Richard and Dianne Kidd farm on Whenuanui farm in the North Island where their suckler and sheep farm is run alongside nature and the environment. This award winning farm won a national title in 2016 for their farming system and work on planting trees and improving water quality on the farm. The farm runs 300 Aberdeen Angus suckler cows along with 50 replacement heifers. Traditionally a finishing farm, in recent years Richard now sells all weanlings to their son who farms 20 minutes away. Richard said, “We generally wean around 230-240kg and sell for $800-$900 (€457-€514) at an exchange rate of $1.75:€1)).”

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The farm is surrounded by pine plantations and cows are wintered on clearfell forestry and young 1-5 year replanted forest. Cows are checked once a day and a zero intervention policy is practiced with one cow being lost last year out of 300. Low birth weight bulls are used which reduces calving issues. Cows are fed silage and calve on this area before coming down to lowland grazing during spring and summer months.

The sheep system breeds for meat and replacements. The Coopworth rams go to the younger ewes, to produce replacement females for the ewe flock, and a Dorset Down, South Suffolk or a Poll Dorset ram goes with the older ewes for meat production. Last year ewes scanned 210% and weaned 175%. Ewes and cows are grazed separately with 100 paddocks currently on the farm. About 40 hectares are reseeded every year and no supplements are fed to ewes at any stage.

The farm has one full time labour unit including Richard and Dianne and also takes in some casual labour for docking etc. Shearing costs $3.50 per sheep and wool is making $2.80/kg or about $5/fleece so selling wool is no longer a lucrative enterprise. Lamb prices are currently experiencing a 10 year high with prices in the region of $8.30/kg (€4.74/kg).

With increasing attention being paid to water quality and environmental issues, New Zealand farmers have had to reappraise some of their systems and pay more attention to developing more sustainable systems that leave the farming environment in a better place. This couple have taken this to the next level.

Environment Quality

Richard and Dianne have taken their environmental responsibilities very seriously and every action on the farm is completed with the environment and nature in mind. Tests on the water quality running through the farm have confirmed it as being extremely high in quality.

“We had it tested and apart from the nitrate levels and phosphate levels which were negligible, we’ve got species in there like fresh water crayfish and whitebait and lots of micro-organisms that wouldn’t survive unless the water was extremely clean” says Richard.

A pine forest was established on 18.5ha alongside 15.3ha of regenerating native bush. They have taken a very pragmatic approach about protecting the environment for future generations. All waterways are fenced, and large areas of Raupo act as sediment traps to capture nutrients. Biodiversity corridors link the upper catchment areas to the bush and also act as pollinator strips for bees where manuka honey is produced from hives on the farm.