Happy Birthday to Me!!

Well since this Wordless Wednesday happens to be my birthday, I thought I'd share a few pictures from my birthday celebration tonight.  I have officially survived 21and this is the last birthday I'll celebrate as a college student!

 

New Zealand Pt. 6: Cattle & Deer & Food, Oh My!

Friday, November 21, 2014

On Friday, we took off for the hills to see Mike and Sharon Barton.  Mike and Sharon are former educators from Auckland, who left the city for a simpler life in Taupo.  They chose their farm because of Mike’s love of hunting and fishing and the amazing views of Lake Taupo. This was definitely one of the most beautiful farms that I had ever seen.  However, they bought their farm in the middle of the Nitrogen controversy in 2004.  

            The urine of livestock contains high levels of nitrogen, which causes hot spots, or concentrated levels of nitrogen in one small area, when they urinate.  In the Taupo area, they have pumice soils that are free draining, which means that within the next 80 years the nitrogen from an animal that urinates today will eventually leach through the soil into the lake.  Lake Taupo is the biggest lake in the Southern Hemisphere and the fourth cleanest lake in the world, so it is very nitrogen sensitive.  High levels of nitrogen and phosphorus cause algae growth which clouds up the lake.  

            Therefore to prevent a problem, in 2005, the Waikato Regional Council initiated constraints on the amount of nitrogen that can be applied to the ground within the catchment.  A catchment is the entire area of land that eventually drains into the lake, known as a watershed here in Iowa.  The Lake Taupo catchment is about 80% native vegetation with only about 20% of it used for agricultural purposes.   

           One of the solutions was to cap the stocking levels for livestock farmers, which means to put a limit on the number of livestock they can own.  Each farmer is not allowed to own more animals than what they owned when the cap was put in place.  This means that it is impossible for livestock farmers to ever grow or expand, so the Barton’s figured out a way to add value to their beef, by branding their product.  

            They created Taupo Beef, which they market to higher-end restaurants in the Taupo area, as grass-fed, antibiotic free meat.  This allows them to charge a premium for their beef (about $20/kg for prime cuts) and has allowed them to make more money within the same stocking rate.  They also switched to using market heifers that can reach market weight in about 18-22 months, much quicker than the 24 months it takes a grassfed steer to make weight.  They also market their cattle at about 800 pounds, so they can finish them quicker, and give their clients, the gourmet chefs, the smaller cuts that they prefer.

             Mike commented that in Taupo, they were not really in farming to feed the starving million, which I thought was interesting.  They can’t really compete with larger markets, mainly because they will never produce much more beef than they are producing now.  They have to be able to make more money with the resources they currently have.  

The Bartons' farm is located in the hills just above Lake Taupo

             There were also comments made about antibiotics in U.S. agriculture and grass-fed beef versus conventionally raised, that once again made me wonder where these perceptions originated.  I do not necessarily have a problem with someone’s preferences as far as organic or grass-fed, because the way I see it, we all have essentially the same goal, we just have different methods of reaching it. What I have an issue with is the misinformation and the fear mongering that is happening.  The Barton’s believed that grass-fed beef tastes better than grain fed, probably because they are used to it and it is what available to them.  I prefer grain fed, but that is what I was raised on and what is currently in my freezer.  I’m not really sure if one way is healthier than the other, since currently there are no conclusive studies on the issue. It is all a matter of opinion really, and using your resources in the best possible way. 

            Next, we stopped at the Maori-owned Rangiatea Station where they raise deer, milk sheep and harvest their forests on about 1600 hectares, with 1700 more hectares in native brush for conservation purposes.  They are completely family owned with over 900 shareholders that span about 3-4 generations of the family.  They are also in the Taupo catchment so they have to adhere to the capped stocking rates.  Maori actually happen to own about 75% of the Lake Taupo catchment.  

Deer happen to take up less stocking units than beef cattle, however they are also flighty and still not very domesticated so they can be more difficult to wrangle.  They take many safety precautions when handling the deer, because of their tendency to spook easily.  The way their barn is set up, to the methods that they described, it is obvious that every situation has been thought of and prepared for.  Also, because of they are still being domesticated, they selectively breed mostly based on temperament and growth. Most of their venison products, about 50%, are shipped to Europe around Christmas, when venison consumption is on the rise.  

            A trust council made up of 6 members of the family is responsible for most of the decisions made about the land.  They usually have a 3 year rotation, but if the family elders feel as if they are effective at their job, they may be asked to stay on longer.  The way things were set up is very interesting.  Obviously, here in Iowa we have family-owned farms, but I don’t know of any that have 900 family members.  It sounds very complicated to me and I’m not entirely sure how they keep everything straight, especially with how much involvement the government has, since they were legally required to develop this side of the lake, after the government returned the land to their family.  Maoris have a different view of the land, than the average Kiwi, because Kiwis see the land as a stepping stone.  They do not get very attached and will sell if a they have a chance at a better opportunity.  The Maori will never sell the land they own.  I think it stems from their desire to conquer. They want to feel as though they belong somewhere, and the land will always provide an income for their family.
          I am a very opinionated person.  I like to think I have an open mind, but at the same time I'm pretty stubborn so it's usually pretty hard to change my mind.  So I took off for New Zealand, expecting to learn all about their methods, but I went with the mindset that my way was still the best way.  An amazing thing happened though.  I realized that my way might be the best way for my family, but it would not work for New Zealand's farmers, just like raising our cattle entirely on grass would never work for my family.  No one was right, no one was wrong.  Everybody was just doing the best they could for their livestock, and really, what more could you ask from a farmer? 
    

New Zealand Pt. 5: Off to Lake Taupo We Go!

After an very long, extended holiday break, here's part 5!

Thursday, November 20th, 2014

This was the day we left the Waikato for the Bay of Plenty, as we headed for Te Puke, the kiwi fruit capital of New Zealand.  This entailed traveling through: Tamahere, Cambridge, Karapiro, Te Poi, the Kaimai Mountains (which separates the Waikato region from the Bay of Plenty region), Tauranga, and Papmoa.  

Te Puke is the best place in the world to grow kiwifruit, mostly because of its climate.  It  is cold enough in the winter to get rid of most of the pests during their winter.  However, it rarely frosts over and because of the hills, most of the  super cold air funnels into the gullys between orchards that are full of the natural brush.  Fun Fact: Kiwifruit vines are actually considered an invasive species in the Bay of Plenty region, because birds eat the seeds from the bad fruit.  This causes the seeds to be spread where it eventually takes over the native vegetation.

Tauranga was Wayne, our bus driver's hometown.  It is currently home to New Zealand's biggest and busiest port, Mt. Maunganui Port, named for the mountain that sits at the entrance of the port.  In the almost 2 hour drive to Te Puke, I was once again reminded about the Kiwis' love for roundabouts.  You  could not travel more than 5 miles without going through a roundabout.  

Once we were in Te Puke, we headed for Trevalyn's Pack and Cool, where we met Daniel Brinie, Trevalyn's avocado manager.  We arrived just in time to see them pack avocados. Trevalyn's has been around Te Puke for about 35 years.  Back in the beginning most orchards had their own packing houses on site, but as the years progressed packing houses moved to central locations so they could serve several different locations.  Trevalyn's, itself, has its own orchards.
                                    

In New Zealand, all kiwifruit producers are required to supply one marketer, called Zespri.  This means that all of the kiwi fruit produced in New Zealand is shipped to packing houses where it is packed, then Zespri is responsible for shipping it around the country and overseas.  Next time you buy kiwifruit at your local grocery store, check out the little sticker.  If it says Zespri, then it was grown in New Zealand!  As a farmkid, I think it's pretty cool to know where your food was produced.

One of the coolest things we saw at Trevalyn's was the pollen mill.  For one reason or another, kiwifruit does not pollinate as efficiently as some producers would prefer.  Some kiwifruit growers rent beehives to  be placed in their orchards while others spray pollen on their female vines. Trevalyn's picks male flowers just before they open and dries the pollen.  It is then mixed into a solution which is sprayed directly onto the female flowers when they open.  This has been shown to increase the fruit size and their seed number.  It is a very profitable venture for Trevalyn's and can cost up to $2000 per kilogram.
                                 
                          

From Trevalyn's we headed to Kiwi360, a kiwifruit orchard that also serves as a tourist attraction, giving tours of their orchards and educating foreigners on New Zealand's kiwifruit industry.  

New Zealand's average kiwifruit orchard is 4-10 hectares.  Last May, Kiwi360 harvested around 100 million trays producing 350,000 tonnes of kiwi, which roughly translates to about $1.5 billion (about 22% of New Zealand's GDP).  About 75% of the national harvest is of the Hayward Green Flesh variety while about 25% is the fairly new gold flesh variety.  However, a bacteria called Pseudomonas syringae (PSA) was discovered in kiwifruit orchards in Bay of Plenty in November of 2010.  The gold variety happened to be very susceptible to the bacteria, causing most of the vines to be wiped out.  They have just now started to recover and have begun their breeding programs over again.

                                       
                                       

I could write a whole blog post solely about the origins of New Zealand's kiwifruit industry so I should probably keep moving.  

We ate our lunch on Maketu Beach where we made some new friends and took a lot of pictures.
                                                 

We would be spending the next few nights Taupo at the Taupo Urban Retreat (which happened to have its own bar).  Fun Fact: Taupo is the coldest city in New Zealand and is usually the only area that sees snow in the winter.  

We were able to eat our supper at Victoria's Cafe Kitchen Bar where we were served burgers made with beef from LakeTaupo Beef, which is owned by Mike and Sharon Barton.  The Barton's farm would be our first stop the next day.

We spent our night bonding with the other foreigners at our hostel and yes, that bonding included beer.  Alcohol, in my limited experience seems to break the international language barrier.  

Megan and I ended up in a room with 2 other roommates who were not a part of our group.  The best part of my night had to be when I was headed back to the room with an armful of laundry and ended up behind a tall, blonde guy who turnedout to be from the Netherlands on the stairs.  It was just my  luck, that he happened to be going the same direction I was heading so I got to be the creepy girl that seemed to be following him to his room at 2 in the morning, and wouldn't you know he ends up being one of my roommates.  He ended up checking out the next day, hopefully it wasn't because of the weird  girl who stalked him through the hostel (pretty sure that's a horror movie).

Alright, that's it for this one.  If you aren't sick of me yet, stay tuned for Part 6!