Mark Billing has a closed herd but that’s never stopped him from looking over the fence or stepping out to help the industry.
The latest addition to WestVic Dairy’s south-west industry honour board has been recognised for his “outstanding contributions to the region’s dairy industry over a long period”.
And at 54, the fourth-generation farmer still has a lot more to offer.
When being inducted to the honour board, judges said Mark’s “passion, capability and commitment shine through, backed up by several leadership positions which have earned him respect within and beyond the dairy industry”.
His industry involvement includes pivotal roles on Bonlac and Fonterra supplier groups, the WestVic Dairy board and United Dairyfarmers of Victoria, where he is vice-president.
His family farm on the outskirts of Colac, ‘Craiglands’, will celebrate its 100th anniversary in 2024. Mark and wife Sam recently bought out his parents Alan and Judy, after running the business for the past 22 years.
Mark says his grandparents would hardly recognise today’s farm.
“I’ve worked here all my life but I’ve always looked over the fence,” he said.
“We’ve been early adopters of many things.”
One game-changing innovation was the introduction of activity monitoring about 20 years ago.
“We were blanket feeding our cows in the dairy and it frustrated me that we couldn’t manipulate the individual feed,” he said.
“We have Westfalia (now GEA) plant so I spoke to them and they had collar technology and were introducing activity monitoring.
“They used our farm and a farm in New Zealand as the first to trial commercially available activity monitoring in a pasture-based system.
“We’re now on version three and it’s helped no end, particularly around mating time.
“We’ve integrated it into our system. It’s second nature, even when we’ve been synchronising cows and manipulating heats, we still rely heavily on the collars.”
The whole system is fully integrated with activity monitoring, drafting, milk metering and feed allocation in one software package.
‘Craiglands’ milks a closed registered Holstein herd of just over 400 head.
“We’re concentrating on building a better cow, rather than lots of them, and building our herd worth that way,” Mark said.
Genotyping — led by Sam who is on the DataGene board — is the key to the herd’s success.
“Sam drives that — I just grow the grass and get the cows ready to get into calf, calve them, and then Sam takes over the calf rearing.
“What’s in the calf shed is the future of our business.”
They have a tight May/June calving to match the farm’s traditional grass growth curve.
“We have a good in-calf rate,” Mark said.
“We do a fair bit of synchronising and timed AI at the start of our mating cycle and use the collars for pre-mating checks so we can intervene if there are any problems.”
They look for an all-round good performing cow.
“We select everything on BPIs and each year our BPI cut-off is getting higher,” Mark said.
“Anything below our mating BPI goes to Angus and we’re rearing all of those and we’re rearing all our Holstein bulls as well.
“We have the capacity to take them through and grow them out but the market has been that positive so we’ve been selling some on AuctionsPlus.”
Mark has continued the family tradition of having a closed herd.
“We’ve been a closed herd for a long time,” he said.
“My father was never keen on buying cattle in. We work hard on our milk quality so we don’t want to be buying in trouble. With a closed herd, from a health perspective it makes it easier for us to manage.”
The Billing family and staff aim to be self-sufficient, using mostly home-grown feed and only buying grain to fill feed gaps or to drive production when it’s economical to do so.
They milk off 240 hectares and have a property at Gellibrand for young stock.
The farm, which fronts the Princes Highway, receives about 700mm rainfall a year and is reasonably drained so doesn’t get too wet. A feedpad also helps pasture management.
“We have our own silage gear so we do it when it suits us, rather than relying on contractors,” Mark said.
“The aim is to be self-sufficient.”
Mark has always been interested in giving back to the industry and has ramped up that contribution in recent years.
“When we took over the business, it was head-down and bum-up, but we’ve got the business in a position where we could employ staff and free up more of my time, with the support of Sam and our staff.”
Mark was a director of the Bonlac Supply Company for a number of years and was chairing the Fonterra Supply Forum when the milk price crashed in 2016.
“That was a stressful period trying to represent suppliers back to the company,” he said.
“I toughed it out for 12 months but didn’t feel I could give any more to the Fonterra role.”
He then joined the WestVic Dairy board for a three-year term, including a year as deputy chair, while maintaining his interest in the UDV.
“When I finished the WestVic role, I focused my energy to the UDV and became a policy councillor representing local farmers and have been vice-president for more than 12 months.
“That’s where my focus is now as it’s important to advocate on behalf of farmers.
“While the industry has significant headwinds with input costs, the policy side of things will make the biggest difference to ensure we can access exports, have a strong domestic market, control animal welfare and create a strong dairy image so when we go to politicians, they’re getting not only pressure from producers but consumers to make sure we’ve got good Aussie quality product on shelves and farmers are treated fairly.
“The whole supply chain needs to be profitable.”
The Great South West Dairy Awards awards — which recognised many younger farmers — enforced Mark’s positive outlook for the industry.
“We need to build an environment through policy that keeps our industry vibrant, strong and attractive to people, especially young people.”
He described his honour board induction as a “huge honour and a massive surprise”.
“When you look at the names on the board — people who were showing strong leadership as I was coming up through UDV — I feel like a bit of an imposter but I was very grateful for the recognition, though I still want to do a fair bit more for the industry.”