Newspaper Article 2004 – Working to a plan

Working to a plan

A couple’s clear plan impressed Farmer of the Year judges.

ROSE HARDING reports.

More than 300 people turned out for the Richmond Hawke’s Bay farmer of the year field day last week.

The attendees climbed onto quad bikes for their trip around Phil and Jo Cregoe’s farm Hafton, at Otamauri, on the Napier-Taihape road.

The farm is a 705ha (560 effective) sheep and beef-breeding and finishing farm. The Cregoes have planted 13ha of radiata pine and 40ha of gorge has been fenced off and placed under a QE 2 Trust convenant.

The judges for the event were independent agricultural consultant Alan McRae and Gisborne angus stud breeder Hamish Williams.

Mr McRae said the winners impressed the judges with the clear plan they outlined when buying Hafton five years ago, as well as the way they went about achieving their goals.

“Attending to water supply, fencing and access in particular has allowed them to establish a mixed sheep, beef-breeding and finishing system that fits in well with the physical nature of the farm, affords flexibility in dealing with climatic and economic factors and has been able to be run by the owners using casual labour where needed,” he said.

“Stock performance, tight cost-control and not being distracted from what they wanted to achieve have resulted in a very profitable and attractive farming business.”

The farm’s cattle policy is to run 150 friesian/hereford cows to charolais bulls, killing progeny at 18-20 months. They also finish more than 330 bulls a year.

The Cregoes put Kelso Composite genetics over the original romney flock of 2650 breeding ewes. The mixed-age ewes are put to composite rams and the rest to poll dorset.

They aim to finish 60 percent off the ewe at 90 days and finish the remaining 40 percent by February or March before buying 700 to 1000 store lambs to finish.

Photo captions –

QUEUE OF QUADS: A convoy of visiting farmers heads out on the Cregoe farm.

TOP HOSTS: Richmond HB Farmer of the Year winners Jo and Phil Cregoe.

PICTURES: KATE TAYLOR