David van Straalen
Dairy Farmer
How’d you get into farming, and why Ballance?
“I was brought up on a farm and always liked the animal side of it. My parents had a small dairy unit and diversified into horticulture and later the hospitality industry, but I stuck with the cows."
"I’ve been with Ballance for 30+ years, they had a good reputation, a good history, and when I was farming near Ōtorohanga, there was a store nearby, so there was a convenience factor."
How do you and Dot (David’s Nutrient Specialist) put your plan together?
“Every spring we go over the soil tests taken bi-anually, look at what we’ve produced, what inputs have gone in, and work out what we’ll need. At present, the farm is split into four areas – flat, rolling, steep, and effluent – so we do different fert for each. We’ve done full paddock soil sampling before, just to see how much variation there is.”
“We also talk about what autumn fert we’ll use, but it depends on how the season plays out. Like last year was a drought, which meant we had put more supplements into the system, so adjusted the plan to cut back the autumn fert.”
What difference does this planning make to your farm?
“You save money as you’re not just putting a blanket of fertiliser over the whole farm. For example, effluent paddocks already have plenty of nutrients, so they don’t need much. Splitting the farm into different areas and planning for each area means we’re not wasting anything.”
“Some of our application needs to be done by helicopter using a high analyst fert which means less loads, which saves on cost too.”
