Smart saving, good timing saves the day for Newry dairy farmers

SMALL changes have made all the difference to balancing the books at Peter Neaves and Kate Mirams dairy farm at Newry this year.

SMALL changes have made all the difference to balancing the books at Peter Neaves and Kate Mirams dairy farm at Newry this year.

The couple, with their children Angus, 12, Tristan, 11, and Daniel, 8, run a spring-calving herd of 235 to 240 cows on 103 hectares.

The couple, who hosted a Tactics for Tight Times Farm Day, were looking at a reduction in income of about $101,000 following the Murray Goulburn milk price cut.

Book smart: Peter Neaves and Kate Mirams with their children, from left Tristan, 11, Daniel, 8 and Angus, 12, have taken all the worry out of balancing the books. Picture: Lyndal Reading

Through saving money on fertiliser, grain, irrigation fuel costs, repairs and maintenance they were able save $54,000.

“We put plenty of fertiliser on just before the milk price cut, so we’re only putting urea on this year,” Kate said.

“We swapped for a cheaper grain mix and we’ll make silage and buy some cereal hay and lucerne silage.”

Kate said it was fort­unate the announcement of the milk price cut came before the end of the fin­ancial year.

“We were looking at paying tax, so we got a new accountant and moved some of our costs into the 2015-16 financial year, such as herd testing, drench agistment and semen costs,” she said.

Kate said despite grain costs dropping, they would hold at one tonne per cow for grain, with an aim of 75 per cent of cow intake being from homegrown feed.

She said the family took the approach of not worrying too much and wanting to enjoy farming, holidays and sport.

“We like to enjoy it and we want low stress on the cows and low stress on the people,” she said.

“We could go harder, we could go further up the response curve.”

Kate said they were keen to limite their exposure.

“We don’t like to much exposure to things we can’t control.”