Wily weka leads the pest patrol
Organic kiwifruit growers Mark and Catriona White’s firm belief in a balance for land and lifestyle has been recognised with the supreme award in the Bay of Plenty Ballance Farm Environment Awards.
First-time award entrants, they say it was an opportunity to get expert advice and help grow and develop their Opotiki-based business.
‘‘Sometimes, in an industry like ours you can become blinkered,’’ Mark says.
‘‘The awards were a chance for others to come to our operation and have a good look at us. We felt it was an opportunity to get feedback, and the judges definitely did that. They looked at everything. It was very comprehensive, a look at our whole operation.’’
The awards recognise and celebrate farm practices which promote sustainable land management. Judges consider the entire environment that the farm operates within, focusing on sustainable profitability, environmental awareness, good business practices and social and community responsibility.
Mark says this was ‘‘very beneficial’’. ‘‘We have a number of new initiatives we will be implementing to further improve our operation in the coming year.’’
Relatively new to kiwifruit growing, the couple have not had the easiest of roads but their determination and desire to produce good organic produce has been the driving force.
Ten years ago, they embarked on a quest to find an improved lifestyle for their family away from the city and found it on a bare block of land near Opotiki.
The award judges said the Whites’ work and passion had transformed part of an organic dairy farm into a successful 7.5ha organic orchard. There was no compromise – being organic was not a barrier to excellent productivity for the orchard.
‘‘Organics is a licence to do things differently,’’ the judges commented. ‘‘Every opportunity is taken to try and to learn new things through observation and open-mindedness.’’
Catriona grew up on an organic dairy farm and organic kiwifruit orchard near Opotiki. She and Mark both went to college in Opotiki and then to universities in the South Island. After graduating, they lived and worked in different places throughout the North and South Islands. Mark’s career with NZ Post took them to Napier, Wellington, Taranaki and Auckland.
Then they decided it was time for a life change, time to move before their two small children reached school-age.
They made a list of wants, for both them and their children. Auckland was not on the list. They wanted to live near the coast, work together in a business that could grow to include children, to be close to good schools somewhere in the North Island, to be near family and to do something that would satisfy their need for a healthy and sustainable lifestyle.
They looked at several options. They were open to anything but it was when Catriona’s parents, Ken and Carole Young, suggested buying a grazing block on their organic dairy farm to grow kiwifruit that this ticked their boxes.
‘‘We never thought we would come back here,’’ Mark says. ‘‘But the kids were approaching school-age, we needed stability and the land was already organic certified. It felt right.’’
The organic option and Zespri’s encouragement was a big factor, he says. ‘‘With a young family it just felt right on so many counts.’’ They set about educating themselves on all things kiwifruit. Although they initially didn’t know much about the fruit, they did most of the physical work setting up the orchard, keeping costs down and learning by their mistakes.
The orchard’s soils are predominantly free-draining Opotiki sandy loam and its top soil encourages root growth. ‘‘Our strategy during the development of the orchard has been to minimise earthworks in order to minimise damaging our soil structure,’’ Mark says.
They developed the kiwifruit structures stringing ‘‘kilometres and kilometres of wires’’, and planted rootstock.
Soon the orchard was flourishing. But then disaster struck.
PSA infected their plants and they were forced to cut them down to the rootstock.
Mark remembers going to Te Puke to see the effects of PSA.
‘‘It was carnage, so hard to see. These were very successful growers and they couldn’t contain or control PSA. Even conventional growers had no answers to the vine killing disease.’’
Mark and a friend went straight from seeing the devastated kiwifruit orchards to a plant wholesaler to buy passionfruit plants. He knew they needed another crop to bring dollars in, to put food on the table. At that stage the outlook for kiwifruit was grim.
The passionfruit option was viable because they could use the kiwifruit structure to grow the plants. The fruit went to Trevelyans Packhouse in Te Puke, which also packed their kiwifruit. The passionfruit move worked, giving them an income and time to get the organic kiwifruit orchard back into production.
It took two years. They grafted the new SunGold variety, which at the time was relatively unproven and luckily turned out to be resistant to PSA, onto their kiwifruit rootstock.
Mark and Catriona say they are now happy as organic kiwifruit growers. Mark says there is a need to find the equilibrium to keep the environment happy.
He enjoys the way nature looks after the plants and the soil if it is treated right. With no sprays there is an abundance of slugs, centipedes and worms and the orchard has its own natural answer to this, what he calls the pest patrol. These are birds, principally weka, that enjoy the abundance of their natural food while keeping the kiwifruit plants relatively pest-free.
Even slugs are welcome living in what Mark calls ‘‘slug hotels’’ - large clumps of grass growing against support posts beneath the vines.
‘‘Slugs assist in recycling organic material on the floor of the orchard and provide a source of food for birds. With plenty for the slugs to eat on the ground, they don’t seem to bother to chew on the newly grafted vines.’’
A small flock of organic sheep have become an integral part of the orchard’s organic lifestyle, being used to keep the grass under control and for keeping tidy marginal areas around the perimeter of the blocks. The sheep are put under the vines once the fruit has been harvested, helping reduce soil compaction from tractor work the.
‘‘They tick so many boxes, no mowing so no compaction and a good reuse of nutrients,’’ Mark says.
He is actively involved in the Tablelands Irrigation Scheme and water use is carefully planned and monitored.
Irrigation on the organic orchard is metered and controlled. ‘‘We have a brilliant climate in Opotiki [for kiwifruit],’’ he says. ‘‘We have five or six frosts a year, which is important for winter chill, and about1400mm of rain. And we have more than 2000 hours of sunshine. We are very lucky to have a natural fit with climate, soil and our SunGold plants fit just perfectly.’’
In 2017, the year the award was judged, the orchard had 3.19 ha of Zespri organic green kiwifruit, producing 23,483 trays. Zespri organic SunGold (G3) is currently grown on 2.65ha producing 38,362 trays.
This production was achieved in a ‘‘challenging growing year’’ which included various cyclones and a wet and windy autumn. Recently developed blocks of SunGold will be in production in the new season.
SunGold makes $2 extra a tray above the conventional kiwifruit price although Zespri reviews this every few years to ensure it reflects market returns. Organic green fruit get a premium of $2.10 a tray.