Adelaide Hills Farmcast: March Edition Adelaide Hills & Fleurieu Farmcast

In the Adelaide Hills Farmcast March Edition, Belle Baker looks at farming jobs Adelaide Hills lifestyle farmers should be planning for during March and April. We’ll cover everything from yard maintenance before the winter rain sets in, lamb vaccinations, and even Bott Eggs to keep your horses in top condition.

We recorded this episode in the home of Catherine McLeod, who has a unique way of naming her paddocks.

And Patrick (Pods) O’Driscoll has a quick chat with Stud Stock auctioneer from Nutrien Ag, Gordon Wood, how to choose a bull to cover your cows or heifers

We hope you find this show helpful and welcome your comments below or email Belle or Pods at hello@adelaidehillsfarmservices.com.au.

You can play the episode, below, or search for Adelaide Hills Farmcast in your favourite podcast app, on Spotify, Apple Music, etc.

Also remember that each episode has chapter markers, so when you’re playing, you can skip to the next section easily.

00:30 Adelaide Hills Farmcast March Edition

Introduction

01:18 Adelaide Hills Farm Almanac / Farm Calendar

We have spent many years living and working on farms and together we have distilled some best practices, farm management schedules, and some handy tricks. We’ve captured these ideas into our own Adelaide Hills Farming Almanac, so that the experience of broad acre farming around South Australia can be adapted to the specific needs of the Adelaide Hills. And we’ve also modified our entries with the Lifestyle Farmer in mind.

Here are the notes about topics and tasks worth concentrating on over the next couple of months, which we’ve grouped together in different sections.

Cattle

With winter rains just a few months away, this early part of autumn is the perfect time to deal with cattleyard maintenance and truck access before things get muddy or overgrown.

This can be as simple as


Checking your yards for protruding nails and rusting rails. The last thing you want is ripping skin and damaging carcases, potentially not allowing the stock to be transported to either market or abattoir. The term we use for this is ‘Dark Cutter’. If you’d like to look further into this the NSW Department of Primary Industries has some good information here.
Give gate latches a clean-up, remove any built-up debris so that you get a good closure and give them some love with a spray of oil or lubricant like WD-40
Spray weeds and whipper snipper around areas of the yards – particularly the areas that aren’t used frequently. – helps with drainage during the wet winter months.
Truck access – Trucks must be able to pull into your cattle yards and be completely off the road. Good time to put rubble in pot holes and build up or repair truck turning circles

Pods and Catherine take one final look at the cattleyards before they get removed to make way for the new yards

SafeWork SA has a no-nonsense guide to livestock loading and transport safety – it’s well worth a quick read.

Sheep


Pre lambing vaccination for April / May Drop
Glanvac® 6 provides sheep and goats with protection against Cheesy Gland (CLA) and the five main clostridial diseases; black disease, black leg, malignant oedema, pulpy kidney, and tetanus. Vaccines can be purchased at rural resellers / retailers in the Adelaide Hills. A handy list is provided at the end of the show notes.
Ideally 4 -6 weeks prior to Lambing
Over handling heavy in Lamb Ewes increases the risk of stress to the animal and potentially causing a toxemia highly likely resulting in death.
It’s worthwhile adding calcium and magnesium supplements for the ewes before they start lactating – suggest putting these out once you return them to their paddock after their vaccination.
Working out gestation period – when your ewes are going to lamb: cousinsms.com.au have a great app on their website.

Shedding Sheep


Dorpers, Wiltipoll and Australian White Sheep are the most common that we see in the Adelaide Hills
Although they are all