Mixed farm at Dunsandel wins medal

Press, 18 June 1976, Page 8

Mixed farm at Dunsandel wins medal

In the last four years there has been quite a substantial change in emphasis in production on the mixed farmin gproperty of Mr M. R. (Mervyn) Barnett at Dunsandel.

He last week received an A. C. Cameron memorial gold medal, which is annually awarded to an outstanding South Island farmer who was formerly a member of the Young Farmers’ Club movement.

Well known in farming circles, Mr Barnett is deputy-chairman of the electoral committee of the Meat and Wool Boards and is junior vice-president of the North Canterbury Federated Farmers and chairman of its meat and wool section. Previously the property, known as Riverslow, was a mainly sheep one with some cattle and some cropping, but with the acquisition of 300 acres ot good cropping land four years ago, which is now all under irrigation. the emphasis of production is now about half on cropping and half on stock. Some 500 acres are harvested each year and there is a flock of 3000 ewes and 500 hoggets and also 100 cattle. Mr Barnett s father, the late Mr R. Barnett, first took up land in the district in 1928, which was just before the depression, and his son places considerable value on having been brought up in an atmosphere born of those difficult times and based on hard work and sound farming principles. The homestead block initially comprised 342 acres, of which about 200 acres was productive and the rest old Selwyn riverbed country covered in gorse. When Mr Barnett came home from school in 1949 it was clear that the property, as it was then, could not support two familes and the alternatives were to sell out and seek a larger one, or retain the property improving the riverbed country and to look round for more country- to make the enterprise economic. The latter course was followed and odd bits of land were purchased, some at quite a distance from the home property and in an undeveloped state, and after improvement these were sold again as land nearer the home base became available. In the early 1950 s 277 acres of mainly riverbed country became available next door to the home farm, ft was almost completely in gorse up to 10 to 12 ft high and a bulldozer was engaged for two months clearing the area at a cost in excess of $6OOO. The 300 acres of cropping land, which was obtained about four years ago, is about three quarters of a mile from the homestead. Here, with some experience of irrigation on the homestead block, the decision was taken to go into total irrigation, with an automatic system requiring a minimum of labour and using . onlyexisting staff. Water was found after some difficulty at 160 ft and there are two wells of Bin and 10m diameter with a capacity of 950 gallons a minute, from which up to 800 gallons a minute are drawn off. Side-roll irrigation is used with mover units that move the spraylines on wheels of 15 ft circumference. There are some 60 chains of spray lines. The block was initially in many small paddocks and fences were removed and a central raceway put in with the underground ir-

rigation mainline also following along it, putting 250 acres of the 300 acres in four blocks, two ot which are of 90 acres each. The refencing has involved about three and a half miles of fencing and the irrigation plant cost about $25,000. With the water available it is now possible to irrigate the whole area in about 20 days. The aim on this unit has been to achieve maximum production per acre with fertility at the same time being maintained or improved. The whole of the area has received three tonnes of lime to the acre in two dressings and Mr Barnett, who is a strong believer in having a soil test done before embarking on a fertilising programme, says that the soil was low in calcium and it was likely that he would not have applied so much lime had it not been for tests. There is no fixed rotation on this area but the objective is to grow three crops in 14 months. Thus, before sowing blue peas on a 90-acre block in October 21b of white clover to the acre is spun on to the ground. Then the peas are sown with a preemergence spray being used to take care of a wire weed problem. After the’ peas are harvested the remaining straw is either baled or chopped up and blown into the air and then immediately giant or Rangi rape are direct drilled in and there is a fodder crop which is grazed during the winter. The aim is to have maximum stock numbers on the block during the winter and to this end, while in the past it has not been Mr Barnett’s practice to breed his own flock replacements on the property. he is now faced with the need for either more breeding ewes or dry stock for winter grazing between the period from March to October. The side-roll irrigation plant incidentally serves a useful secondary role in the grazing routine with an alkathene tube being fitted to each of the wheels ot the unit and an electric wire then run through it to form an electric fence. To fence off another break the unit is then simply rolled a revolution or two. Mr Barnett has also had bogeys built on which the wheels of the side roll units can be mounted and then about eight sections at a time can be readily moved sideways behind a motor-cycle. After feeding off the rape the remnants are sprayed out and weeds are also sprayed in the spring leaving a clean clover crop for harvesting. After harvesting, the clover is watered again and used for flushing feed for the ewes in the autumn. The ground is then surface worked and deep ploughed before being sown to wheat, and after this crop the ground is either direct drilled or surface worked and put into Italian ryegrass. Last season, in a very favourable season for crops, blue peas yielded up to 88 bushels to the acre. It was also the best year ever for wheat on the property with Kopara going up to 102 bushels to the acre on 90 acres. White clover also dressed out at

an average of 5101 b to the acre. It has been found that the soil on the 300-acre block is now very easy to work and Mr Barnett attributes it to a combination of factors including the liming, the build up of nitrogen through the white clover and also the concentration of stock. On the 1027 acres property as a whole the header harvester works over some 500 acres in a season, including 200 acres of grain crop, 100 acres of peas and last season 130 acres of clover, which is no longer a catch crop. The area of grass harvested for seed depends on the season A paddock of lupins is headed for seed and some lucerne seed is also harvested. An attempt has been made to grow oil seed rape, but it was found that there was a problem with birds. It is felt that a contributing factor to the good results with white clover last season was that all of the crop was sprayed with a defoliant. After a day it was mowed and then the next day it was harvested and at that stage the crop was completely dry at the bottom.

The stock side of the enterprise comprises 3000 Corriedale breeding ewes, 400 Border-Corriedale ewe hoggets, 100 Coop worth ewe hoggets and 100 beef cattle.

The cattle are bought in March or April as 20 months steers or heifers in good condition, with the idea that they 7 will be fat and off the place by November, which was vital in the days before much irrigation was done. Mr Barnett says that he is well satisfied with the performance of the Corriedale ewes on his country, but if he is to go into more ewes he is looking to easy care ewes and is interested in the BorderCorriedales which he says milk slightly better and are probably better mothers. Any of the crossbreds that need assistance at lambing are marked and subsequently culled. The practice has been to mate the Corriedale ewe to the South Dorset Down or Hampshire ram and mainly to the former. There are studs of both breeds on the property with mainly flock rams being sold and Mr Barnett is interested in the individual performance of the stud sheep.

While once ewes were allowed to lose weight from weaning through to flushing, Mr Barnett now likes to keep his ewes at a steady level of liveweight during this period. Before flushing the ewes receive selenium and are flushed on white clover and ryegrass pastures. Although there are some 300 acres of highly regarded lucerne on the property it is not used for flushing. Depending on the condition of the ewes Mr Barnett likes to see his ewes gain some 10 to 20 lb during this period extending to about three weeks after tupping.

At this stage straws are fed out — some 10,000 bales of straw and hay are made a year — and in the period up to a month before lambing Mr Barnett is quite happy if body weight goes down by 10 to 20lb. From then on they are on a rising plane of nutrition to lambing. Before lambing the ewes are given more selenium and are also inoculated against pulpy kidney in their lambs.

Stock health on the property is good and Mr Barnett says that there is little sleepy sickness, with care being taken to see that ewes do not get too fat early in pregnancy. The ewes are lambed in mobs of 1000 with the first

starting to lamb about the last week in July. The lambing percentage last year was 130 — the percentage of ewes to the ram — but in drought years it has been down to 120. The lambs receive selenium at docking and are drenched at weaning and as required. The aim is to get about 60 to 75 per cent away off the mothers at about 15 kilograms dressed weight. The rest are fattened on lucerne. In recent years there has been a marked reduction in fodder crops grown —

both roots for the winter and also rape for lamb fattening — and this has meant a reduction in cultivation costs.

The ewes now clip 5.4 or 5.5 kilograms of wool with the support of irrigation, but in drought times in the past they were down to 4.5 kilograms. The Border-Corriedale ewe lambs are bought in in February at about $1 above ruling schedule rates and mated for two cycles to give a 70 to 80 per cent lambing. Mr Barnett also has 100 Coopworth ewe lambs to compare with them.

As an experiment Mr Barnett is interested in the production of heavier lambs with a larger eye of meat and greater weight but with no more fat. To this end he is interested in crossing the crossbred ewes with Suffolk or South Suffolk rams. He says that with more sophisticated markets for lamb opening up overseas he feels that New Zealand cannot continue to export the light, weight sort of lamb that it has been doing, but if his experiment does not show the production of heavier lambs to be a viable proposition he says that it will not worry him. While he does not like using lucerne for flushing ewes, he says that without their 300 acres of it their carrying capacity would be much lower. On the lightish old riverbed country he says that nothing produces like it and with the buildup of fertility under heavy stocking he says that it is essential that' they carry out an intensive weed control programme, so that on a rotational basis lucerne is sprayed every two or three years. But he adds that he does not spray more often than he has to as lambs seem to do better on unsprayed stands. Lucerne gets 2 cwt of superphosphate annually with sulphur super being used every second year. It is applied in the winter to induce early spring growth. A ton of lime is applied with new sowings but more is used if soil tests indicate this to be necessary.

Once Mr Barnett treated his lucerne hard during the winter feeding hay out on it and while this cleaned up the stand of weeds he said that growth did not come away so readily in the spring. Now he tries to have all stock off lucerne by the end of June.

Pastures get cwt of superphosphate after they have been shut up at the end of April. Because of his responsibilities off the farm. Mr Barnett warmly acknowledges the cooperation, understanding and efficiency of those who work for him. One of his two married men, Mr M. Hill, has been with him for 26 years, and Mr D. A. Stewart joined him four years ago taking the place of a man who had been on the property for 14 years. He looks on the operation of the property as a team effort, with all being brought into the exercise. His family including his wife, Mavis, are also very much a part of this team. Nigel is at present at Lincoln College, Philip is completing a bachelor of commerce degree and Stephenie and Jocelyn are both at Christchurch Girls’ High School. Mrs Barnett, who comes originally from only about three miles away from the Barnett farm, performs secretarial duties for her husband and has occasionally performed farm tasks like feeding out to stock.

Reviewing results on his property, Mr Barnett says that there has been a distinct rise in profitability with irrigation, but with the escalation of costs and also of land values it has been a matter of varying rotations and methods to keep the profitability up. On the cropping side he says that they could go into process cropping —

and they will be growing some freezing peas next

season — but he believes that they have probably done just as well with stock and conventional cropping under their system, producing a comparable amount per acre.

He places great importance on a farmer having a good accountant and a lawyer. He says that he relies on his accountant to save him money and he uses his annual accounts as a basis for budgeting. The situation where a farmer called on his accountant only once a year to deliver the books was not good enough.

To try to ensure that the maximum amount of money was available for reinvestment in the property and to enable his heirs to follow him on the property if they wished, Mr Barnett said he had had to go into a companystructure and also a children’s trust.

Born in Dunsandel, Mr Barnett is strongly attached to his home district, which he regards highly, and has played a part in many district organisations. He and his wife remember how the district rallied around to help them when their house was burnt down five years and a half ago. While at Christchurch Boys’ High School Mr Barnett was a founder of the Young Farmers’ Club there and he was a member of the school club debating team that won the South Island Young Farmers’ Club debating contest. When he returned home from school there was no club in his district, it hav- ■ ing gone into recess duringthe war, and he and a neighbour got it going; again.

Today Mr Barnett is, chairman of the Christchurch Boys’ High School board of governors and also vice-president of the Canterbury Rugby Football Union.