‘Farm in Focus’ catches up with Kaniva farmer, Tyson Vivian.
- By: "Farm Tender" News
- US & World News
- May 27, 2018
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This edition of ‘Farm in Focus’ catches up with Kaniva farmer, Tyson Vivian.
Tell us a bit about the structure of the farm
I farm with my wife Carin, my parents, Peter and Sharon, and my brother and his wife, Shane and Sammie. We’ve both got three kids. You could say Dad’s semi-retired, but he’s not really. He gets away a lot now – at this time of year he may be gone for three months, but he still has strong oversight of the farm. We also have two full time employees and we’re lucky, because these guys have been with us for ages and they’re really good. We have got trucks as well, which is a separate business that Mum and Dad started over 30 years ago for diversification. We mainly use them to cart our own grain and do commercial work as well.
And the farm itself?
We farm about 7,000ha. Mostly around Kaniva but we also have a block out at Telopea Downs that we run sheep on. We grow wheat, barley, canola, vetch, beans, lentils, durum and oaten hay plus rye and lucerne for sheep feed. Shane and I manage the farm together, I look after the cropping side of things and he looks after the sheep side.
How is the season looking so far?
We had high stubble loads at sowing which were challenging. We got through alright, we were really glad that we didn’t have to burn much at all. It was far more time consuming than normal, especially with it being a bit wet. The crops went in really well with good moisture and we’ve had about 80mm for July. It’s looking really good, we can’t complain at all at the moment. We’re probably going to have to put up more nitrogen than normal because of last year’s crops. Vetch and bean stubbles aren’t too bad from a nitrogen fixation perspective, but may need some topping up. Recent timely showers have been great for spreading urea. There’s a few aphids around in anything not treated with Gaucho and it’s not too bad for disease so far. Things are going pretty smoothly – I hope it stays that way!
And the rest of the season?
I’m quietly confident, but also cautious. Weather wise, even looking at predications of an average to just below rainfall for spring, I think we’d finish off pretty well. We’ve really got good subsoil moisture.
What ag tech have you implemented on farm and how is it going?
We’re doing variable rate especially with gypsum and fertiliser. We’re also just starting to trial seed. We’ve seen big savings with the gypsum. There’s no point putting gypsum out on country that doesn’t need it, so we back it right off there. Urea management is the same. Our different soil types, red and black, obviously need to be managed very differently. We’ve got most paddocks mapped by soil type and we’re in the process of working through our yield mapping.
We rely heavily on our agronomist for assistance interpreting precision ag data – it’s all good to have the information, but you’ve got to know how to interpret it. I can look at something and then go “is that right?” you could actually make it worse if you don’t interpret it correctly. There’s too much for the standard farmer to know, so you really need solid advice, unless you’re really into it. You’ve got to manage yourself, because there’s just too much for one person to be across.
I’m keen to see more gross margin mapping done where yield is overlaid against price and the cost that you’d put on per hectare. I’ve seen some and they’re really interesting. Then you can overlay on multiple years and see areas that are underperforming, although again, what you do with that area raises more questions than answers – do you remove it completely from production and get nothing off it? There’s only so much you can do every year. I guess it comes back to my main point – you need to have good advice.
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