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The Muster- Peter Allan: Deer Farming In September · The Muster on Hokonui

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Peter Allen farms deer at the Glenure in Northern Southland
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: and joins us on a Wednesday.
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: Pete, good afternoon. It's wet here in Gore. I'd imagine
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: it's no different where you're based.
• 0:21
  Speaker 3: Absolutely. As I said before we went to air, Andy,
• 0:24
  Speaker 3: it is just like a fire hose here at the
• 0:26
  Speaker 3: moment and we're Had a bit of thunder half an
• 0:29
  Speaker 3: hour ago, and that just increased the level of rain. So, no,
• 0:35
  Speaker 3: just what we needed. As far as saturation goes, right
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: at the minute, we're about 120% saturation, and there's a
• 0:41
  Speaker 3: lot of water flowing off the top from the heavy
• 0:43
  Speaker 3: rain we've had here in the last hour.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: Is this worse than the previous couple of springs of
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: what you've seen so far?
• 0:50
  Speaker 3: Oh, no question. Yeah, no question. Like, the mess I've
• 0:53
  Speaker 3: made of some of the paddocks is just... horrendous and
• 0:56
  Speaker 3: I've never before in 50 years here have um it's
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: the first winter that I haven't been able to take
• 1:03
  Speaker 3: the motorbike and pick up all the electric fencing gear
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: to shift brakes and stuff and now I've just had
• 1:07
  Speaker 3: to walk and carry stuff and um I'm putting that
• 1:11
  Speaker 3: off to shift to hind brake this afternoon but it'll
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: get there uh just one of those things Andy in
• 1:16
  Speaker 3: one of those years but you do wonder if there
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: is any end and certainly looking at the next six
• 1:21
  Speaker 3: or seven days there's no respite there either The.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: Last couple of days, though, they were pretty reasonable, I'd imagine? Yeah.
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: No, no.
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: It's two days, for goodness sake.
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: I shifted a lot of baleage feeders around. I feed
• 1:36
  Speaker 3: out about 900 bales of baleage here to 1,200 odd
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: deer and shifted all the baleage feeders to what I
• 1:44
  Speaker 3: thought was some drier ground yesterday, but that's kind of
• 1:47
  Speaker 3: all been unraveled. I've got 32 baleage feeders around the farm.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: Sal, as far as your crops, obviously just running deer
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: on your operation there, are you through your winter feed
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: yet as such?
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  Speaker 3: No, it's quite a different mindset to dairy cattle, beef cattle, sheep.
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: We take our breeding high in $ 300 of them right
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: through to the end of October. And that's because it's still,
• 2:11
  Speaker 3: you know, we feed them right up until two weeks
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: prior to their forming. So it's totally different to, you know,
• 2:18
  Speaker 3: your cattle where they'll feed them to the end of
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: July and and then the next week they'll start calving. Well,
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: I guess that methodology and that mindset's still the same,
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: but we can take them another two months longer than
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: sheep and cattle farmers.
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: So as far as the deer, how are they looking
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: on the crops, apart from a bit wet?
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: The hinds are looking really good, probably as good as any.
• 2:39
  Speaker 3: They've got a big peat bog tussock block as a
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: runoff this year, and it's been worth its weight in gold,
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: but they've had a good crop, albeit a bit late.
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: slightly drier paddock but the stags have been the wettest
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: paddock on the farm and they've ploughed up their paddock
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: I can't get on it they've just finished so that's
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: why we start feeding them a few nuts as they
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: get into button drop time so that's what's happening too
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: early to talk about you know velvet and velvet prices
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: even though the stags are starting to grow velvet Andy
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: but venison's holding strong steady you know $ 11 plus for
• 3:16
  Speaker 3: most grades of venison at the moment. Not many people
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: kill older stags this time of the year and it's
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: too late to kill older hinds. I think once you
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: get past the 1st of October that's it for any
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: pregnant hinds, not that you would be killing them right
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: at the moment. And then your yearling hinds and yearling stags,
• 3:40
  Speaker 3: people are into killing them at the moment.
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: Well, $ 11 plus, I mean, that's in line with what
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: we're seeing with other red meat prices as well, so
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: it's good to see that's holding up.
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's been steady, I guess. There hasn't been your
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: highs and lows that we've had to put up with
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: for the last few years, and right from, you know,
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: December last year, there was reasonably firm and solid outlook
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: right through to what it is now, and basically it's,
• 4:06
  Speaker 3: you know, geopolitical interference and fuel prices and everything associated
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: with freight and you name it that are bringing back
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: the price a bit. But if we can remain above there,
• 4:19
  Speaker 3: it's still pretty good for everybody.
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: Pete, last time we spoke to you, you were having
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: dramas around malignant catarrhal fever. How's it been since?
• 4:30
  Speaker 3: Lost another couple, but because most of the sheep farmers
• 4:33
  Speaker 3: around us have spread their sheep out onto better feed...
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: that's abated somewhat. The sheep aren't under pressure on weather
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: conditions on breaks, and they don't shed the spores. The
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: aerosol doesn't come off their skin as readily. So if
• 4:50
  Speaker 3: the weather remains okay, and even in really heavy rain
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: like this, it's not spread. It's the wind that spreads it. So, yeah,
• 4:58
  Speaker 3: so far so good at the moment. But We've got
• 5:01
  Speaker 3: to sort of keep an eye on it and where
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: we put animals right through to the end of October
• 5:06
  Speaker 3: because when hoggets are within a couple of weeks of lambing,
• 5:11
  Speaker 3: they can be quite lethal as well. They're under a
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: lot of pressure in their pregnancy. We've got to this point, Annie,
• 5:20
  Speaker 3: it's just one of those years. I've talked to a
• 5:21
  Speaker 3: few other colleagues that have lost more than they normally do,
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: but not quite the number that we do, but then
• 5:26
  Speaker 3: they're probably not surrounded by animals on four sides with
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: the amount of sheep that we are. But look, it's
• 5:31
  Speaker 3: just one of life's things. You've got to put up
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: with it. You know, I'm talking to a couple of
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: cattle farmers that have lost a number of cattle this
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: year for unknown reasons, and that's always frustrating. So it's
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: just farming. You have livestock, you get dead stock.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: To be fair, you wouldn't really know about this disease
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: or what this condition is if you haven't read about it.
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: No, and an amazing feedback from a month ago. I
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: had about 14 or 15 people email me, text me,
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: and just I guess, weren't aware of the connotations of
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: it and weren't aware of the fact that sheep carried it.
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: But that's totally understandable, too, when they are not farming
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: cattle or deer in amongst them. You know, there is
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: a rule of thought that a lot of deer farmers
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: that have sheep, there is a considerable amount of passive
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: immunity there. attained if you do it that way but
• 6:23
  Speaker 3: I know one guy that was boasting about never having
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: a problem with MCF because he ran sheep and grey
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: sheep with the deer for 10 years and then one
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: year bang he lost 15 so there's no rhyme or
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: reason it's an invisible thing you know it's all part
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: of an old herpes virus and we just can't can't
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: foresee it and sometimes we can't change it and Sometimes
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: when you get storms that are preceded by really strong winds,
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: and it's certainly the weather pattern this year, you can
• 6:55
  Speaker 3: get wind from any direction, so you can't exactly foolproof
• 6:59
  Speaker 3: your farm when it can be carried in the wind
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: for up to a kilometre.
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: Pete, just finally, you'd like to pass your thoughts on
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: to somebody who's passed on recently who's well known in
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: the deer community.
• 7:12
  Speaker 3: Yeah, huge sympathy to the Newlands family at Mosman Engineering.
• 7:20
  Speaker 3: Jed Newlands just passed away on the weekend and Jed
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: was an absolute legend and his deer crushes will live
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: on for many, many years. The most popular deer crush
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: in the country and right throughout New Zealand. We've got
• 7:34
  Speaker 3: one here and we've had it for 30, 40 years
• 7:37
  Speaker 3: and Jed designed and built our deer yards but not
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: only ours, about hundreds of deer yards and cattle yards
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: and even sheep yards right throughout the country. And his son, Carl,
• 7:48
  Speaker 3: has taken over the business, Mosman Engineering, and a very
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: clever engineer and builder in his own right. And, look,
• 7:58
  Speaker 3: Jed's memory and his mark on the deer industry will
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: be there for a long, long time. And he was
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: a clever man. Like, he goes right back to the
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  Speaker 3: very first deer farm in New Zealand where Sid Taylor
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: from West Dome had the first, deer farm way back
• 8:14
  Speaker 3: in the day we had to apply for consent to
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: do that and we were the same back in the
• 8:18
  Speaker 3: late 70s but that's how long Jed's been involved in
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: the deer industry and he was just a very clever
• 8:25
  Speaker 3: man at designing deer yards and flow and I don't
• 8:30
  Speaker 3: think there'd be a deer farmer around the country certainly
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: in my generation that wouldn't have had anything to do
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: with the Newlands deer crush and no he certainly left
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: a mark so our deepest sympathy to the Newlands family
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: in Moslem.
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: Hey, good on you, Pete. Stay dry up there at
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: the Glenure. We'll catch up again.
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: Thanks, Andy.
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: Peter Allen at a very damp Glenure. You're listening to
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: The Muster. From Glenure to Muller Flatnecks, let's catch up
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: with James Edgar.