• Coronavirus (COVID-19)
• Are your livestock fit to load?
• Farm Safety Creative Competition
• Sheep Notes - autumn edition
• 'It's never you, until it is' - WorkSafe campaign
• Hive of activity of Victorian ports to protect our bees
• Recording of Stubble, Straw and Carbon - Panels, pellets and alternative uses
• Fox and wild dog bounty details
• Finding pets a loving home
• In case you missed it - top stories from recently
• What's on

Keep up to date with all the latest restrictions and requirements at coronavirus.vic.gov.au.

Dr Jeff Cave, District Veterinary Officer

Any person in charge of an animal, which could include producers, farm workers, transporters and livestock agents, must not allow any animal to be loaded onto transport that is not fit for the journey ahead.

Unfortunately, we occasionally see animal welfare issues associated with transporting livestock.

In each case this has been partly due to the owner not having a good understanding of what was fit to load and what was not.

An animal is not fit to load if it is:

• not able to walk normally or bear weight on all its legs - this may be due to a recent or old fracture, an injury, a deformity, or an infection
• not strong enough to make the journey
• suffering from severe distress or injury
• in a condition that could cause it increased pain or distress during transport
• blind in both eyes
• in late pregnancy.

If you discover an animal is unfit to load you can either:

• treat the animal and transport it when it has recovered and is fit to load - naturally this is not an option in cases the animal is not readily treatable
• humanely destroy the animal - a knackery service is available in many areas to help with this option
• consult a veterinarian and only transport under veterinary advice.

If in doubt about an animal’s suitability for transport you should contact your private veterinarian or Agriculture Victoria.

For more information go to https://go.vic.gov.au/dXkGyE,

There is also a guideline “Is the animal fit to load?” produced by Meat & Livestock Australia.

Remember, the person in charge of the animal is responsible for its welfare. Community values and expectations don’t accept anything less.

Think Farm Safe, Be Farm Safe. 

Support the primary schoolers in your life to create something amazing for the KidSafe Victoria creative competition. 

The competition is part of Agriculture Victoria’s Smarter, Safer Farms commitment to improve safety and skills outcomes for Victorian farmers and their families.

Enter on the KidSafe Victoria website.

Sheep Notes informs sheep producers about general sheep health and welfare, production, market protection and biosecurity issues.

It also provides details about specific department and industry programs to guide improvement in the productivity, profitability and sustainability of sheep enterprises.

Subscribe to the Sheep Notes newsletter on the Agriculture Victoria website.

In this issue:

• Staggers
• LiveFeed - seasonal webinar
• Underperforming animals in a paddock full of feed
• Assess feed and animal requirements
• Online learning - stock containment; irrigation, soil
• Digital Tips
• Resistance to insecticides in blowflies
• Farmer tips on autumn saving
• High performance maidens, grazing weeds
• Livestock Farm Monitor Project results
• Free benchmarking and profit assessment
• NEXUS
• Did you know?
• Do you mules your lambs?

Accidents happen on farms every day, but they don’t have to.

You can prevent accidents, you can prevent deaths.

Visit the WorkSafe Victoria website to find safety support for your farm.

Caption - Agriculture Victoria biosecurity officer Nikki Jones

Artificially intelligent beehives are being installed at Victoria’s ports to bolster protection from exotic pests and diseases, in an initiative backed by the Victorian Government. 

Minister for Agriculture Mary-Anne Thomas was at the Port of Melbourne recently to launch new Agriculture Victoria agreements with Bega Cheese and HiveKeepers, which will trial technology for rapid detection of pests at Victoria’s ports. 

Bega Cheese’s Purple Hive project is being installed alongside sentinel hives managed and monitored by Agriculture Victoria.

Purple Hive is a solar-powered device that detects bee pest Varroa destructor, providing alerts in real-time using artificial intelligence and 360-degree camera technology.

Purple Hive has been tested in New Zealand where the mite is established, to prepare for installation at the Port of Melbourne. 

HiveKeepers will install a smart hive at the Port of Hastings, which operates by identifying pests and recognising diseases through bee health and behaviour, and sending alerts to a remote computer or mobile device.

The National Bee Pest Surveillance Program has hives located at the ports of Melbourne, Geelong, Hastings and Portland that are monitored for exotic pests and diseases like Varroa mite every six weeks.

These ports are identified as a high-risk pathway for bee pests to enter Victoria, with bees from Varroa-infested countries hitchhiking on ships that enter Victoria, which could threaten the state’s honey bee population.

In 2018, Varroa destructor was detected on a ship that had entered the Port of Melbourne.

The government worked with industry and community to act swiftly to ensure the detected Varroa destructor didn’t spread through Victoria’s bee population and become an outbreak.

If Varroa mite was to become established in Australia, an estimated 20,000 cropping and horticulture industry businesses would be affected, as well as home gardeners and the wider community.

There are more than 12,800 beekeepers with almost 135,000 registered hives in Australia, which contribute to the state’s $17.5 million apiary industry.

These new partnerships align with Victoria’s agriculture strategy to protect our bee population by ensuring we are well placed to respond to new pests, and modernising Victorian agriculture through new technology.

To find out more, visit Agriculture Victoria.

Listen to the recording of Stubble, Straw and Carbon - Panels, pellets and alternative uses.

Presented by:

• Graeme Anderson, Agriculture Victoria
• Steve Layfield, Ortech Industries
• Ray Davies, Central Highlands Straw Alliance.

Stubble management can be a complex issue for farmers. Stubble retention has well-documented benefits, including nutrient recycling, reduced erosion, improved rainfall infiltration and reduced moisture evaporation.

Retaining stubbles also improves soil health and biology. For seasons with large stubble loads there is room to put some of it into other productive uses.

In this webinar recording Graeme Anderson explains the basic carbon cycle and the benefits of putting stubbles into building products to capture carbon for the long term.

Steve Layfield from Ortech Industries  shares how they are contributing to positive carbon farming by using straw stubbles in building products which would otherwise be burnt after harvest contributing to carbon emissions.

Ray Davies from the Pyrenees Shire Council discusses how local farmers are converting stubble straw to energy as one means of alleviating the need to burn stubbles in autumn.

Ray shares a pilot project at the Skipton Hospital where straw pellets will be used as a replacement for LPG to meet the thermal demand for hydronic heating and hot water.

Other investigations include opportunities for combined heat and power in manufacturing and potential for a biogas plant.

Victorian fox and wild dog bounty collections resumed on Monday 1 March 2021, in line with current COVIDSafe requirements.

Agriculture Victoria has a COVIDSafe Plan for each bounty collection centre.

If you are attending a collection centre, you must comply with COVIDSafe requirements including physical distancing, good hygiene practices and wearing a face mask indoors and where you can’t distance outdoors.

Electronic funds transfer (EFT) is the preferred method of payment so please bring your EFT details to the collection centre.

Stay safe by following the COVIDSafe requirements and, if you feel unwell, get tested and stay home.

Acceptable entire fox scalps and entire wild dog body parts will be collected from eligible members of the public at specific dates and times, and from sites scheduled as collection centres.

Please note that no entire-fox scalps or entire wild dog body parts will be accepted at any public counter or state government office.

Collections will only be accepted at the designated times.

The 2021 bounty collections will run until the end of October.

Find the South West collection schedule details.

Visit www.agriculture.vic.gov.au/bounty to find out more or call the Customer Service Centre on 136 186.

The Victorian Government is ensuring more pets get the loving homes they deserve with a new taskforce dedicated to rehoming animals.

Minister for Agriculture Mary-Anne Thomas was at Lort Smith Animal Hospital recently to announce the Taskforce on Rehoming Pets, comprising Member for Western Victoria Andy Meddick (Chair), Member for Bendigo West Maree Edwards and Member for Narre Warren South Gary Maas.

The taskforce will provide recommendations to the Victorian Government on how to improve and better support the rehoming of pets in Victoria, including research animals.

It will recommend regulatory options to improve the welfare and survival rates of dogs and cats that need rehoming, and establish ways to make the movement of animals between shelters, pounds and rescue groups more transparent.

Working with industry and community stakeholders, the taskforce will ensure a range of perspectives are considered and will provide its final report and recommendations to the government by the end of this year.

The taskforce is just one way the government is working to ensure that Victorian pets are well cared for on the journey to their forever homes.

Minister Thomas congratulated the Lort Smith Animal Hospital on being awarded a $50,000 Animal Welfare Fund grant to grow its services.

Lort Smith is one of 15 recipients of funding under the ninth round of the fund, with money to go towards the development of an animal adoption centre in a soon-to-be completed clinic in Campbellfield.

Round nine of the Animal Welfare Fund program supports not-for-profit animal shelters and foster care organisations to rehome animals, as well as community vet clinics to establish or expand their services in areas of need throughout Victoria.

For more information, visit Animal Welfare Victoria.

Having an autumn baiting program is generally part of a well-planned pest animal management program for many producers and land managers.

Agriculture Victoria is reminding all users of 1080 pest animal bait products of the possible risks to non-target animals.

READ THE MEDIA RELEASE IN FULL

Caption - Dr James Hill ( image supplied)

Local farmers can learn how to improve productivity on their farms through optimisation of irrigation output and timing at an upcoming field day.

Attendees will hear how to ensure the water they use has the maximum positive benefit to their business.

Dr James Hills is Australia’s leading expert in pressurised irrigation for the dairy industry.

He is visiting south-west Victoria to present the latest results from research and on-farm monitoring he and the team at the Tasmanian Institute of Agriculture (TIA) have collected as part of the Smarter Irrigation for Profit: Phase II (SIP2) project.

Joining him will be Nick O’Halloran, Agriculture Victoria Irrigation Extension Officer and experienced farm consultant Graeme Ward.

Dr Hills has been working to understand how to optimise irrigation practises to improve productivity and water utilisation on dairy farms.

Research has shown that farmers can experience substantial losses due to inefficient irrigation.

Dr Hills will explain how the monitoring of five farms over the course of three years revealed significant opportunities to boost productivity by using precision irrigation systems on-farm.

One Tasmanian farm was using 6.2 megalitres of water per hectare during the season, but incorrect irrigation scheduling meant pastures failed to grow well.

Over $70,000 in excess feed costs were required to cover the deficit.

‘We found their production was typically half of what they could potentially be producing,’ Dr Hills said. ‘

There were significant issues with their irrigation practices and a massive opportunity for improvement.’

By modifying irrigation scheduling practices during the research, pasture growth went from 34 kgDM to 69 kgDM per hectare per day over the irrigation period.

All farmers and service providers are invited to attend the field day, which will run on Wednesday 7 April from 11.00am to 2.00pm at the Naringal Baptist Church.

RSVP via the WestVic Dairy website.

The ‘Ask the Researcher’ forums are an interactive monthly event where farmers and service providers come together with the scientists that are leading the transformational research at DairyBio and DairyFeedbase to ask questions and hear about on-farm applications and the future direction of the programs

Join GippsDairy REO Donna Gibson and Agriculture Victoria senior research scientist Dr Liz Morse-McNabb to hear more and ask questions about the future of pasture utilisation ‘PastureSmarts’.

DATE: Monday 21 April

TIME: 12.30 pm

REGISTER HERE

Enjoying the Barwon South West Ag News? Then why not forward to a friend or subscribe yourself.

It's easy – simply click this link.