Don chatted some more with the farmer neighbours - Steve and Angela - who gave us their address and said we were welcome to drop by to see the farm, something Don was very interested in. As it turned out their farm was only about a 50 minute drive from the campground and we were at their farm at 11am. After some more chatting with both of them, Steve gave us an elaborate tour (by truck) of the farm, stopping at the various buildings and areas and explaining lots of things about the setup and operation of the farm. Don - having grown up on a farm - asked Steve many questions and discussed different aspects of farming with him.
Steve and Angela each grew up on a farm and together were part of a group operating five farms until they decided that that operation was too big. They bought the farm - now named Waikirikiri after the nearby river - five years ago (with an investment partner), and converted it from sheep farm to dairy farm (something that can't (easily) be done any longer). Note that there are no dairy quotas in New Zealand. They put in an irrigation system, milking shed etc and built two two-bedroom houses for the staff and recently added a one-bedroom house. Steve is more hands-on on the farm and Angela does a lot of the management. Steve and Angela are very much into sustainability and doing it right, from using some electric motorbikes around the farm to extensively planting native plants all around the farm and along the road to providing their four permanent staff with proper housing (not shared) with a view to staff happiness, wellbeing and long-term retention. Their farm is starting to be known as a really nice and tidy farm and indeed Steve and Angela are trying to build a reputation and show that you run dairy farm the right way and still be profitable. At the same time they would like to buy another, likely older, dairy farm in the area in the next few years together with one or more investors. Canterbury, the region of the South Island they live in, has only increasingly been used for dairy farming in the past 30 years or so. The climate allows for cost-effective growing of grass and feeding of cows, allowing for more cows per hectare than eg on the North Island which is traditionally the island of dairy farms.
The 800 cows mainly eat grass and rotate through the paddocks in two groups. They eat some barley when they are in the milking shed, some fodder beet (more in winter) and some silage (some of which the farm produces and some that is bought, but not much). The cows are walking cows, meaning that they walk to their food (rather than the food being brought to them) and of course from and to the milking shed. They are not large cows, with the ideal breed being a (kiwi) cross between a Holstein-Friesian and Jerseys resulting in a slightly smaller cows able to walk around four kilometers per day and yet being a good milk producer. They are outdoors all year round and are moved to a neighbouring farm for two winter months where they dry up. This year's calves as well as the yearlings graze in paddocks at the same neighbour's farm until they are two years' old and ready to calve and then join the main herd.
Partway through the tour we had a lovely lunch at their house after which Steve continued the tour. We watched Spot, their New Zealand shepherd (working) dog trying to round up the yearlings as a demo for us, but it was rather hot and Spot is only two and by the looks of it somewhat overwhelmed at having to round up close to 200 cows so the demo did not quite work out as intended but was nice to watch anyway. After that we watched part of the main herd being milked at the shed which was also interesting to watch. Then it was time to hit the road, so we thanked Steve and Angela for their hospitality, were given some fresh eggs yet, and headed towards Twizel, our next destination. We got as far as Geraldine where we got some groceries and then saw a Top 10 and decided to call it a day as it was close to 6pm by that time.
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