Last week we held a TFS field day looking at Parasite Control with Matt Playford of Dawbuts and Soil Profiles with Graminus and Jason Condon. We kicked off early in an effort to make the event a true half day, and we were hosted by Clive and Meredith Cawthorne at Kialla. A big TFS thanks goes out to Clive and Meredith for their efforts in hosting the field day.
Matt started by looking at some of the trends and variations they are seeing in the lab and the reasons why this is happening. There was active audience participation with numerous questions and clarification. We were lucky to have been given permission to use some recently completed drench tests carried out by TFS members. These results raised further questions around the efficacy of certain drenches and what can be done in addition to assist with parasite control. Matt went through an exercise with attendees, which looks at all the components that make up a worm control program in a sheep enterprise and helps to self-assess the strengths and weaknesses of current practices. The exercise can be accessed here Dawbuts Sheep Producer Self Assessment Table-compressed
Ideally by the end of the exercise producers will have a fairly even shaded wagon wheel. Matt emphasized that one of the most useful tools sheep producers have in combating worms is a larval culture. Culturing WEC tests to work out the type of worm/s your sheep have, allows you to go on and use a drench that will target that particular worm species.
Matt briefly went on to discuss drenching cattle and resistance in cattle. He confirmed that they are starting to see higher levels of resistance in cattle in their lab results.
Attending members were keen to access the Dawbuts drench testing protocol sheet – this can be found here https://dawbuts.com/2020/07/22/drench-test-guide/
After a quick morning tea and catch up we moved onto the 4th Healthy Soils workshop which looked at soil profiles. This was run by Jim and Nathan from Graminus and Jason Condon from CSU. We started in the shed looking at Sub Soil and what the interest in it is and then moved out into the paddock to look at some soil samples. The notes from the workshop can be found here Presentation Slides-compressed
We are looking to hold the next Healthy Soils workshop in June.