Grow Organic Dairy Project; Successes in Organic Dairying
The Grow Organic Dairy project objective is to research and share successful organic management practices, as part of the drive to grow the organic dairy network, lift the production of individual farms, increase innovation and make sustainable dairy production methods an attractive proposition to other dairy farmers.
This project has brought a multi-disciplinary teamtogether, consisting of leading organic dairy farmersandscientists from Massey University. Collectively, the team makes the decisions on how to proceed with the project, which includes data gathering, research and experimental trials, using the experiential science methodology.
The first part of the project we captured the successes in organic management in the four key areas: animal health, pasture management, soils and soil fertility and farm management.
As part of the data gathering, DairyBase is used to analyse physical and financial farm business information. In the near future, DairyBase will allow existing organic farmers and those considering conversion to compare themselves against an organic benchmark, rather than against a benchmark of conventional farms as at present. Initial results show that comparing organic farms can be a little misleading. There is a huge variance in the production of the farmers on the Grow Organic team, from around 450 to 900 kg MS/ha per annum, which reflects the different land and soil types.
The team analysed animal health prevention and treatments programmes for mastitis, lameness, bloat. The key message is: prevention through maximum hygiene and animal health and minimum of stress of all cows at all times. This requires a more holistic farming approach in which pasture management is important. Prevention is especially important for certified organic farmers, as they have fewer tools to treat sick cows. The team will undertake more in-depth monitoring to quantify successful mastitis and calf rearing practises in the next part of this project. Information sheets have been produced on the topics of mastitis, lameness, bloat and are available from the ODPG website (www.organicpastoral.co.nz).
Weeds are seldom a major problem on organic dairy pastures if attention is paid to good management techniques combined with strategies such as timely mowing. Organic farmers value a high quality, productive sward with a combination of perennial ryegrass, white clover, red clover, plantain and chicory. The most effective way of improving pastures is by resowing pastures after growing a crop. Oversowing is less effective but has its place for improving swards, especially if done in autumn or for fixing up damaged pasture following pugging. The next part of this project will focus on cropping.
Trial work will continue on organic soil management and soil fertility. Broadening the current knowledge around this key area is what the research team believes as being the most important in growing the organic dairy sector further in New Zealand. The team will research questions around the nutrient status of organic soils, organic soil fertility programmes, the effectiveness of organic fertilizers and the impact of organic dairying on the environment.
Grow Organic Dairy is funded by the Sustainable Farming Fund and DairyNZ.
