together and get them aligned.
But hopefully you can you can see there now that there's a pretty clearly east to west trend which really backs up,
the rainfall patterns that we've seen there in the last sort of two months.
So what we'll do now is we'll zoom in and just have a look at three locations.
So I've picked up Roy Park, which is near. Yes. Henty and out in the Riverina
and then down to Corowa in the Murray, just to, as demonstrations of what information you can actually get out of this website,
in terms of moisture and pasture predictions. So we'll start with the Rye Park site in the south east.
So this is I saw it that had 300mm measured since mine since the break
and really good soil moisture, present down to 60cm.
So on the left hand side under the probe heading when you go into farming forecast, you're getting real time
information on current soil moisture levels, different dips. Down through the profile.
So these sites actually had 179mm in the last five weeks. Really topped up the profile.
And it's sitting in a very comfortable position, particularly at this time of the as, as the weather starts to warm up
and pasture really starts to grow and pull moisture out of the system.
So very, very, you know, a fully saturated soil that raw pork,
and then on the right hand side is the pasture forecast. So I just explained that a little bit
for each of these probe sites if you just got back. Thanks, Brett. For each of the prime sites, we develop a,
farm system in Grass Grove. And to do that, so grass grow is a I've,
I'd say farm systems modeling program developed by CSIRO. And for each of the prime locations, we we build a custom farm system
which uses a local soil type like a pasture spaces,
weather data and and the livestock enterprise.
And so once you've built the grass grow farm system, we can then run it over the long term, in this case 30 years,
and pull out a whole range of production data. So one of the things we can pull out of
that model is pasture, growing grain pasture supply. And so the pasture forecast, if we look at the heading
there is the projected grain herbage available relative to historic variation.
So just ignore the lawns for a moment and just focus on those shaded areas.
The shaded areas, indicate the the range in grain feed on the ground
at right off that you would expect to see in that in that forecast window.
So between the 1st of September through to the end of December.
So as you can see, huge amount of variation in the amount of spring feed, we get over the years,
the, the way the grains on the grain shaded zone touches the,
the top of the yellow shaded zone, that is what that's historically speaking, that is the 50th percentile.
So that's the long term average. So you really simplistic terms if we look at the the projection lines.
Now if we're traveling in the green zone that means we're above the long term average in terms of grain size.
So we'd be all small. If the lines are sitting
in the orange zone, it's it's below average, but still manageable.
And if we're down in the red territory, that means we're in the bottom 25% of years.
Historically and in, in pretty difficult territory.
So if we have a look at this past year forecasts, what it's showing is that, well,
the pasture forecast is actually done at the start of each month. And so this the grass growing model is span up to the 1st of September.
And then we use the last 30 years of actual climate data for this location to do 30 possible
outcomes, all based off the same starting point. So rather than having 30 possible
pasture curves coming off the start of September, and being quite difficult to interpret,
we just apply those 30 possible runs based on climate data. Historically, we just display that as percentiles.
So the yellow line is the midpoint of those 30 runs, and the blue line is the 90th percentile,
and the red line is the 10th percentile. So another way of looking at this is
the the yellow line is what would what's what's likely to happen
on average going forward if we had really, really good conditions for growth.
The blue line is where things could possibly get to. The red line is what is possible
if we have an extremely dry scenario. So I'm looking at Rye Park.
In summary, if we look at the starting point at the start of September, we would we start off in pretty difficult territory.
So down in that red shaded zone. And that's really because we had, you know, a light autumn break,
a really tough winter, like a lot of areas in the South, time it came out of winter, well below average in terms of growing food.
And now we can see we're starting to, to climb, out of the red zone and get up into the just the, just the tip of the,
of the orange sort of zone, if you like. So things are definitely improving, and we've seen that in the past,
in the district in the recent weeks that things are really starting to take off. And if we look further ahead at where that yellow line goes,
we can see that it doesn't quite get up to the long term average.
But it's, it's, it's on track for what you might say, below average spring,
but but getting pretty close to the long term average. So at this stage right Park
things are definitely improving and things are looking pretty,
pretty positive at the moment. The pasture forecast will actually be updated
in about two weeks time, so it'll start then from the 1st of October. And given current soil moisture conditions,
Albany spec with a new pasture forecast that comes out that that that yellow projection line might actually even get up somewhere near the,
the long term average. So on the next slide, we'll go to the Riverina and down to Henty.
So we're now moving further west, where soil moisture wasn't looking quite as good.
And we can see there are Henty instead of, instead of 200mm, sorry, instead of 300mm of rain.
Since the May break, we're now down to 200mm. So 100mm, less rainfall since the end of May.
And as you can see there, with the soil moisture sensor ratings, when rather than having up around 100%,
we're now down in the 30s and 40s. So a much drier profile.
And if we look at the past forecast, we can see
a similar situation coming out of winter. Starting point is is in the red zone.
And we can see that black tracking line which is updated every white. We've we've seen that black trucking line really kick off in response to that
that moisture in late August and September. So things are definitely heading north and and heading in the right direction.
But because of the draw nature of the soil,
follow up rainfall in the next sort of fortnight, three weeks is going to be really important to keep.
So going, and to keep driving things up towards,
that, you know, into the orange zone and get some sort of spring cycle.
Unfortunately, has, missed out on the rain a bit more and
was now seeing, a much drier profile again. So Corowa really is, struggling for moisture.
And if we look at the past year forecast similar situation where starting the red zone
and the forecast at the start of September wasn't looking very good at all.
So the yellow projection line is really struggling to get out of the red zone.
And I think getting, an above average spring rainfall was really required the
to keep things going and get some sort of spring. So a bit like any bit of rice and rain as
things were starting to head in the right direction. But unfortunately it's always a lot drier than NZ
and so very much a hand to mouth, situation at present and highly dependent on moisture from above to keep things going.
So for this sort it'd be really important to keep a very close eye on the forecast and having some clear plans,
and strategies in place if spring cuts out early. So the next lot is what's, what's on the horizon,
in terms of rainfall, because some of those sites clearly really need some, some follow up moisture to keep things going.
Unfortunately, the eye to eye forecast isn't looking overly positive. So that's the current I day forecast from the bureau on the left
and the I suppose the more longer term forecasts, on the right hand side,
this is a, a current forecast for above average, the chance of above
average median rainfall for October and even though the map
is still looking fairly positive in terms of chances, but chances of exceeding rainfall in the,
the as far as the southern part of the state and those areas that are really needing rainfall, it's
the forecast has really from the bureau. So for October has really backed off compared to what it was showing,
in previous update. So yeah, it's it's just what unfortunately, the,
the big wet spring hasn't really, got cranked up as yet. So in summary, soil moisture present as you can say, is highly variable.
Some areas have good moisture to depth and, are on track to get a spring.
Some areas are still very dry, and rain in the coming weeks will be critical.
Spring pasture conditions will will be a key factor in driving cow calf performance and management strategies.
Going ahead and, if spring goes with you, if, you know, if you care, conditional marketing,
like cows are pretty. What you're spraying goes with you. That's certainly going to help. Getting calls on that rising point of nutrition and bucking calf.
So that's a quick snapshot of current seasonal conditions. If we now turn to our focus on the the breeding side of
things and what, what tails. Really where they're up to in their cycles,
the one thing that we've known for a long time in beef enterprises is that profitability of our base herds is driven by two things,
not stocking rate and fertility. So the job of a female in a broad based breeding
production system is to conceive as early as possible in a joining period,
deliver a live calf and rise it into a winning within every 12 month period of her breeding lots.
So the primary target of any place herd is one calf per cow per year.
Now, one of the difficulties in achieving this target is this long gestation period the cattle have of around 280 days,
and so after calving, we have a period where cows are putting
all of their energy into lactation and as a result, they stop cycling for a period of time,
which is that yellow wedge in the, the pie chart, which is return to estrus.
The length of that period in terms of returning the oysters and so forth, then again
varies considerably depending on a whole range of factors.
But if we are to achieve our one calf per cow per year target, we need to get those cycling
as quickly as possible and ideally within 55 days. And if we hit the 55 day target,
that gives her about 30 days or one and a half cycles, six cycles around 21 days,
gives her about one and a half cycles to conceive and achieve that 365 day timeframe.
So if we look at the pie chart, we don't really have much control over the gestation period
or the estrus or the length of ice rose cycle, you know that those two things are pretty well rigid.
The thing that we can manage when we have greatest degree of control over is the yellow wedge in that pie chart,
getting tail cycling and back up and going again. So what are the major things that influence returned oysters.
So research has shown that the amount of estrus period, that yellow wedge in the chart is heavily influenced
by body condition at calving or fat school and nutrition in early lactation.
So that's scoring and nutrition a key. And I also use a factor.
So these graphs actually out of the more beef from pastures manual. And if we just focus on the green line first
what we can see that if the green line is good food.
So it's good for, you know, early in early lactation, if cows calve down
in that two and a half to three and a half fat school, which is our ideal target window
at the point of calving, if I calm down in that sort of fat school on good feed, which is the green line,
if we look across to the left hand side, which is the days from calving to first height, we can see there that the quite easily
making that 55 day target. Yeah. If you look through the on the green line, you see that around about between
sort of 2022 days, sorry, 22 days to about 40 days
in terms of getting back into, and start cycling again.
If we look at the blue line, the blue line is now poor feed post calving.
And so if I even if I are in good fat score calving and we've met that target,
if cows are really struggling from a nutrition point of view, then we can see that blue line,
going above that target of 55 days, which means that she'll just,
she'll conceive later in the joining period. And if she's, if she's concise, lied in the joining period,
she's not going to achieve that. That goal of one cow, one calf per capita yet.
So she looks a bit lighter back in the in the group. That was a research trial done
many years ago. Now the graphs and research station and was a really interesting piece of work
because it actually ties this out a bit more. And what they did is I looked at the impact of both
fat score and nutrition on conception rights in first calves.
So what I did is I had a group of first calves and I manipulated the nutrition during pregnancy.
So I had two groups, one group of down in that ideal vet school range of two and a half to three,
whereas the other group that were managed to be well below that. So I get down on the low line and they count down,
you know, a fat score of 1 to 1 and a half. So two groups, very, very different fat scores.
And then I looked at different lines of nutrition during early lactation between calving and and the bulls going out
to look at the combined effect. So the first group was the high high
and night cycles that those first car was a calf down in that scored two and a half to three on good nutrition
that were least how, you know, slightly gaining weight through that period. They their conception rate came out at 97%, which is a great result.
The low grow the calves down in sort of 1 to 1 and a half school.
They were also given pipeline of nutrition and interestingly they came out of 86% conception.
Right. So I nutrition actually was able to compensate for lack of vet school,
to to a very large degree. The other two groups were the low flying nutrition groups.
And it's interesting that even though this like group did a calf down in two and a half to three, or if they were under the pump
nutritionally and losing point six to point, I'd die. We had a fertility check the down at around
70% conception right. And the low group that also had poor nutrition.
We saw a big drop off in conception right. Down at 47%, bucking calves.
So the key messages out of this was that fat score at the point of calving has the biggest impact on conception.
Right? But post calving nutrition is also important.
The other thing is that good nutrition in early lactation. And I'll think this is this is the big message in years like this, like good nutrition in early
lactation can really help to compensate for suboptimal fat.
School, calving. And so and even though this work was done
on first calves and they, the hardest age group to get back into calf,
the general principles, that was seen here on this work certainly applies to older mature cows as well.
No worries. Thanks, man. Sorry for a couple of the glitches. With my changeovers.
So I suppose the question is really where you cows now? What condition of line? How do we tell?
Really looking at them? Here, we've got two cars. The,
a cow on the right. This is a cow that's in that vet school three. So, you know, going back to match previous stuff, it's in the
that higher group. And, and also the larger
caches in that higher group as well. But in fact, score two looking at those cars, it's pretty
easy to tell the difference in fatness and looking at them. And you can really see with that call on the,
right hand side, the darker cow. That same in the back home quarters field. There's a little bit of fat round the tail hide the flanks out.
There's a little bit in that brisket. And you can see that Cass definitely got a little bit more cover in both.
These photos were taken on the same day on the same property, and these cars were all running the same paddock.
But you can see this cow on on the left hand side is just doing it.
Not quite as well. Hasn't quite got that fat. I see. You can see the bit of that. Same in that back on quarter in this cow.
When we scanned her up she came in at that fat school two but screen up at five millimeters of fat on the plate so it.
Bursley this girl here, same paddock, same same property on the same day.
She came in at a low fat score. So when we scanned her, she came up with only roughly around about three millimeters of fat.
It's very important. And we know through a lot of work that's being done by Drew Ferguson
and others, that this is really where we start to run into that cut with fat score in those animals, in that lower fat score, really,
starts to kick in that bottom end of the fat score two or condition score two, as it's called in other other language.
And you can see this care. We're just on to see a few of the little bit more of the sports process. It's definitely doesn't have that fat.
If you look at look at the she's tucked in at the flank, quite easily. See that horn. The same in that horn quarter.
And we know that that cow in that condition is is dying. The, the
trigger, for mobilizing, fat if you like, and need to sign the mobilize muscle is an energy reserve.
And this is where we really do start to see the that drop off in some of the conception.
Right. So really important Nance tone particularly looking forward
to go out and take stock of where are your calves. What condition are they actually in.
Are they looking like the first scale we had or are they looking like this this carry who's just
just on the lighter end of where we, we really want her to be.
So with that in mind, we can think about it and go, what are your calves and postures like?
Because obviously thinking back to what that's just going through that better nutrition, better quality feet
will really help to get these cars joining up and help us get that calf and and get that condensed calving and get that coffee.
The cow, he, he's actually probably in the vet school three to see a lot more fat around that.
Tollett, brought through little bits on the come behind the shoulders and into that brisket in the flanks. Popped in the like,
scanned up the cow. Came in at the top end of fat school. Three to above ten millimeters of fat as gained.
So yeah. So you feast. Definitely. Right. And if all your car's looking like that, we do know you've got a bit of buffer.
But what are your pastures like? And and how do we know what the pastures like? Well, this pasture here, just a little bit of an interesting
side, was a posh cut that was done in spring last year by some work colleagues in the central time lines.
And this came back with an energy of roughly about 11.9, or a digestibility of 77.3,
crude protein of 24.3. And when we punch that pasture into the grass, feed
with the British bred kale, obviously fairly good quality feed,
there's no limitation on how wide that calves putting on this pie part of 800g a die and 100 kilo
calf 60 days old would be gaining it at at a kilo and a half.
So yeah, it really is performing, but as Matt pretty well described in
SIP saying, we know that isn't the case everywhere with that that the of feed and we also know through our travels
that not all cows are looking as good as some of those cars.
So, results from that spring pasture cut that was done last year by the,
staff of, the air time in the central guidelines, like lane services really did show us that there was huge variation
depending on grazing crops improved in unimproved pastures. That we saw a huge range of of the quality
of some of these fruit we saw through prior times. And just to give you a bit of an idea, it ranged from 3.3% through to 39.7.
That was a grazing crop, but also some improved pastures, up as high as 42.
But yeah, big range with some of the energies that we saw.
We saw variation, say from from five all the way up to 14,
which is just phenomenal quality of feed. And then some of the digestibility obviously,
you know, we saw that that big range as well. And those are important numbers to think about because, you know, at the moment
we can depending on the cows and where we've got them, we've got them in that
lactation in that so early part of lactation. And really we know crude protein about
12 and namely above ten. I've got 12. That should be ten.
And, and really need that, that good quality for those animals to at least 19.
So really important not only to have a look at those costs, but have a look at the top feed and the quality of food
that we've got in front of the X, particularly coming in to joining and and think about that work that I did grafting on those first calf first.
We know if we've got calves that aren't quite where we need them to be, that we need to be thinking about what,
what quality of feed if we got in front of them. And, it is one of those ones. And I'll hand over to Matt to, to explain some of that a little bit better.
Yeah. Thanks, bro. So I just on the next slide, just to try and unpack
this a little bit and go through it.
So one of the I guess one of the challenges in spring is we asked is just trying so quickly.
We go through these this growth phase where we we pass is increasing in height and,
and the amount of feed on the dick. But they also go through
a reproduction phase for our for our wheat to grow. And we're at temperate spaces. So the amount improves as we go through spring.
But digestibility goes the other way and starts to drop off.
So for those of you that have done probably guys, the the chart on the right hand side will be very familiar.
And what it shows is that as plants mature and and go through the, the,
the reproductive phase, that digestibility declines. And on the right hand side of that, that,
that chart that we have energy as well. And digestibility and energy advice and protein
are both positively, correlated. So right now when we got when we come in through winter, a lot of that pass is
do is sit in that 75, 70, 75% range maybe and better as Brett slide show.
But then as we move into spring and pastures put up a seed head and go into that reproduction phase, we do see a decline
in digestibility and energy. And different species
go through these a different paces than others. So our annuals will tend to set.
So first and foremost. So if you think about you know the pasture spaces season out in our paddocks.
That put up a solid head first. It's generally things like barley grass and silver grass,
and kite Boyd and things like that. And then our perennial spaces talksport's for us is
and the like then tend to go ahead a little bit lighter. And so Stoke are really good
at picking up the most digestible part of the pasture, and they will do their very best to select out
parts of the paddock, parts of the pasture, in the spaces that have the best digestibility, the best energy and the best probably don't.
So I guess the key message here is is that, yeah, pasture assessment in spring
is is particularly difficult because it is rapidly changing. So one of the things that we tend to,
to do to try and work through, okay, we've got Hales with problems at Fort
and we're trying to set them up to drive lactation and prevent excessive exercise, excessive weight loss,
so that I can start cycling and get back into calf. So height milk yield
occurs around about 4 to 6 weeks after birth. And so we want really good nutrition in the first two months of lactation
to really set up the lactation curve and also to get tails in a a positive energy balance as quickly as I can so I can start cycling.
So the chart this is this is a table now at two months in the lactation.
And I've crunched these numbers using grass feed. And if we look at the table, if we've got high
quality feed 75%, the rest of the table shows the pasture hides
that we need at different digestibility at two months in the lactation to actually get a positive for the cost, at least before.
And I'm putting a little bit of weight on and to be getting good white, into that calf.
So if you've got 75% digestible, you need about 3.5cm of horse in that feed.
Once we get to 70% digestible, it goes up to about five centimeters to get that same level of performance
and at 65% digestible when they are to ten centimeters to get that
same level of performance. So the key thing here is to have a look at
what you pass is it passes are doing in terms of height. But then also have a look at that, that prograis chart there and have a look
at how much you know, are you seeing seed heads, how you know how much leaf versus stem.
So heads are getting, getting in the pasture. That will give you a clue to digestibility.
The other thing you can do with cattle is have a look at what's coming out the back end,
because the facies shape and consistency also is a pretty good indicator of what the digestibility of the diet actually eats.
And so I've got a column there with the dung indicator. And you can see there that on really highly digestible pasture,
the dung parts are pretty much flat to the ground, and very, very loose.
As digestibility comes down, there's more structural,
fiber, fibrous components in the plant that the bugs in the room and can't break down.
So you get more, more bits of fiber coming out. And that makes the dung, the dung pots actually form up a bit.
So, have a look at the pastures. But if you also have a look at what's coming at the back end,
that'll give you a really good guide. And then you can line up to those pasture heights to get a pretty good feel
for how stop, performing eat as we move so through spring.
The next slide now looks at the three months into lactation periods. We're now a month further along.
And this is the point when the bulls are back out and we're trying to get cows to join back up.
So same slot as before. But this time we're month further along.
And I've also included a 55% digestible,
over line on that table. And what we know is that once pastures go from green
to, to yellow, all those, you know, the fight off and moisture is cut out
past is generally seeded around 60% digestible.
So at that point we can say the the dung pots are really starting to form up.
And once we get around about 60% digestible. So the grains sort of going out of the system and when they are on the, on the really,
you know, on a did you know dry pasture pastures are paid off. That's really the trigger to going with some supplement to really help,
prevent cows from slipping and losing. Why? And it's interesting, if you have a look at that last line,
if you compare the 65% digestible column a row compared to the 55,
and you compare the ten centimeter lines at ten centimeters at 60% digestible
the cost putting on point five a day, 1.4 kilos in the in the calf.
So that's actually going pretty well if you compare that to the 55% at the same
height, the cows on the losing, almost half a kilo a day,
and that calf growth rate has dropped back to 0.6. So less than half. So it just goes to show that things can drop away
quite considerably once that growth side drops out of the system. So they can really close on that.
Thanks. Broke. So really, that's pretty well covered it. The nutrition, is really going to be dependent on the year.
And if you haven't got that quality partially, we're starting to see that dung start to get a bit high.
The other thing I tend to look at as well. So that highlights a really great indicator, but also having a look at the fragments that we start to see in the dung.
If we start to see that dung, they, we know that that's going to be one of those ones that, that.
So once we start to see the segments, so get up around about half a centimeter, we really know that that that can be one of those
indicators that, we, we're starting to see
the benefit of probably doing supplement or something like that to really help stimulate that appetite.
And they help those animals like, just for your.
Getting that back on. I did know this was a couple of questions. Question was around the pasture forecast.
Is the black line an actual or is it still a predictor? The the response is it's a predictor.
So the pasture forecast is all predicted modeled. Information out of the grass grow program.
And the black line is is a tracking line that is updated three times
during the month, which gives us a sense of how we're actually tracking
against that original forecast.
Yeah. You back on there, bright lights come up. So you're right to go.
No worries. Apologies, everyone. So
the Nutrition Pasture supplement story is a, What I would say to people is
at the moment, if you don't have that quality, we're starting to see that hard. The dunk start to get up the and going back to
what Matt's got there is high an appropriate supplement. A lot of the time when we do our food tests high,
we tend to find that it will be below nine megajoules of energy.
And really go back to what we've seen there, where we're looking at that care performance. Ideally we want it above ten.
So it's it's one of those things, if you're lucky enough to have a bit of bulk of feed
and that quality's gone off, then probably doing supplements, obviously one of those ones that we could start to
look at to stimulate appetite increasing take or if you haven't
got that bulk of faith and it really comes standard to an energy supplement. So a grain or something along the lines of a pellet
or even things like cottonseed in the like as well, just to leave those. Cos
if you haven't got that and, and that supplementation obviously with the cow timing is pretty hard.
What other things can we do. There's, there's things like full weaning and that's been around for a long time.
It's, it's a tool that we've seen. It's also called 48 hour cough removal.
And it's a little trick that we can do with those cats. If we're looking at cows and they're in that fat, go to the bottom end.
It's a tool that works relatively well with those cattle that are in that borderline fat school. Two
and what we do know, that by removing that calf for the 48 hours and 24 hours doesn't
do it at night, be 40 idles by stopping that suckling effect. We say the hormones start to kick into gear, and all of a sudden
we can get a few more cast out to cycle than what we would do. Only the research is really showing us that,
so we can get up to A66 to 8% increase in a naturally mated animals.
And it has been noted a few times that if we've gone higher program
or we've got animals with the boss, indicates content, we can actually get a higher,
increasing conception. Right? What I would say, particularly with doing this and in the experience
where I've seen that, where people have done a fourth weaning, management of the calf is critical.
Looking after those cows, having a good area set up, is one of these ones.
If you don't do that, look after those calves. It can have a few little downfalls. And and I've been involved with a couple where we've seen some issues. So
really do you have the set up. Can you do it? You cows in that fed school too. That's one of those important questions.
One of the ones that we definitely know. And and it's it's one of those ones is is waning.
And you can really say that, energy requirements of that 500 kilo cow,
as an example, you know, if they dry. Yeah.
So I, I'm the 60 megajoules and you die to maintainer and
this is a, like, pregnant cow where she's getting up around about 70 eggs rules. And then you're dealing with the lactating cow and,
and getting up close to 90 megajoules a day. And if you've got cows a very big milk is.
The more they milk, the more energy they require. And they can be up over 100 megajoules a day.
So all of a sudden, by weaning that calf, we drop that nutritional domain.
Very importantly, we also say we trigger that stop of the suckling effect as well. So we'll get get that kicking in, ice calves joining.
We know that that quality, the food that they need to be nurtured substantially.
So all of a sudden instead of dealing with a ten megajoules fake, we go to end with, say, 7 or 8 megajoules feed that will maintain that calf.
All very good, but we need to have the bull there when you do this. So pretty much means that you are going to be early weaning.
So setting it up and looking after those calves is also one of those important things.
So really good idea what we do now by weaning those calves off
you give those cows, particularly if they're in that low into fat school. Two to gain condition.
And we know that a fat score is somewhere in the vicinity around about depending on the cow, about 70 kilos.
So if we've got a cow that's dropped from that fat school, throwing that fat school to
we really need to give it that time to gain that extra weight. So and the other thing to be really aware
of before your early weaning these calves is waning. Those calves that we need to have them educated and, and used to
what we're going to feed to really ensure that we get them to grow and grow well. And it's been done successfully for years and years.
And it is one of those really important ones that for success that you do look at waning and waning early.
Might. Yeah. Thanks, Brett. Well, this this time on, I was supposed to fall on that thread of,
of, you know, early waning. And, when pasture conditions is a really struggling
it, you know, there's this is sort of this scenario is really based around where you've got a bit of heart in the groin phase, but the sorry bit of heart in that
for you in the public. But you've you've only had a groin and it's gone from growing to dead. And we could say earlier on from that previous slide
that has cows really struggle once the groin goes out of the system
without some sort of supplementation. So the first, the top part of that table or just do the running grows.
If I look at what once that fight dries off, 55% digestibility, ten centimeters a heart,
how much supplement might be required to actually take the system ticking over,
and prevent weight loss in the cow in this situation of used four kilos per head today.
These are DTG pellets. Putting the graphite. And I found that that sort of amount was able to hold the cow.
So you can see in the far right hand side the basically, not really well, not gaining weight, but not, not really losing weight either.
And getting about a kilo a day growth in the calf.
I then looked at it, well, what if we separated, separated the two and we just fed the the fed, the
the calves separately, which is the bottom part of the table. And interestingly, if we if we wine
and put cows onto that same dry pasture, they actually now able to hold condition
and you can say that they're doing 80g a day. So, basically holding
on that dry feed without the calf and foot, and then we can put around three and a half,
3.6 kilos of the data straight into the calf on that dry feed to do our point.
Started doing a kilo. I had a die. So I just just sort of demonstrates the quantities of Fe.
If we weigh in and separate, we can actually reduce the amount of, say, required,
and more efficiently, just directly feed that calf.
Matthew or experience just well with a I know I've had reports of sort of people
that have been wildly while the bulls were at that they've seen a distinct jump in that in those conception.
Right. I know we were talking about today early. It's very, very energy.
Energy inefficient to try to feed a calf through a cow. And that's one of those stories we have for for a long time.
But by weaning those calves, some of the your experience was sort of increasing conception.
Right? Yeah. Back in the 2000, I don't know what time period.
In that drought, we ran a number of workshops in the South. I said, where where we're really under similar conditions
in terms of, fat scoring cows at this time of the year. But the pasture outlook was certainly looking grim.
And, and all these, you know, techniques around early whining and false whining and sport feeding thing were
we were talking about and a number of producers up this way
actually went home and, and did wine during the joining period. And they, they know they noted that there was a significant increase,
in spike around that time when they came to do preg testing. So, yeah, they were quite, quite happy
and, pleased with how, you know, how how effective it was, you know, waiting, waiting calves off cows during joining.
What it actually did in terms of getting cows back into calf.
The supposed the other option we have got is splitting mobs up on condition white for for TLC.
Bit of tender loving care and this is a produce that I've worked with,
in the past now on them for my whole career. So 30, 30 odd years.
And this was a photo of actually during the Millennium Tour period, you know, as I, I bought their property
and really and met down there that. Yeah, that, that definitely that their condition has a big driver
and we do see this and this is a classic here, where we've got the, cow on the right hand side with the calves sitting next to her.
You can really see that. Yeah, you can see that seam in the back on your knife. Veteran. That tile she's tucked right up in that twist the flanks.
Flank seen. She's doing quite, she's at the bottom end of that fat school to the that that is actually a first cafe
for whereas you compare to the cow on the left that's a mature calf.
You know, she's got a little bit of condition on, doing it so much better.
Obviously her nutrition requirements and you can see some of these other cows as you look through that and just that little bit better condition.
So we're really trying to get those cats in the calf. It might be worthwhile thinking about looking after splitting some mobs up.
And I'm really concentrating on some of those cars. So in some cases these cars more would be just better.
Milkers. And we saw the entry requirements say before for these better milkers,
that the Wayne heavy calf and the like, but also looking at the first calf heifers and.
Okay. And it's one of these ones that we really we do not quite
have a distinct effect on, on their performance. So if wolves in their ability to get back in the calf.
So we look at this table here, we can really say that, you know, days after calving.
So 40, 53 to 100 cows older than five years that they are more likely to get back in the calf early, far more successful.
Whereas the younger cows we know, particularly with those second calves and Matt mentioned it before again to do it a lot harder,
they harder to get that calf through and get them up. So it's
it's one of those things that you really need to do. So splitting mobs up definitely worthwhile
spot fighting and or or looking at a flash of feed if you like.
He's been around for a long time and and we've seen this over the years where people have used different systems, where they've moved animals out
in the different paddocks, put the animals on the high quality feed, got that flush and, and increase their, their joining.
Right. It's one of those ones. It's definitely out there. But once again, is it a pride owned supplement or an energy supplement
that you need to give it that little bit of a kick? It's been a lot of work done on protein supplements
and spike feeding in the North. There's worked on, Rand Grafton by David Hennessy and the like.
And it really did show that, you know, by giving me supplement, increasing the intake at the pasture that we said we have to lift conception.
Right. Some of the work in the North also looked at spike feeding,
prior to calving carving, horses bolted in and in for for a lot of people, the calves now were about the calves.
So it's a bit like to but definitely something to think about. Targeting that supplementary and trying to give them that little bit of a flush.
So we get that spiking in that joining. Matt you've got an example of of some
of a producer that you were talking to. Yeah, I just saw a producer from Barry Wood recently.
Again, back in that 1819 drought, had some, some housing, very light condition
around joining and wasn't overly confident that he would get a, a good result, but
put them onto a grazing crop. I think it was oats and still had cows at.
And so they weren't, weren't lined. But just putting those those like cows on grazing crop,
actually, you know, gave some pretty, pretty surprising results in terms of,
how well these cows turned around and actually started cycling. So, I guess it's just a good example of the impact of,
of nutrition. Look, there's some other tools about,
this is an old photo now trying to get those calves up, get them heavier so you can win.
Obviously in this scenario this these these guys are well and truly big enough and a big bit of season.
But the option of crate feeding trying to get those calves up, educating them to to what you going to have prior to weaning them,
particularly if you're looking at early weaning is is a pretty useful tool. It doesn't have to be flash.
This is an example of a of produce a and the crate gates have been around and
and I know I did a workshop there and a producer told me there one day that about his father and, she wasn't exactly a spring
chicken telling me about her father, who taught her about crate feeding.
And. Yeah. So it's been around for a long, long time. I've read a lot of documents.
It is a very useful tool for getting those calves up bigger and heavier.
Doesn't have to be a flash. Makes this. He is a photo on the. The bottom left hand side is is just simply some some oats.
And that is. Yeah. And oats and the value of a fetus. We know that the some of that, you know notes that you that, took
this photo was up around about 12 megajoules and, and roughly around about 14ft times time.
Probably for getting those calves bigger and heavier. But really, the tie kind of message is,
get out. So she paddocks, so she pastures and animals and, and it really is a time to think about, okay.
If I want those calf chaos to come in and, and get that calf
in that four month, 365 days and try to get a condensed calving, then really these about trying to get those calves cows
in as good as the kids are keen or at least give them a flush and that committee to be by weaning the calves of them all
by giving, feeding them something suitable and appropriate, and to get them to where we need them.
So I met that sort of opens up, wraps up where we're at at the moment.
Hopefully everyone sort of starting to look a bit more on the, right rather than the left,
of that photo. But, the big picture there, but, are there any questions?
Thanks, Brett. I did have a couple of questions that have come through, so I might just go through those.
One question here. If you had an IOI program lined up, when would you do the false one in
in relation to I o on?
I'd have it done before because we know it will trigger them and and
and trigger the mapping to cycling. And I wouldn't be messing around with when I do a
on the fly around with the, the drugs and the, the seed is in the program. So I'd have it because you guys end up with some disruption.
Kathy just had a question. What do you mean by protein supplement?
Can you talk so I types of protein supplements, and that's got question mark or and blocks.
But generally we find blocks, good at minimizing, like.
Loss. I don't stop it. When I'm talking about protein supplements, we know that,
with you, I'm tending to talk more about dry leaks and,
those dry leaks. A urea in them or a protein meal.
And I'm also talking the about protein meals, and we know that,
with those that we stimulate appetite. Now, I'll sort of somewhere in the vicinity around about that 12 to
going through 24% increase in intake, doesn't change the quality of the eating, but there's no drive.
The appetite and, and increase throughput. I'm a big fan of protein meals.
I'm also a big fan of, lupines, and the like, and the other thing
that we have been using, a lot lately is, is cotton. So,
in, in a lot of areas where they simply using that bulk and we know with cotton so that you're getting energy as well as protein,
generally we find we get app based performance with protein supplement
that has got a protein meal in it rather than just a straight there.
Ureteral or ammonia as a protein source.
Blocks tend to limit intake. And I tend to struggle to get enough of what they need out of them.
Whereas, a lot of the time we tend to form with you, draw links that,
draw a little protein male, but as long as you've got it set up right, you can get some very good performance out of them.
So that's that's really what I'm talking about when I'm talking about protein supplementation.
And really what we tend to find, Matt, would be that mice people
tend to stop protein supplementary that feeding to light.
So, what what I tend to say to people have a look at that. Lot of the done like you were talking about there before,
but also have a look at the length of the fiber in that, and we know that once we start to see the fiber length in that dung,
start to sort of get up a little bit, and we're starting to see it getting up to half a centimeter to a centimeter,
we know that we will get a benefit from a protein supplementation when we start to see that thought, but also that forward link start to
get up there. Right. Thanks for
the on the, my we have one more question. Come through.
A couple more come through. So how do you set up a draw? Link was a follow up question.
So you got you got a bit of experience, right after 1 or 2.
You draw. I always tend to introduce because, you draw links, have got, salt, as an attraction in them.
So I tend to use them to, to get, rid of the, the craving
and put that at first. What I sort of look at with
the draw links, particularly if they've got urea and, and the like on them, in them is bring a way of keeping the water off them.
So some people will, may I say, driving around, containers that they've got,
plastic containers have got lids over the top of them and the like,
troughing that's got leads. And and that works. Well, I've seen people use,
old feeders and things like that. Is, is a means to get those draw looks at,
it's just a method and, and generally with some of those draw links depending on on
and you can buy them direct from companies or you can make your own. Usually we're looking at.
So somewhere in there I've seen here in about 150 through to around about 300g per hit per day of those draw.
Alex. So, you know, obviously they designed the salt to limit their intake.
And also some of them use stuff I did my here, which is, which is within palatable unpalatable the limit their intake to stop that that issue.
And we know salt once you get over 10% and stop that craving that will help with the your we'll start to limit intake.
So it's about having enough of those troughs to handle the mobs that you've got.
And what I would say is just be be guided by some of the manufacturers, but usually what I do see is
I, I tend to work me out like a water trough. So, I can do my sums for the mob that I've got.
And the spice around the, container or the faded that I'm using that with those straw. Alex.
If I'm looking at, a protein mill, then something like can tell a male
we know a lactating care with would only need as long as she's got adequate roughly
to somewhere in the vicinity of her and about one half cages per head per day.
The way that you can fold it out twice a week. But you've got to follow the follow the rules for troughing, where we talk
about 60cm per head, and if it's double sided thing, 30cm per animal,
because those animals again need to get in and have a feed during that.
The only caveat that I would put on that is, soybean meal,
experience tells me that if we're going to use soybean meal, then you want to do it feed a little bit off a little bit three, three times a week
rather than twice week with, the likes of canal meal, cotton. So male and copper male and the like.
Right. I think spread just one one come through around.
Well, here's a follow up on the AI question. So if we're going with a 48 hour wine,
what sort of timing? Look how many days before the AI program,
would you be looking at? There's no hard and fast rule experience.
So tells us that you. If they've got to have be settled back down and sort of kicking back into gear.
But we do know that that what we do, we say with that 40 ideal wine is that the false waning, that
it is a pretty quick start to cycle that that week after it, so I,
I would think I'd want it done and dusted the week before I'd start trying to do an AI program with the ice glass.
Okay. All right. And look at the dotted stockholders with with that false
waning in this stuff in the states and everything that. Yeah, it it still.
Yeah. You can't get up to. Yeah. I, sort of ran a bit that no end up to 12%
increasing in, in those case cycling. But it won't be the cure all Golden bullet.
Nothing bites. Good nutrition, good management leading in. So if you've got care as a really struggling then
then I'd probably be looking at a full wine rather than a false one.
Okay. RTI
I think that's all the questions. Unless anyone has any any final questions
I'd like to send through. We'll, we're pretty well close to talking there, Matt.
If people do have more questions, please feel free to follow me. What we do have is the QR code.
So if people could place scan that, that code, to help us with the post
survey event and feedback, we will obviously this will be going up on the YouTube.
Hopefully it doesn't catch me sneezing. And also my internet going.
So I'm sure we can edit all that stuff out. But, I'm so,
but thanks. Any more questions? Matt, before we sign off?
No, I think that's we get a few thanks coming through. So, yeah. Thanks, everyone for
for your attendance and, Yeah, for sending those questions tonight. Thanks very much, everyone, for giving us your tone this evening.
Really appreciate it. We'll hopefully we'll get get the rain and,
everything's great, but, definitely, if people have a question through chat, we can have a chat.
But, yeah, they where? It's good time to have a look at your animals and look at the
look at the pasture we've got ahead. So thanks very much, everyone, for joining with us and hanging in there.
Appreciate it and apologies for the technical issues. And who catches by drone.
Thank you. Thanks, everyone.
