Minimising nitrate loss to water from over winter forage crops at Mangakino 2009

The field work reported here was funded by DairyNZ, Balance Agri Nutrients and the Lake Taupo Protection Trust (LTPT) and conducted on the property of Wairarapa Moana Incorporated (WMI) at Mangakino.  It was carried out in the context of a larger systems project whose objective is to investigate and develop winter management systems that minimise nitrate leaching from dairy farming, especially over winter.   This is a key period of sensitivity and could potentially impact on efforts to intensify (dairying in particular) and ‘freedom to operate’.

The first two years of field work has been completed.  The aim of this work was to field test the risk of nitrate leaching from the management of over-winter forage fed to dairy cows and to start to develop management strategies to minimise this risk.  Although the use of over-winter forage (as opposed to pasture) might be useful management tool for benefiting production, little is known about the associated environmental risks, and importantly how these might be managed.  Read more ….