Nick Renyard wasn’t even a teenager back in 1984 when he started tinkering with computers.
Today, his electrical handyman abilities come in handy on his Curdievale farm.
Nick and his wife Simone estimate his input saved $10,000 on the installation of new cow collars, plus he’s been able to spread an electric fence system across the 390ha property, bring the dairy under the home NBN and introduce a water monitoring system.
Embracing easy-to-use technologies is high on the agenda as the Renyards build a new 60-unit dairy.
There have been massive changes during their 25 years of farming just outside Timboon, and they believe future-proofing the business with enough land for home-grown feed, a bigger dairy and new technology will mean a positive outlook.
The farm was purchased by Nick’s grandparents in the 1960s.
“Going back a long way, the area we are farming was once five dairy farms,” he said.
The 390ha home farm is supported by 43ha closer to Timboon to run young stock and a 30ha out-paddock.
The most recent purchase was in 2016, a 120ha neighbouring dairy farm.
“It coincided with losing some leased land so it was the right time and it was only 800m from the dairy,” Nick said.
“It gave us an opportunity to be more self-sufficient,” Simone added.
“The plan wasn’t necessarily to go bigger in cow numbers but to be more sustainable and grow our own feed. It gave us security because we know feed prices fluctuate so much.
“It was a farm that needed a lot of love and we had to spend a bit of money to get it up to scratch, but it’s to a point now that we can grow good feed on it and it’s really good for young stock.”
The Renyards have 540-550 predominantly Holstein cows, but Aussie Red crossbreds have been introduced during the past eight years and they have started a three-way cross system with the first calves born last year.
“The crosses are about fertility,” Simone said.
“The bigger-framed Friesians can be more difficult to get in calf and we had those issues over 20 years. To be more sustainable and viable, we wanted a smaller frame and more fertile cow without giving away good feed conversion efficiency.”
“By moderating the frame size, maintaining feed efficiency and with three-way crosses you pick up hybrid vigour,” Nick said.
“We’ve definitely got a more fertile animal since introducing Aussie Reds.”
The first three-way cross calves are coming into the system.
“The calves look great and we’re getting more than ever,” Simone said.
“Instead of getting just enough to maintain the herd, we now have options to either sell some calves or increase herd size.”
They are planning to edge the herd up to around 600, while being cautious realising good seasons and prices aren’t guaranteed.
Nick expects productivity to improve through cross breeding and continually selecting bulls based on feed conversion.
They are replacing a 32-year-old 50-unit rotary with a 60-unit system.
“As cow size comes down, if we can also lift productivity, we’ll look at the liveweight per hectare and gradually increase numbers,” Nick said.
“The dairy probably needed replacing five years ago but at that time there was no cash flow; the past two seasons and milk price gave us the confidence to do it.”
After 12 months of planning, construction by GreenCon is now under way.
It is attached to the existing dairy, and equipment such as pumps and refrigeration will be reused while the existing dairy will be gutted and used for shedding and the yards expanded. There will be a staff room to support their three full-time staff, all living on the farm.
“Fifty to 60 is not a massive step-up in cost and there’s a reasonable chance one of our children will come back on the farm so we wanted to leave it open for opportunities,” Nick said.
“A 60-unit will allow them to milk more cows if they want.”
Inspired by the success of other farmers and an Agricultural Digital Innovation grant, the Renyards added cow collars last October.
“At the moment it’s just gathering data but already it has picked out a few alerts for cows with a few health issues,” Nick said.
“We’re being more proactive on health, and experience shows they are incredibly valuable in picking cows that have not recovered from calving.”
“The technology is there, so why not embrace it?” Simone said.
Another relatively cheap but good value addition is the Smart Water app.
“We have a wireless gateway so we can remotely monitor all our water tank levels and adjust pumping in response to those figures,” Nick said.
“As long as I have internet, I can control those remotely, which means we can keep an eye on things when we go away and get onto problems a lot earlier.
“I’ve been able to repurpose a few old 3G antennas to expand our range so we’re now covering 95 per cent of the farm. It all runs off the back of a wireless internet system we have around the farm.
“We wanted to share internet with the dairy without having another NBN connection so I got some bits and bobs and made it happen. It means I can remote access the ID computer or the collars and see where they’re up to milking.
“There are more and more products at a reasonable price where you can remotely monitor things,” he said, which is handy as the couple hopes to travel more in the future.
“We’d like to be in a position to take more breaks and are working towards that with technology and simple systems,” Simone said.
“We’re trying to put that thinking around every part of the new dairy.”
The farm has been benefiting from Nick’s technical expertise for years.
“Many years ago, we bought an off-the-shelf solar-powered electric fence unit,” he said.
“It wasn’t getting through much of winter and we’d only have powered fences during the day. Through researching and setting up solar when away camping, I started to build some knowledge and applied that to building my own solar fence units.
“We had some calves destroy a unit one day, so I put it in a fridge to protect it. The first unit I built is still running and we’ve made a massive saving.
“I estimate we saved about $10,000 on the collars system or we might not have got the coverage that we get without my additions.”
Staff members have Healthy Cow apps on their phones and everyone is in a What’s App group. The Renyards also get great benefits from being in a discussion group with successful farmers and business owners.
The business is now set up if the couple’s children William, who has finished a Bachelor of Business (Agriculture) at Marcus Oldham, or Laura who works in banking, are keen to return to the farm.
“We don’t want to be this hands-on in 10 years,” Simone said.
“The next generation will have to be savvy and smarter to keep the business growing.
“As an industry, I think we undervalue the skills farmers have and the level of smartness they need to run a successful business,” she said.
“We have to uptake technology and look at different ways of doing things because labour is a big problem for the industry.”