The Farmers Club Newsletter

The “Club Notes” for Saturday, the 23rd of December 2023

By Dwain Duxson

If you can, please get your family, friends and colleagues to sign up. See the website link here.

Our movement over the next 10 days

I just want to take this opportunity to wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas. I am absolutely stoked that I took the plunge and started this newsletter, and I really do appreciate you signing up and reading. I also love the replies that people send in and the kind words. I get so many ideas for stories from your replies, and I get back to every one of them. So, over the Christmas and New Year period, it will be business as usual. We will have one ready to go on Monday morning (Christmas morning), and be at it for the rest of the week. The Ag media shuts down at this time of year, so we want to keep the Ag news flowing. Reply to [email protected]

The old strip and cart

We wrote about how the Grain Storages are struggling to keep up yesterday, and we had a few people reply endorsing that. They said it's been very frustrating and a real bottleneck. But all this talk of Grain Storages got me thinking about the old days when we used to line up at the Silo with our 8 to 10-tonne Trucks. Sometimes, the lines were a couple of hundred metres long. Back then, and I am talking about the 70s and 80s, the Harvest time was much more relaxed. It was almost a social thing to be held up in line because you could chat with a wide range of people around the district. Some Farmers were lone rangers back then and were the Header Driver, then doubled up as Truck Driver as well. We used to call it the "strip and cart". You would fill the Truck, and get another box full, take the Truck to the Silo and go back and do it all again. How contrasting is it to now? Can you please tell us about the olden days when Harvest was a much more relaxed affair? Reply to [email protected]

A real problem

Wild Dogs are a real problem. Have been for a long time now. Wild Dogs single-handedly ended Sheep Breeding in parts of Queensland. I was speaking to a Farmer who last a dozen or so Sheep on a property he was leasing in Central Victoria. It was 3 Dogs, a German Shepherd, a Kelpie and another Dog who were working in a pack, would kill their prey and virtually sit around for the day and eat them in between resting. They were apparently domesticated Dogs but had split personalities when they got together. The Farmer did the right thing and got hold of the Ranger who went through the do's and don'ts. To cut a long story short, he got the 3 Dogs, but not before one tried to attack him. With the amount of people with pets around, this issue will probably only get worse, and people sometimes abandon their pets and have to fend for themselves. Have you had any issues with wild Dogs? Reply to [email protected]

Last minute Christmas present. 

A great present for the ultra-keen Farmer who is on a continual learning journey would be to buy them a ticket to our FarmTender2024 - Entrepreneur in Farming event on March 1st at Marnoo in Victoria. Tickets are $350 per person, and I promise you will get heaps of Farming takeaway. Click here to buy a ticket.

End of message.

Dwain Duxson
0427 011 900

Random and associated Ag articles and images.