Phosphorus Supplement

Phosphorus (P) is an essential mineral required by all people, animals and plants. It is vital for most functions of the body from simple life support to reproduction and health.

Cow and calf consuming the phosphorus.

In the northern areas of Australia many of the soils are phosphorus deficient and cattle in the north are not usually able to obtain sufficient quantities from the natural pastures on which they graze as the plants also tend to be deficient.

Phosphorus is vital for the growth of bones, teeth, milk production and efficient feed conversion which is when the animal gets the most benefit from what it eats.

Symptoms of phosphorus deficiency in a herd is not instantly obvious as the animal draws on their phosphorus ‘stores’ from their bones and this takes time to deplete. It also takes time to replenish.Symptoms in animals are that they have poor growth , have weak bones, even eating less. Often the animals will chew bones, loose condition faster than a non-deficient animal, particularly in the latter stages of ‘dry seasons’ as the feed reserves lesson. Their fertility could be very low, thus a herd may have low calving percentages and poor weaning rates. Generally they are more susceptible to disease, particularly botulism (See Botulism Vaccinations). Botulism is an organism that produces a toxin which through paralysis of the muscles can be fatal to cattle. It is very prevalent in the soils and is present in old bones and carcases which the animals will chew as they are craving and seeking phosphorus.

From an animal welfare point of the view the feeding of supplements like Phosphorus assists the animal’s general health. Their bone structure is stronger; they grow better from a young age, usually meaning they are a healthier animal overall which assists their bodies to resist infections and maintain itself. They also utilise feed available more efficiently in dry periods when the grasses lose their nutritional value and the cattle would be expected to lose some body conditioning, such as late in the dry seasons. It also lessons their desire to chew the bones of dead animals.

From a production value point of  view animals receiving adequate phosphorus are healthier throughout their whole life and are much more likely to have increased reproductive fertility. Producing healthier calves, as a cow with good phosphorus levels can maintain a better milk supply; those calves will grow into strong animals themselves with heavier body weights and better general health. Their is usually a decrease in mortality rates across the herd due to these combined improvements.

The benefits to a property monetary wise is more animal production, less deaths and more kilograms to sell. While it may cost approximately $20 -$30 per head to feed an animal just phosphorus,the healthier animal’s better health and calving percentages usually enable a return on investment to warrant the increasing cost of supplementations.

Phosphorus can be fed as a supplement in a number of ways, water additives or in feed mixes with other supplements. We feed ours in a concentrated granule that is placed in various areas of the property for the animals to access as they require.

If you are interested in reading further on this subject go to

www.mla.com.au

‘Phosphorus management of beef cattle in Northern Australia’

A trip to the local store

Katherine is 320km away, as the crow flies, our nearest major town. This can have its challenges for keeping up the food supply at home. With the use of cool-rooms, freezers and our own 24 hour solar hybrid system, keeping of food is much better for us than it was for our predecessors.

I need to feed a family of  4 and the occasional worker and visitor, in case of wet weather I always try to have enough to last three months, it would be low by the end of three months but it could be done easily enough.  We kill our own beef and occasional goat, have chooks, grow some vegetables and fruits, and I milk goats.

The rest of our food requirements needs to be bought in and considering I sometimes haven’t  been  to town for over 2 months that’s one heck of a shop up for not only food but general household supplies. At the station I have what’s called a store, not your retail store but a storage of all our canned goods and non-perishables in a room attached to the house. It is about 10m X 6m, with a large number of heavy shelves. This room also has our coolroom and acts as the butcher shop when we get a ‘killer’, drop a beast for meat. The store is not unlike a super -sized pantry, I have 4 freezers.

This is just a small area of the store. The labels are for our daughter to practice maths for school

Planning for town begins at-least a week ahead, this trip was predominately to stock up on food and a few other station items. I knew I was taking my station wagon and trailer this trip, other times  we have a small 16 tonne body truck for heavier station items if needed.

I  pre-order some goods so it will be in town on the day I specify to pick up, frozen, chilled and non- perishables from a wholesale group who despatch from Darwin. These are things that I will buy in bulk, such as a boxes of tins of fruit, vegetables, beans, beetroot,  10kg drums of flour, rice, pasta, boxes of bread, whole outers of  toilet paper, cordial, butter by the carton. I can pretty much buy anything from this group as you would buy at your local supermarket, except I buy in boxes like sauces in 4 litre bottles and cereal in 6kg boxes laundry powder in 20kg tubs.  It’s not unusual for this order alone to cost several thousand dollars.

Fruit and Vegetables  I can pre order from a local  store,  20kg bags of potatoes, onions, carrots and the like. Depending on the time of year I’m able to grow a large volume of tomatoes, pumpkins, some salad varieties like Rocket, capsicums, and eggplants. I also grow bananas and fruiting plants like paw-paw, I have planted over 40 fruit trees the last 4 years, mainly mango’s with the odd citrus. The problem with the vegie garden is I have a constant battle with animals that like it too, bugs, fruit fly, bats, Bower birds would you believe constantly stealing my small water sprays, particularly if a bright colour, even pigs are coming in recently, not the vegies as it is very well fenced but the pigs love the mulch around my fruit trees.

This is the recently renovated vegie garden in January 2013. Getting ready to plant about February /March. A small banana section is outside the vegie garden and fruit trees further to the far left in the background. Behind the camera is an area for sprawling plants like pumpkins.

For several days before town it is planning, write everything down, to the smallest thing, nothing worse than getting home and realise you’ve forgotten deodorant, dish cloths, face cream, toothbrushes or other basics that will simply drive you nuts to be without for the next few months.

We have two ways to go to town, shorter of the two is 3 and half hours drive, the rough, is 90km of very corrugated dirt, many creek crossings and some fairly ordinary black soil flats that are treacherous if wet, 100km of a narrow bitumen road, single lane you share with road trains. I should explain here, you don’t really share, when you see them coming you clear off, they can weigh up to 120 tonne. My cars no match and doesn’t play well with trucks, this same road is heavily used by several large aboriginal communities, of which there is no police so all manners of unregistered broken down vehicles often litter sections, abandoned, sometimes on the road, many trades people and tourists, usually towing caravans and boats, these you can share the road with if they don’t decide to play chicken at 100km/hr head on. Not forgetting this road is often frequented by suicidal kangaroos, cattle, horses, donkey’s, pigs, buffalo and carpet snakes and then there’s the birds. This single lane bitumen with blind corners, single lane bridges and a number of water ways which after a wet often have whole sections washed out,  joins the Stuart Highway at Mataranka and then I’m on a two lane road to Katherine. I hate that road with a vengeance so I actually prefer to go the longer way which is much safer.

The long way, 450km, 100km of good dirt, much better maintained dirt, 9 gates and then onto the Stuart Highway just north of Daly Waters, I takes longer but does less damage to your car and gear and simply doesn’t have the volume of on coming traffic, though still with the manic depressed suicidal kangaroos and  other animals like cattle.

Due to the weather and not wishing to overnight in Katherine we try to do town trips in one day. This starts by leaving home at 4.30am, we’ll be in town by usually 10am, hopefully not much wet weather around and the creeks are crossable with no flat tyres or problems on the way, Thank goodness NT has decent speed limits as once I hit that highway that right peddle go’s down, hard.

So four and a half hours of solid driving, after the obligatory chiller ice coffee at Maccas, and a strategic a plan of attack, we go store to store picking up goods and doing the town jobs we need to do.

This is from picking up feed for animals, chemicals for weed control, the stores that we ordered from, hardware stores for small maintenance and repair items, chemists, newsagency, office shop and  irrigation shop for plumbing, car parts, bike parts, tyres, oils. A super quick run through Country Target for essentials like knickers and new bras, just hope there’s a discount sale on. Forget browsing, you still got a list as long as your arm to check off.

Last job is always Woolies, the only major supermarket in Katherine, the largest turnover of all Woolworths shops in Australia is Katherine. This is where I buy the items I really don’t want to have packs of 24 of, like various varieties of ‘tasties’ ,deodorants, various dry foods, noodles and such. If birthday is coming up, like 2-3 months away I need to buy for that too. Have resorted to matches on birthday cakes because I forgot candles. Rarely do I leave this shop without filling at-least 2 trollies and often it’s three.

Out on the car trailer I have 4 large eskies, I put  cold and frozen goods in these, pack with ice and then proceed to find any vacant spot on board, in the car, the roof rack, on the trailer, on seats, under seats, just  keep loading and strapping everything down. If we think wet weather is a chance, we’ll place a tarp over the trailer. Usually the trailer is so loaded now its starting to groan, the tyres look decidedly flatterl The only room left inside is now for hubbie and me to actually sit.

Heading home, always stop at the servo on the way out, fuel up and buy a multitude of life sustaining energy drinks, munchies and chocolate. Going home is usually a slower affair than getting to town, due to the weight. Often taking turns to drive as usually the fast trips hubbie and I tag team the driving, If all going well getting home about 10-11pm that night.

So having used 150 litres of fuel to drive in and out, it normally is a 20 hour day, having spent probably close to $4000 just on food and grocery items, hopefully without hitting any kangaroos, there’s normally several victims, windows haven’t smashed from rocks and trailer bearings have hung together, tyres have stayed up. If all goes to plan it’s a good day, if a long one.

So next time your wandering through an outback town and and leisurely strolling around a supermarket, if you should see a woman struggling with several  trollies, that are ridiculously full, its not that she may have a footy team of strapping hungry teenage sons shes just trying to fit 3 months shopping into 1 hours speed shop. You’ll look at her with sympathy but she’ll only need to say two words “station shopping”  Just give her a smile and plenty of space,  because she’s on a mission and no time for delays.

Oh, but what ever you do, beat her to the checkout because you know those 10 counters they built, there will only have 2 or 3 working at anytime.

Milking my goats

I have a handful of goats at home, a couple which I milk each day. My family have eczema and we find for some reason the goats milk really assists with helping skin complaints.
Thought I’d posts before and after shot of milking my favorite girl, Rapsody.

I only milk once a day by hand, it only takes a about 5 minutes, and I get  2 litres each morning. If I milked more often I’d get more but 2 litres is sufficent for my families use.Goats milk is high in vitamin A, butterfat and protein. it is has smaller fat globules than cows milk, Sometimes even those allergic to cows milk are able to drink goats milk.
This nanny ( mature female goat) is about 4 years old now, she is a pure bred British Alpine. My personal view is no animal exists with the attitude of a goat, they are just the loveliest animals.

Land Transport Standards

A number of tweets have been coming across my feed lately concerning the welfare of animals during transport and the regulations in Australia that govern those welfare rulings. To me these are reading like we don’t have regulations in place or they simply aren’t good enough! This isn’t true as Australia has the national ‘Land Transport Standards’ introduced 1st January 2013, a replacement and national streamline of 20 previous codes of practice.

Another document was supplied to me called the ‘Scientific Opinion Concerning the Welfare of Animals during Transport’ European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), requested by the European Commission, dated 19th Jan 2011.

As I produce cattle in the Northern Territory I will comment on cattle.

Having only read the abstract and summary the ESPA seemed like a practical analysis based on good animal welfare standards, until I hit this completely stupid statement.

“In the case of sheep, acceleration, braking, stopping, cornering, gear changing and uneven road surfaces should be avoided….”

To me this reads animals are loaded but can’t move, if the truck does move, then it’s expected to travel on an unerringly straight uninhabited road that’s perfectly smooth. I’ve never travelled overseas but I assume their roads have corners, intersections, and other traffic too.

As for the rest of the article I thought in general it was relatively sound animal husbandry.

Australia has a standard in place that has been recently upgraded.

The Australian National Land Transport Standards (LTS), a set of nationally agreed standards and guidelines to ensure appropriate welfare for livestock during the transport process. The standards are legislated and regulated by law.

Click to access Land-transport-of-livestock-Standards-and-Guidelines-Version-1.-1-21-September-2012.pdf

It is important to appreciate the effort and diversity people who participated in the upgrading of the LTS. A writing group was organised in 2008 from government, industry and animal welfare groups involving 1 RSPCA, 2 animal advocate members. These people met and using the 20 prior codes of practice for many sorts of livestock updated and formulated the LTS. This same working group are involved with the development of National Animal Welfare laws for livestock still being finalised. Other working groups will consider wildlife, animals in sport, animals on display, companion and aquatic.

Much of the LTS is relative common sense and practical organisational skills. So I thought I’d write about the process of what we do when ‘Trucking’.

It needs to be remembered a short trip for our cattle is Darwin, 700km by road.

We expect our truck driver to deliver all animals we load in as healthy a condition except for fluid loss as they were loaded. This is why we specifically ask for one driver to drive our cattle and have used that one and only driver for the last 18 months.

We don’t load any cattle that are lame, have weepy sores, injured in any way. We don’t load any animals if they are poor condition, not that they would be sellable anyway but just saying. We also don’t load any cattle that for some reason have succumbed to a sickness while recently in the yard. We don’t load cattle if we have observed them not eating or drinking and generally withdrawing from food and water.

It takes approximately 10-12 hours for our truckie to travel to yards just south of Darwin. Normal process of handling is we sort the animals and draft what will be sent a number of days before travel. The whole time in the yards they are given electrolytes in water and fed every day. Animals are dipped for ticks generally on draft day when it is also checked they have the necessary NLIS tags. Day before travel is a rest day and they aren’t moved around the yard at all except to feed and water.

From the outset we stipulate our cattle are to travel the longer route. The longer way is a better maintained road, though an extra 150km, at $1.65(excluding GST)+2.5% insurance/deck/km this costs money but we feel the cattle travel better and thus the expense is validated not only in the hip pocket but by healthier animals to the buyer.

To those sceptics that say as a producer we are only interested in the money may I remind them why they need to have a job. Do they want to make a better life for themselves, their family or be totally reliant on the continually depleting resources of a cash strapped government? We make money by producing good quality animals for others to eat. The importance of how healthy those animals arrive at their destination and handle is imperative to encourage a buyer to return and purchase more of our cattle in the future.

Loading of cattle onto trucks is always early in the morning, as its generally in the dry season its usually cool. Cattle numbers per pen in the trucks is determined by the type and size of animal and we rely partly on the experience and knowledge of our truckie to tell us what is comfortable for the animals. Numbers for a pen of Indonesian steers (less than350kg) will be larger than a pen of Philippine Steers (weighing over 450kg) each. Knowing what’s too loose and what’s too tight is a skill. Too loose the animal actually has nothing to brace against and can get thrown around by the movement of the crates. Too tight and individuals will get pushed and squashed around by another’s movement and fall, then cause others to fall by undermining their neighbours feet. Cattle take a while to ‘settle’ they will shove and push to find ‘their’ space, even while the trucks are stationary they fidget and wiggle. Often the cattle will form a pattern of head/toe formation and generally stand side on in the crate with the face and butt to the sides as the animals ride movement better on an angle or side on stance rather than facing straight forward.

Our truckie will travel at less than 60km/hr for the first 3 hours, That’s just to get to the bitumen, he has to contend with a very rough rocky in parts,all dirt road, 7 gates to open and close, road trains need a kilometre to stop when traveling at pace and are over 50m long, animals on the road, corners and an extremely steep jump up. He actually allows the animals a rest by stopping for half an hour at the turn off onto the bitumen. He’ll walk the whole truck around and top plank to check every single animal. If any are sitting or worse fallen and hasn’t got up he’ll get them up. He may have to use a jigger to reach into the truck but sitting animals tend to make others fall so it’s a big no no to let a steer sit.

Large bovine should not be allowed to sit on trucks. Calves will often sit under their mums but in general you segregate all animals to their equal sizes. Never putting large bulls unless polls with steers, they are simply too aggressive and beat the crap out of them. Horned bulls if trucked you try to keep with other horned bulls but we don’t sell many horned animals anymore with any length of horn because the specifications for the boats simply don’t want them. We sell an animal that has any horn it’s an automatic deduction of 20c per kg, if we send one and don’t declare that animal its 30c or the possibility it will be sent home at our expense .

Truckie’s need breaks too, he’ll will have a sandwich, the normal bacon and egg we provide, a cup of tea, check his tyres and any other checks he needs to do.

The Stuart Highway is generally 2 lane bitumen, it’s a fair road for a car, but by highway standards for a truck it’s pathetic! The road during the dry is extremely busy with the grey nomads and slow caravans traveling in convoy, many wide loads, and other road trains carrying mining supplies, fuel, groceries and animals, plus normal car traffic including the army. A survey conducted in 2007 counted 9000 vehicles passing through Katherine each day with heavy vehicles making up 15% of them. The Royal Automobile Association rated the section of Stuart Highway in South Australia in May 2007 as so poor is was graded as 5 out of 10 a grading unchanged from 2 years previously.

So our truck driver enters this fray. He and his now 100 plus tonne, with 70 tyres on the road is allowed to travel at 100km/hr but will need to abide by local laws when passing through a number of small townships before getting to Katherine. Before Katherine is the dreaded Scalies (road transport inspectors). They always seem to be open in Katherine and with only one road south they tend to pull over every single vehicle over 4.5t. Our truckie has to pull in there, pass the requirements of weight, and general vehicle checked for registration and licences. This has nothing to do with animals and is a government requirement.

Truckie pulls onto highway again and in a few kilometres is at Katherine, a small town where he’ll need to fuel up and weigh again. This time to weigh our cattle. This is done on the truck by using a method of ‘tare off’ the truckie will have weighed fuelled up before coming out home so a figure can be realised for the weight of the cattle and this is what we are paid on. By rights change of legal ownership of these cattle has just occurred. Usually truckie gives us a call and lets us know how he’s travelling at this point.

The animals will be checked again and the whole process of climbing on and over the truck carried out again, by now it is generally about late morning/midday. This rest stop may be an hour. The cattle have been on the truck now about 5 hours.

Truckie will continue on the same Stuart Highway to Darwin. This generally takes another 4-5 hours depending on traffic, weather, road maintenance. Generally the animals are checked every 3-4 hours so our truckie tends to pull up somewhere and check the animals are travelling OK.

Time can be extended if tyres need to be changed due to blow outs or unforseen delays occur. Often wide-load escorts that are only permitted during the day, accidents and road works cause special circumstances and extension of time in transit to occur. UHF Channel 40 is working overtime, the truckies channel, they will be communicating up and down the highway, talking about where the delays are, truck stuff and all the rest. In some ways this can help the cattle as the cattle truck driver may even pull over to truck stops to allow convoys or such pass that he’s heard about coming towards him. We’ve had trucks delayed on the road because people have collided into them and as a procedure of the accident investigation the truckie has had to wait to speak to police before proceeding.

So continuing up to Darwin, hopefully with no delays, usually late afternoon the truckie arrives at the depot yard. Unloaded the animals are put straight onto water and feed by the buyer this will continue up to the point when cattle are ready to be transported again.

Cattle in their natural environment, the paddock, tend to graze for about 4 hours, come into drink, chew their cud, where they regurgitate the food and digest more (ruminants) rest/sleep a number of hours then graze again for a number of hours. On the truck they haven’t been able to sleep and its tiring standing all that time on a moving floor so the 24 hours in the exporters yard while they may eat a small amount and drink, but they will mainly just sleep.

While we feed hay on the property the exporters will introduce the cattle to the feed they will eat while on the ship. A form of stockfeed pellets. All animals take a while to adjust to new feedstuffs and it will be this week that the animals will do that.

In these yards the animals will be prepped for loading onto the boats, they will go through a process of several vet checks and induction requirements to meet the Standards required under the ‘Australian Standards for the Export of livestock’.

When boats are in port and the buyers are certain that the boats are ready for livestock they will load the cattle onto trucks and in generally a couple of hours have pulled up on the wharf and directly loaded the cattle onto the ships through special ramps that direct connect truck to ship.

I’ve never been on the livestock ships so I need to rely on people who I trust in the industry for the following information. Considering I have heard these same views from many numbers of trusted people I know well, I am convinced they are true.

The understanding and improvement in the chemical analysis of electrolytes in water solution supplements have advanced greatly in the last 2 years. Specifically with a number of products developed by a company call Beachport. We use these products for our general herd and an electrolyte replacement that is designed for animals, to enable replacement of salts and minerals required. Specifically we use one when weaning calves and removing them from their mothers as they are in a new environment and feel stressed. So the electrolytes help to calm them and we find they have a tendency to go on feed and water better using the product rather than not using it. The way this works is that the natural Amino acids (Fulvic acid component) in Beachport assists the rumen to improve moisture absorption and retention. A specific blend of supplement with chelated trace elements in the mix suppresses stress causing hormones which results in calmer cattle .

In a similar fashion the exporters will use electrolytes if they feel the animals need it to assist with replacement of essential minerals the animals may require. There are all sorts of blends available not unlike a person buying multi vitamins from a chemist and using as required.

Automated feed and watering systems are on the ships with air ventilation strictly monitored and controlled. The ship on-board ventilation actually beats commercial passenger aircraft and cruise liners by three times industry standards.

While I applaud the discussion of innovative ideas for animal welfare it needs to be recognised that that not all studies irrespective of scientific basis meet other requirements of practicality and real life situations. While it could be argued we have shorter trips for cattle on the assumption it will be less tiresome for the animal in a practical sense any form of handling of animals is tiring. Increasing loading and unloading will actually add to stress and weariness of the animal. Mustering, handling in the yards walking back to paddocks all induce some exertion of physical activity by an animal, in regards to stress well that’s personal opinion. Low stress animal handling is certainly attainable and commonly practiced, the calmness of the way animals are handled on the ground during their life will often dictate how well they travel.

The LTS is a definite improvement on the codes of practices it replaces and is an enforceable Australian legislated nationally recognised standard which must be adhered to so as to meet the livestock management practice requirements in Australia. It has been developed with industry and those opposed to the industry involvement while it still recognises the animal welfare science and stockmanship behind those practices.

Cattle Work. (Is never done)

Due to the heat and weather conditions cattle are handled mainly during the dry, handling means mustering (gathering in), walking the caught animals to stock yards where they are sorted.Sorting the cattle is called drafting, the cattle are put through a series of yards to a pen which enables them to walk in a single file through a laneway called a race, in this race I have a series of gates I can open and close. Depending on the type of animal coming up the race depends into which pen they are destined.

Bush cattle are the cattle we keep, they will return to their original paddocks. These tend to be the breeder cattle, cows, bulls and other branded animals that are intended to be used for breeding. With them will be returned small calves who are too small to wean.

Weaners are the unbranded