Farmers turn to regeneration
Two dairy farmers in the South Island are improving their farm environments for the better, writes Rebecca Black.
Patience is key for John Legg as he reduces the amount of inorganic inputs on his farm and adds diversity to the pastures his cows feed on.
‘‘Sometimes we want a silver bullet, but you try to get your head away from that to — let’s try some things and see if we can come up with a better way of doing it and learn from our mistakes.’’
Legg was introduced to regenerative farming when he attended a sustainable agriculture group where soil researcher Nicole Masters was speaking.
‘‘It sort of opened my eyes to a lot of we’ve done in the past that’s been detrimental to our soils and how we’re running things,’’ Legg said.
It’s Legg’s seventh year back on-farm, after returning from playing rugby in Otago.
He is a fourth-generation farmer. His family has been dairy farming on their property in Leeston, Canterbury, for almost 100 years.
The farm is split between a milking platform, where he milks 200 cows on a 100 hectare ayrshire stud, and an 80ha run-off block where he grows crops, including barley and wheat, and grows peas for Watties.
Legg also runs 70 breeding ewes on the run-off.
Legg said he had always felt like his family’s farm was behind the times, his father and grandfather had maintained a low-stocking rate and hadn’t used soluble fertilisers or made changes other farms had.
But he found what they were doing was compatible with what Masters recommended. ‘‘When I started looking into it, I realised we’re actually sitting in a really good position.’’
The first change he made was to stop using urea and super phosphate.
Legg is now adding diversity to the pastures on the milking platform and companion species on the cropping run-off. He is also working on reducing tillage to avoid its detrimental effects on soil biology.
Being able to dairy farm without irrigation is one of Legg’s driving ambitions and he has been experimenting with drought-tolerant species like lucerne, red clover, chicory and plantain.
Pasture diversity had paid off, he said. Last year, he had to irrigate for only six weeks. A good season helped and the pastures made the difference.
Legg said he was fortunate in that the farm didn’t carry debt, which gave him freedom to make changes.
Changing to regenerative agriculture meant making significant adjustments, Legg said, but he was confident doing it. ‘‘It just made sense to me. As we’ve gone down the track, it is pretty simple.’’
Legg relied on advice from US farmer Gabe Brown in his book Dirt to Soil. ‘‘There’s five principles and you follow them. The better you follow them, the better your soil turns out.’’
The principles have paid off; Legg has seen an increase in production, fertility has improved and the herd has had fewer health issues.
There was more to success than how animals were performing though.
‘‘I think getting the soil right does have a positive impact on your livestock health but I think with regenerative farming, it’s more a mindset,’’ Legg said.
For every decision he made, he also considered the impacts to soil health and how he could mitigate disturbances or help feed soil.
‘‘We just set out to make small changes, observe them, and continue the things that we saw were beneficial and stop the things that we thought weren’t so beneficial to our system, and we’re still on that path.’’
Scott Mathieson is farming alongside his father on a property established by his greatgrandparents. He milks 880 cows on the 680ha dairy farm in Riverton, Southland.
Mathieson returned to farming almost four years ago.
‘‘I moved back from the city because I wanted to have space and grow my own food and see where everything was coming from,’’ he said.
Mathieson returned knowing he wanted to improve the farm. He was introduced to regenerative agriculture a year ago at a seminar where he heard South African holistic grazing farmer Ian Mitchell-Innes speak.
Mathieson saw what other dairy farmers in Southland had achieved through regenerative farming.
He was able to win the support of his father but didn’t imagine they would make progress as quickly as they have.
‘‘When I first brought up the possibility of regenerative agriculture, I thought we’d have like a trial paddock or we would move at snail’s pace, but we are already transitioning our system,’’ he said.
The first focus Mathieson took was on grazing.
He split their paddocks into smaller breaks so cows would be in a higher density of feed for shorter periods of time. They then trample in the pasture, this provides organic matter to feed the soil leading to lower fertiliser inputs.
Mathieson is aiming to lower nitrogen use over three years. In the first year it was down 20 per cent and this year they will lower it by 50 per cent.
Increasing pasture diversity is another plan. ‘‘We’re experimenting with moving away from our traditional ryegrass, light clover pastures and we’re putting in really diverse mixes.’’
On one pasture, Mathieson will experiment with 25 different species. He is also using plants with deeper root systems to improve soil health.
It required a change of mindset to make progress, he said. ‘‘In dairy, all we talk about is production and how the cows are producing. So there’s such a huge cultural shift that needs to happen.’’
Adjusting their outlook had resulted in better animal, environmental and soil health.