'Wasteland' turned into productive farms

Tall fescue "guru" Gavin Milne stands in a two-year-old paddock of the grass at Regent's Park farm. PHOTO/ SUPPLIED

A group of dairy farms on droughty sand country near the Rangitikei coast have turned "wasteland" into productive land that support a number of families.

That is the view of H&T Agronomics business manager Duncan Thomas, talking about the OB Group Dairy Farms clustered around Santoft.

The first was bought by John O'Brien and Andy Hurley 20 years ago, and there are now at least six separate farms, each with different variations of ownership.

Stuart Taylor is an equity partner and their general manager, while H & T Agronomics provides advice.

In the past the coastal strip of dune and sandy flats was mainly used by hill country farmers for winter grazing, Mr Thomas said. It was a handy and warm place for farmers with heavy soils to winter their cattle.

Mr O'Brien got the land for a good price. The dairy boom hadn't started yet and no one imagined it would support a milking herd - but he thought it would, if he could just add water.

"Everyone thought he was slightly deranged but he was buying land that was undervalued and developing it for probably cheaper than you could go and buy a dairy farm in Rangitikei."

When the new owners tried rye grass pasture on the land, it didn't work. The grey sand heated up to 30-40degC in summer, and the shallow roots of rye grass couldn't suck up enough water.

H & T Agronomics got involved. Mr Thomas said the theory of adding water was correct, but the pasture species was wrong. He thought tall fescue, a tough grass that most grazing animals don't like, might survive better in that environment.

H & T has links with a Danish seed company that has done an extensive tall fescue breeding programme. It offered varieties not available in New Zealand and Tower tall fescue was chosen.

Tall fescue is usually very upright, but Tower has a lot of low growth as well. It shades the sand and stops it heating up. Mixed with red and white clover, and brome in places, it's proved ideal for the Santoft country.

The OB Group started using Tower in 2010 and now it's across all the farms.
There's quite a process to convert dune land into a dairy farm, Mr Thomas said. Bores are sunk to get water, with consent from Horizons Regional Council. The bores are deep, so that water is cooller and local aquifers are less affected.

A Santoft water users' group was formed, so that local water users would talk to each other.

Electricity supply had to be boosted, to run the farms' big irrigators.

Trees that would get in the irrigators' way are removed. Top soil is stripped off and piled up, then the dunes are levelled and the topsoil is spread back on top.

The land is sown first with white oats, then kale and sorghum for break feeding. The soil is fed with chicken manure and other fertilisers - especially nitrogen and sulphur.

Fertiliser has to be applied little and often, to prevent it leaching through the sand. The organic matter builds up quickly.

"The soils have improved out of sight," Mr Thomas said.

The first OB Farms were Hyde Park and Regent's Park; now there are also Sanderry, Killarney and the newest one, The Plains, near Koitiata. New people have come to the area to work them.

"Twenty years ago they were just wasteland. Now you've got a sustainable kind of environment and fifty more people and families out there."

Mr Thomas says that's a stunning transformation, specially at a time when rural communities are failing elsewhere.

++ Farmers can learn more about tall fescue on a field trip to the OB Group farms in November, when Whanganui hosts New Zealand's annual Grasslands Conference.