The Farmers Club Newsletter

The “Club Notes” for Thursday, the 23rd of November 2023

By Dwain Duxson

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Sacred Site Sacred Cows

I was listening to the Humans of Agriculture posdcast where Ollie interviewed Erica Halliday, a Farm at Walcha. It's a very good podcast with lots of takeaways. You can listen here. Erica sounds like a get-shit-done type of lady. She talked about how we get tied up with the romance of Farming and don't necessarily use the hard business principles that some Farming businesses use. But I reckon that there needs to be a balance. And for the record, Erica did, too. Like when the Grazing Chart is telling us that we need to destock everything as a droughts is on the way. I mean, some of those Cattle and Sheep have been years in the making, and there is no way Farmers are going to give up on those Breeders just because a model says to. That's the sacred Cow bit. And what prevents Farmers from selling out is that the majority love what they do, love their Farms and are usually generational Farmers with a tradition to uphold. That's the sacred site bit. Do you follow hard business principles? The Reply to [email protected]

All the planets have to line up

Collaborative Farming is very rare in Australia. We know that Farmers are fiercely independent and thrive that way. But in this day and age there would be advantages is sharing some Machinery with the prices of new stuff. But as romantic as it is, it never seems to really work, as more often than not, both Farmers usually want the same Machines at the same time. To do a successful Collaborative Farming arrangement, you have to be in boots and all and have trust in the Farmer you are partnering with. See the 3 part story below of how Mick Pole and Jim Wakefield have managed to make it work. It's a good read. At our FarmTender2024 - Entrepreneurs in the Farming event on March 1, we will feature John Gladigau, who was part of the high-profile Bulla Burra Collaborative Farming outfit near Loxton, SA. It has been wound up, and I look forward to interviewing John about the positives and negatives of such an arrangement. With these models, all the planets have to line up for them to even get off the ground. Have you thought about a collaborative Farming model? Reply to [email protected]

The Thornton Portable Sheep Yards

I think the first set of Thornton Yards was built probably 30 years ago, maybe longer. I am pretty sure they have stopped making them, as, just looking at the Thornton website, they have moved on to much bigger things. But when they made the yards over the decades, they never changed the style. Many would say they are still the best Portable Sheep Yards on the market. They are a readily traded item on our Farm Tender website, and if priced right, they don't last more than a day. But why do they work? Because they are simple, they are easy to carry around and easy to unpack and pack up. Like many things on the Farm, if something works, you tend to stick with it. What's something you have used on the Farm for decades that you still use? Reply to [email protected]

The consultant

In Australia, we know how to create jobs for things that don't need doing. We are graduating from our ripping little old 1940's weatherboard Farm House to something a bit more modern. Sometimes, we wonder why we are borrowing money to build a house, but we are. Anyway, it's been about two and a half years in the making, and we are still yet to strike a blow. I've worked out that there is a consultant for everything. In the first house location, we had 3 different consultants who tried to get the site approved by the Fire Authority, but all 3 were unsuccessful. We had other consultants attend to other requirements. But thinking about Ag, we are lucky not to be overpopulated with consultants who have jobs created for them by authorities. However, I do remember all the hoops we had to jump through for the Johne disease accreditation; it went on for years and made Vets a lot of money along the way. Who remembers the Johnes days?? Reply to [email protected]

End of message.

Dwain Duxson
0427 011 900

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