14 Apr 08 - Deer lure an adventurous Kiwi home

14th April 2008 - Country-Wide Southern | Sam Davidson. 

Eyre Creek Station manager Nick Davison is no stranger to challenges.

14th April 2008 - Country-Wide Southern | Sam Davidson.

Eyre Creek Station manager Nick Davison is no stranger to challenges.

Brought up on a sheep and beef farm in South Canterbury, he has had a varied and interesting background in agriculture.

In his early twenties he lived in Western Australia's sub-tropical Kimberley region for more than five years, designing, building and managing a live export feedlot depot for cattle bound to southeast Asia and the Middle East.

He has also spent time as a stockman on live export ships and as a ringer on a million-acre station in the remote West Australian outback.

But it was deer which attracted Nick to the Landcorp Farming-owned Eyre Creek in 2006.

He had limited experience with deer, spending the majority of his farming background in sheep and beef. But he found the challenge of working with the animals exciting and it is a decision that has not disappointed.

Eyre Creek runs 3500 hinds, including 500 replacement yearlings, on 1700ha of mainly medium to steep hill country.

Deer were introduced about seven years ago as part of Landcorp's diversification strategy into deer and dairy. The animals thrive on the rocky, matagouri-laden hills where they are set-stocked for fawning. Deer fencing covers the majority of the property, on about 1460ha.

The station also runs 400 Angus cows for pasture management and 1500 ewes, mainly for ragwort control.

And although Eyre Creek is one of Landcorp's smaller properties, the station still presents plenty of challenges.

This year the farm has experienced its fair share of the country's wide-spread drought and Nick, along with Landcorp, has implemented emergency strategies to cope with the hardened conditions.

With already expensive supplement feed costs skyrocketing, it has been increasingly important to plan for the upcoming winter period.

The station has been supplementing grain to its deer herd since January and has contracted its cattle to the neighbouring farm for grazing.

The financial cost of supplementing feed for such a long period is high and wasn't budgeted for. But the decision has meant the station has not had to dip into its winter silage reserves.

Eyre Creek has three self-feeding pads which Nick has implemented over the past 18 months. Each will feed 500 hinds over the winter.

The move was necessary to combat the time-consuming and dangerous job of feeding out on hill blocks in winter conditions.

With the new feedpads, Nick estimates tractor hours will be cut by five to six hours a day.

He hopes to introduce a further two pads by next summer, self-feeding a total of 2500 hinds the following winter.

He says the feedpads cut wastage by up to half, creating significant financial gains for the farm and also reducing the risk to staff.

I believe it is the way forward for Eyre Creek in terms of efficiency and safety.

The farm has been part of the Landcorp stable since 1987 when it was managed under the former Department of Lands and Survey and covered about 20,000ha.

Further parcels of land have been released over the years, including land returned to the Crown under the tenure review process and now managed by the Department of Conservation as the Eyre Mountains Conservation Park.

Today, there is a public easement running through the station which provides access to hunting, mountain biking, horse riding, four-wheel driving and tramping opportunities in the adjoining conservation park.

Eyre Creek runs predominantly Red deer with Wapiti stags used as terminal sires over a small cross-section of the herd.

The 97 stags on the property are farmed only as sires but still produce good quality velvet, returning the farm a healthy by-product. The average price of velvet reached more than $100/kg this year.

Nick has also brought

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