Getting
Down and
Dirty on
the dairy
farm with
Emma
& Jet
http://www.slideshare.net/LandLearnNSW

Emma and Jet
• My name is Emma I am 16. As part
of my HSC I am doing a dairy
traineeship at Clover Hill Dairies
• My name is Jet. I am also doing a
dairy traineeship with Alan and
Leesa Swan at Hillview Dairy

Hi
I’m Jet
Hi
I’m
Emma

Visit our new Website
News
Flash
www.dairyyouthaustralia.com.au

Cream of the Crop Competition
Dairy Youth Australia and Landlearn NSW have launched
the Cream of the Crop Competition - a great opportunity
for NSW students to win $1000 and get published
• The Cream of the Crop Competition is open to students in
NSW Secondary Schools and Tertiary Institutions studying
Agriculture, Primary Industries or Natural Resource
Management related topics.
• There is over $4500 in prize money on offer with an awards
ceremony scheduled for the
Sydney Royal Easter Show, 2010. Enter and
• For full details and entry form visit: win $1000
www.dairyyouthaustralia.com.au/competition

What are Emma Jet and Emma are going to
and Jet going to talk about sustainable
talk about farming and the
today? importance of
Healthy Dairy Farming
Landscapes .

Update on farm yard happenings
• Cows in cyberspace have earned Dairy Youth Australia
Inc a grant from Kiama council.
• We plan to use the grant to expand the topics, including
creating videos on both the Dairy Youth Australia Inc and
the Landlearn NSW website
• We are also very keen to profile allied dairy industry
careers
• The first of this series will document a day in the life of a
trainee vet. We would like to say thanks to Associate
Professor John House – Director of Bovine Livestock – and
Dr Matt Izzo from the Faculty of Veterinary Science at
Sydney University for their assistance in making this
happen

More updates on farm
yard happenings
Nick is the star of
―The Slice of Life‖ photo shoot
in the
Illawarra Mercury Weekender

This is Illawarra
Mercury photographer
Greg Totman making
every opportunity to
take that special shot

.
Maybe the
white shirt was
not such a wise
idea!!!!

viat
And the end result.
Looks pretty classy
doesn’t it ?

Oscar has a happy reunion with his
family
Remember Oscar the little
Silky chicken we had to raise
in the bathroom under a
light because his mum and
dad didn’t want him ?

Great news after ten days
living in the bathroom
Oscar’s mum and dad and
brothers and sisters welcome
him home .

Its like he never
left !!!
Hello Oscar

Today we are going to talk about
healthy dairy farm landscapes .
We farm in an environmentally
sensitive forest .
The rainforest supports many native
animal species.
Supporting this biodiversity is
important to us .

Sustainable Dairying
• Sustainable agriculture is profitable
agriculture that protects and replenishes
resources rather than using them up.
• It is a system that produces what we need
while working in harmony with the
environment.

Healthy Landscape
• As farmers we know we must look after our
land so we can continue to produce food to
feed the people of Australia and in the case
of dairy (which exports 50% of its product)
the world
• Dairy cows use the natural resources sunlight,
soil, nutrients (food or chemicals), pasture
and water to make milk

A healthy
landscape requires a
partnership
between
a number
of things.
Lets have a look
at these
things.

Soil
worms
Oxygen
Food/
Nutrients Shelter
Fertiliser Pasture trees and
Organic matter shrubs
Weather
Temperature Sunshine
rain

Lets look at each one
1. Soil
2. Nutrients
3. Weather
4. Shelter

Healthy Soil
• A healthy soil is a soil that is productive and
easy to manage under the intended land use.
• It has biological, chemical and physical
properties that promote the health of plants,
animals and humans while also maintaining
environmental quality.

Great new website on Healthy Soils
• http://soilhealthknowledge.com.au/
Check it out?

Did you know that if your
soil has worms its healthy
soil?
http://urbanext.illinois.edu/worms/

More stuff about worms
• Earthworms are like free farm help. They help to
"turn" the soil—bringing down organic matter
from the top and mixing it with the soil below.
• Another interesting job that the worm has is that
of making fertilizer.
Pretty amazing for just a little old worm,
don't you think?
http://urbanext.illinois.edu/worms/

Most soils contain four
basic components:
mineral particles,
water, air, and organic
matter.
Organic matter can be
further sub-divided
into humus, roots, and
living organisms. The
values given above are
for an average soil.
http://www.physicalgeography.net/fundamentals/10t.html

And of course
plants live in soil.
So lets look at what
makes plants tick.
Lets start with the
science and
Photosynthesis

Photosynthesis
Carbon dioxide + water + sunlight = sugar + oxygen
• Plants absorb a common gas called carbon
dioxide, pull water up through their roots and
use light to make sugar.
• Plants use the sugar to grow.
• Plants give off oxygen as a by-product.
• The green parts of the plant make the sugar
and oxygen.

http://grapevine.net.au/~grunwald/une/KLAs/science/photosynthesis.html

Holding the soil together
• A web of powerful roots deep underground
also helps hold the soil together and keeps its
nutrients exactly where they’re needed.
• Soils become well-conditioned and able to
grow better pasture.
• Stronger soils and better pastures are then
better-able to fight off attacks from weeds
and harmful insects.

Cows can eat 100kgs As we know
grass per day which is a
wheelbarrow full cows eat lots of
grass.
So how do
we make the
grass grow faster
and
thicker and
full
of lots of
sugars

Fertiliser is very useful in this
process.
Read all about fertiliser in our
Grow Grass Grow series
@ this link
http://www.slideshare.net/LandLearnNSW

You grow lots
Look what
and lots of
happens when
yummy short
you spread
sweet grass
fertiliser
So healthy dairy farm
landscapes are very
important for both
the farmer and the
environment

How does the weather affect
farming
• Cows don’t like it too hot or too cold –between
15 and 25 degrees centigrade
• Cows need shade and shelter to produce milk
• The weather also affects how and when the
grass grows
• As you know grass grows much faster in spring
Australian cows are lucky they get to live
outside in the sunshine and fresh
air eating grass

We girls are
very sensitive
to sudden
temperature
changes

Now we are going to talk about
the importance of shelter for the
landscape and the animals.

Shelter
• Planting trees and shrubs means many good
things for birds and native animals, for other
sorts of plants, for the soil and … oh yes, for
the cows, too.
• Planted in rows, trees offer shelter from wind,
rain and hot sun.
• These shelterbelts of trees and plants make
life more comfortable for the dairy cows …
and the people who work with them.

Shelter belts
• Down below the ground, these shelterbelts
are doing more good work.
• Their powerful roots are pushing through the
soil to drag up water.
• This action means that the soils do not get too
soggy, or waterlogged.
• Nor do they get too full of salt – that’s a
problem called soil salinity.

This is a new
shelterbelt we
have planted

This shelterbelt began its journey
in 2005 and is a result of lots of
hard work by Andrew Britton who
runs the Small Farms Network in
our region
http://www.smallfarms.net.au/

Before Andrew planted the
trees, he poisoned three rows of
grass with glycophosphate .
The newly planted trees are
protected with tree guards

In 2007 we increased the
length of the shelterbelt and
put in a big T section of trees
to protect our cows who are
calving

Shelterbelts provide a safe habit for native
animals
Here you see a shelter corridor
This happens when you connect the shelterbelts
together
I.e. the newly planted trees connect with the
trees that have been there a long time

Shelterbelts help
protect native animals
from foxes.
Foxes are very nasty
for many reasons
http://www.animalcontrol.com.au/foxes.htm

Protect
Rehabilitate
Revegetate

In a nutshell
To achieve sustainable agriculture we must deal
both with issues involving environmental impacts
and productivity of the land. Any program to
successfully develop a system of sustainable
agriculture must have farmer involvement at all
stages of its development, and must look at a
farming system as a whole, not just at individual
elements. The farmer-focused agricultural
organisations in Australia are working with
researchers to develop farming systems that are
both sustainable and profitable.

Did you know Charles Stuart Uni
has a Master of Sustainable
Agriculture course???
This course is designed to meet the changing
needs of agriculture by equipping students
with the necessary skills to balance the
natural resource, human and economic
factors that affect agricultural sustainability
http://www.myfuture.edu.au/services/default.asp?FunctionID=5350&CourseID=29969

Visit our new Website
www.dairyyouthaustralia.com.au

Jet and Emma Farm Management
Education Series K to 12
Links
Milk It
http://www.slideshare.net/LandLearnNSW/dairy-farming-with-jet-and-emma-milk-it
Cups On Cups Off
http://www.slideshare.net/LandLearnNSW/dairy-farming-with-jet-and-emma-cups-on-cups-off
Grow Grass Grow
http://www.slideshare.net/LandLearnNSW/dairy-farming-with-jet-and-emma
Seeding Time
http://www.slideshare.net/LandLearnNSW/dairy-farming-with-jet-and-emma-seeding-time-1236604
How it all began – a Taste for Dairy
http://www.slideshare.net/LandLearnNSW/jet-and-emma-a-taste-for-dairy
Healthy Landscapes
http://www.slideshare.net/LandLearnNSW/dairy-farming-with-jet-and-emma-healthy-landscape-1641792
Circle of Life – Calf to Cow
http://www.slideshare.net/LandLearnNSW/circle-of-life-calf-to-cow

Acknowledgements
Farm yard animal graphics have been created
for the ―Jet and Emma Get Down and Dirty
on the Farm‖ series by students from Mt Terry
Public School

Cream of the Crop
is a Dairy Youth Australia Inc initiative
supported by funding from
Department of Agriculture Forestry and Fisheries
Farming for the Future Initiative.

The Jet and Emma Series is a Dairy Youth
Australia inc initiative assisted by Kiama
Municipal Council through its Sustainable
Living Grants Program.

Watch
this
space
we will
be back
soon