September 2, 2026 • 9 mins
Peter Gardyne looks at dry hoggets and their worth which he says is rather pleasing to say the least!
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
Peter Gardine farms in Napdale and joins us once again
this afternoon on the muster.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Pete, good afternoon. You're not swabbing or anything on top
of the ground?
Speaker 3 (00:17):
No, I'm actually just in a jersey. I'll jack it
off and it's great.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Sunshine just makes people happy, especially in September, whenever you
get it.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Oh, it does. And the last week or so has
been pretty blooming tough, to be fair. Yeah, no, on
the lambing rounds, we've only got a handful lambing, so
we're on the more fortunate end of things. But, yeah, boy, heck,
is it wet. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
When are you due to start lambing proper then?
Speaker 3 (00:45):
The commercials start on the 10th, and I think they
can definitely wait until then. Yeah, I'm glad they're not
earlier this year.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
So your feed, have you got much?
Speaker 3 (00:57):
We're a bit tight, we've got nitrogen and sulphur on
the home place, we're hopefully doing the hill maybe today
and Pukarell once we get some floaty armbands for the
tractor we might try and get some on down there.
Yeah so no we're a bit tight for Tucker but
it is warmish and even when it was, yeah the
(01:20):
soil temperature's not too bad but yeah hopefully it rises.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Yeah, that's for sure. You'd like to think so, getting
into the first week of September, though.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Yeah, yeah, I probably, we're a wee bit busy at
the end of autumn, and I'm a bit kicking myself.
I would like to put some nitrogen on in April,
and I kind of missed the boat on that, which
is something I stuffed up. And, yeah, so we're just
going to, yeah, chuck a bit of nitrogen, a bit
of sulfur, a bit of selenium, cobalt, and zinc on. And, yeah,
so most of that's on, but just still a bit
(01:49):
to go once it dries out.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
Are you happy with the state of your ewes heading
into September? Like, not many issues, bearings.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
And the likes?
Speaker 3 (01:58):
Yeah, no, Cam's got the ewes looking pretty good, eh?
And we've had very, very few bearings. But I had
a mate ring up asking me about bearings, and it's
something that we've worked on for a very, very long
time genetically. And then we also work on trying to
keep our ewes as an even body condition score all
year within reason. We don't do any flushing or anything
(02:19):
like that, and we don't shut them down. Some guys
sort of flush them hard and then shut them down
after mating. We sort of just try and keep them
even through the whole year. Because I personally think if
you've got a flush a year to get a decent
amount of lambs into her from a conception point of view,
there's probably not a lot of chance that she'll actually
take them to the gate at weaning if you've had
(02:40):
to give her extra just to get those extra lambs
in her. So that's why we don't bother flushing.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
You just back your feed throughout the year?
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Yeah. We back the feed and we also just back
the fact that we've done the genetic work behind the scenes.
You know, like we scanned 181 twin scan and 191
triplet scan. So that's a pretty respectable twin scan. And
to only have 10% triplets on top of that, that's
exactly what we want. And I just find if you flush,
you get more triplets on news that probably shouldn't be
(03:09):
carrying triplets.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
So what do you do separately with your triplets in
regard to lambing time, I suppose? Do you run them
separately or mix them with singles, as has been suggested
by a couple of people?
Speaker 3 (03:21):
Yeah, no, we've got a good plan on that front.
We've tried a few different things. I once lambed them
on the own, and I will never do that again.
That was pretty good for the first half of the paddock.
Then after that, it just seemed like absolute chaos. I
would never put them with singles because their feeding requirements
are so different that that just seems crazy to me.
So what we do here is we draft them out
(03:43):
at scanning and they go with our old girls and
our old girls stay on grass for all the winter
or green feed oats. So yeah, they get better fed
from scanning to lambing. And then at lambing time, we
just dilute them with the lighter end of the twins
or just any twins and we just sort of dilute
them to get a dilution factor. And we do give
(04:04):
them our higher quality feed and better sheltered paddocks.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Knowing that you've been working on your genetics for so long,
how often do you go around on the lambing beet then?
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Well, on the hill, we haven't done a lambing beet
since 1970. So we spread them out for pre-lamb and
then we don't see them again until tailing time. On
the flats, we do look them once or twice a day. Yeah,
and we save what we can save, but we don't
get too carried away. And the key thing that I
learned to do well is we tag anything we touch
(04:38):
and there's no second chances. They all go to either
the works or a terminal. So, yeah, we save them
from a money point of view and we cull them
from a genetic point of view.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
What about wet dries due to the weather? How do
you look at them?
Speaker 3 (04:53):
Wet dries due to the weather, that's a good point.
And that probably comes into the, that's a fun one
for a stud. Because with a stud, you can use
a storm code, which kind of gives them a bit
of a credit that it was crappy weather. So in
the stud, I only use the storm code if 50%
of the lambs are dead that day in that paddock.
(05:14):
If less than 50% of the lambs are dead in
the paddock, I don't use the storm code. And commercially,
I do the same sort of thing. I give them
a bit of credit if there's a bit of death.
Wet dries, we usually, if the mutton's price is good,
we just kill them. If the mutton price is poor,
we will sometimes hang on to the younger ones and
(05:34):
give them another chance to a terminal sire. So either way,
they're never bred from again.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Well, it's interesting how people look at it, I suppose,
because due to Mother Nature coming through and it's a
wash-up of when you've had a weather event and you're
seeing all these wet dries in the paddock through no
fault of their own and all of a sudden you're thinking,
what's the point of doing a black tag on an
animal that isn't actually her fault?
Speaker 3 (05:56):
Yeah, and I think that's where my rule of thumb
is if 50% of the lambs are born dead in
that paddock, in that lambing round, I kind of say, hey,
that's the weather. But if less than 50% of the... Oh, sorry, if.
Less than 50% of them are dead. I go, well,
some of them have got the brains to keep them
alive and some of them don't. So that's when I tag.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
And I suppose when you hit September as well, you
look at optimism for the season ahead. Yes, the next
couple of weeks, it is what it is. But just
the overall picture for the meat industry is looking pretty rosy.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
Oh, it's looking blimmin' awesome, eh? Yeah, no, it's looking positive.
I mean, it could come off the boil a bit, but, man,
it's starting at an awesome place. I mean, you know,
we killed the dry hoggets the other day, and we
killed two-thirds of them, and, you know, they hung up
at 27.3 kgs, and they went $ 12, so there's definitely
no tears shed over that kill sheet.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
OK, I'm just trying to do the quick math. What's that,
around $ 300? Yeah, $ 327 in the hand, which is.
Speaker 3 (06:53):
Like, man, there's no complaints. Yeah, and we only had 9%
dries in our commercial hoggarts. So, yeah, pretty happy with
that and pretty happy to cash them up and, you know,
bank a bit more feed because I just cannot get
my head around running a dry hoggart. That's not going
to make us any money until Christmas 2027. I just
(07:15):
can't get my head around feeding that for 15 months
before it might make a profit when I can get
that much money for it now.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Hoggart-Lemming, we talk about it a lot, but do you
think it's gaining in popularity with those people you know
that have pretty much stayed away from it?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
I think there's two classes of thought. There's the guys
that are into it and the guys that aren't. I
actually struggled to... Sorry, I'll reword this. Every farmer has
their own goals and their own what they're trying to
achieve in life. And I don't judge people with different goals. Like,
you know, my life's my life and someone else's life
(07:49):
is someone else's life. So I don't stress about what
other people do in that regards because what's right for
me won't be right for the next person and that's
still cool. But saying that, if you're in a situation
where you're trying to make stuff happen, you're trying to
pay down a mortgage or get into a farm, if
you're in that situation, I don't see how you can't
(08:11):
hog it, Liam. And I'll be pretty passionate about that
because to lamb a hog it, it takes 20% more
feed than to not lamb a hog it. And I
tell you, there's quite a bit of profitability for that 20%
more feed. And in any situation, I would drop my
U numbers to land my hoggarts or drop my hoggart
numbers to land my hoggarts. If you're in a situation
(08:32):
where you need to maximise profitability and pay down a mortgage.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
Good on you, Pete.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Next time we catch up, it'll be near the end
of September and we will have gumdrop buttons falling from
the sky, courtesy of the big yellow and little Lambo
gangs running around all over the show. Appreciate your time
as always.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
Sounds awesome. Good story.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Peter Gardine, based in Napdale. Hoggart lambing, certainly interesting the
way it's evolved.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
We talk about this more often than not, but interesting
Pete's mindset around it too. If it's a dry animal
not producing until late next year, why bother with it?
Simon Hotcroft's up next from the Southland Rural Support Trust.
You're listening to The Muster.
Peter Gardine farms in Napdale and joins us once again
this afternoon on the muster.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Pete, good afternoon. You're not swabbing or anything on top
of the ground?
Speaker 3 (00:17):
No, I'm actually just in a jersey. I'll jack it
off and it's great.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Sunshine just makes people happy, especially in September, whenever you
get it.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Oh, it does. And the last week or so has
been pretty blooming tough, to be fair. Yeah, no, on
the lambing rounds, we've only got a handful lambing, so
we're on the more fortunate end of things. But, yeah, boy, heck,
is it wet. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
When are you due to start lambing proper then?
Speaker 3 (00:45):
The commercials start on the 10th, and I think they
can definitely wait until then. Yeah, I'm glad they're not
earlier this year.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
So your feed, have you got much?
Speaker 3 (00:57):
We're a bit tight, we've got nitrogen and sulphur on
the home place, we're hopefully doing the hill maybe today
and Pukarell once we get some floaty armbands for the
tractor we might try and get some on down there.
Yeah so no we're a bit tight for Tucker but
it is warmish and even when it was, yeah the
(01:20):
soil temperature's not too bad but yeah hopefully it rises.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Yeah, that's for sure. You'd like to think so, getting
into the first week of September, though.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Yeah, yeah, I probably, we're a wee bit busy at
the end of autumn, and I'm a bit kicking myself.
I would like to put some nitrogen on in April,
and I kind of missed the boat on that, which
is something I stuffed up. And, yeah, so we're just
going to, yeah, chuck a bit of nitrogen, a bit
of sulfur, a bit of selenium, cobalt, and zinc on. And, yeah,
so most of that's on, but just still a bit
(01:49):
to go once it dries out.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
Are you happy with the state of your ewes heading
into September? Like, not many issues, bearings.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
And the likes?
Speaker 3 (01:58):
Yeah, no, Cam's got the ewes looking pretty good, eh?
And we've had very, very few bearings. But I had
a mate ring up asking me about bearings, and it's
something that we've worked on for a very, very long
time genetically. And then we also work on trying to
keep our ewes as an even body condition score all
year within reason. We don't do any flushing or anything
(02:19):
like that, and we don't shut them down. Some guys
sort of flush them hard and then shut them down
after mating. We sort of just try and keep them
even through the whole year. Because I personally think if
you've got a flush a year to get a decent
amount of lambs into her from a conception point of view,
there's probably not a lot of chance that she'll actually
take them to the gate at weaning if you've had
(02:40):
to give her extra just to get those extra lambs
in her. So that's why we don't bother flushing.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
You just back your feed throughout the year?
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Yeah. We back the feed and we also just back
the fact that we've done the genetic work behind the scenes.
You know, like we scanned 181 twin scan and 191
triplet scan. So that's a pretty respectable twin scan. And
to only have 10% triplets on top of that, that's
exactly what we want. And I just find if you flush,
you get more triplets on news that probably shouldn't be
(03:09):
carrying triplets.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
So what do you do separately with your triplets in
regard to lambing time, I suppose? Do you run them
separately or mix them with singles, as has been suggested
by a couple of people?
Speaker 3 (03:21):
Yeah, no, we've got a good plan on that front.
We've tried a few different things. I once lambed them
on the own, and I will never do that again.
That was pretty good for the first half of the paddock.
Then after that, it just seemed like absolute chaos. I
would never put them with singles because their feeding requirements
are so different that that just seems crazy to me.
So what we do here is we draft them out
(03:43):
at scanning and they go with our old girls and
our old girls stay on grass for all the winter
or green feed oats. So yeah, they get better fed
from scanning to lambing. And then at lambing time, we
just dilute them with the lighter end of the twins
or just any twins and we just sort of dilute
them to get a dilution factor. And we do give
(04:04):
them our higher quality feed and better sheltered paddocks.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Knowing that you've been working on your genetics for so long,
how often do you go around on the lambing beet then?
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Well, on the hill, we haven't done a lambing beet
since 1970. So we spread them out for pre-lamb and
then we don't see them again until tailing time. On
the flats, we do look them once or twice a day. Yeah,
and we save what we can save, but we don't
get too carried away. And the key thing that I
learned to do well is we tag anything we touch
(04:38):
and there's no second chances. They all go to either
the works or a terminal. So, yeah, we save them
from a money point of view and we cull them
from a genetic point of view.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
What about wet dries due to the weather? How do
you look at them?
Speaker 3 (04:53):
Wet dries due to the weather, that's a good point.
And that probably comes into the, that's a fun one
for a stud. Because with a stud, you can use
a storm code, which kind of gives them a bit
of a credit that it was crappy weather. So in
the stud, I only use the storm code if 50%
of the lambs are dead that day in that paddock.
(05:14):
If less than 50% of the lambs are dead in
the paddock, I don't use the storm code. And commercially,
I do the same sort of thing. I give them
a bit of credit if there's a bit of death.
Wet dries, we usually, if the mutton's price is good,
we just kill them. If the mutton price is poor,
we will sometimes hang on to the younger ones and
(05:34):
give them another chance to a terminal sire. So either way,
they're never bred from again.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Well, it's interesting how people look at it, I suppose,
because due to Mother Nature coming through and it's a
wash-up of when you've had a weather event and you're
seeing all these wet dries in the paddock through no
fault of their own and all of a sudden you're thinking,
what's the point of doing a black tag on an
animal that isn't actually her fault?
Speaker 3 (05:56):
Yeah, and I think that's where my rule of thumb
is if 50% of the lambs are born dead in
that paddock, in that lambing round, I kind of say, hey,
that's the weather. But if less than 50% of the... Oh, sorry, if.
Less than 50% of them are dead. I go, well,
some of them have got the brains to keep them
alive and some of them don't. So that's when I tag.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
And I suppose when you hit September as well, you
look at optimism for the season ahead. Yes, the next
couple of weeks, it is what it is. But just
the overall picture for the meat industry is looking pretty rosy.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
Oh, it's looking blimmin' awesome, eh? Yeah, no, it's looking positive.
I mean, it could come off the boil a bit, but, man,
it's starting at an awesome place. I mean, you know,
we killed the dry hoggets the other day, and we
killed two-thirds of them, and, you know, they hung up
at 27.3 kgs, and they went $ 12, so there's definitely
no tears shed over that kill sheet.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
OK, I'm just trying to do the quick math. What's that,
around $ 300? Yeah, $ 327 in the hand, which is.
Speaker 3 (06:53):
Like, man, there's no complaints. Yeah, and we only had 9%
dries in our commercial hoggarts. So, yeah, pretty happy with
that and pretty happy to cash them up and, you know,
bank a bit more feed because I just cannot get
my head around running a dry hoggart. That's not going
to make us any money until Christmas 2027. I just
(07:15):
can't get my head around feeding that for 15 months
before it might make a profit when I can get
that much money for it now.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Hoggart-Lemming, we talk about it a lot, but do you
think it's gaining in popularity with those people you know
that have pretty much stayed away from it?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
I think there's two classes of thought. There's the guys
that are into it and the guys that aren't. I
actually struggled to... Sorry, I'll reword this. Every farmer has
their own goals and their own what they're trying to
achieve in life. And I don't judge people with different goals. Like,
you know, my life's my life and someone else's life
(07:49):
is someone else's life. So I don't stress about what
other people do in that regards because what's right for
me won't be right for the next person and that's
still cool. But saying that, if you're in a situation
where you're trying to make stuff happen, you're trying to
pay down a mortgage or get into a farm, if
you're in that situation, I don't see how you can't
(08:11):
hog it, Liam. And I'll be pretty passionate about that
because to lamb a hog it, it takes 20% more
feed than to not lamb a hog it. And I
tell you, there's quite a bit of profitability for that 20%
more feed. And in any situation, I would drop my
U numbers to land my hoggarts or drop my hoggart
numbers to land my hoggarts. If you're in a situation
(08:32):
where you need to maximise profitability and pay down a mortgage.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
Good on you, Pete.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Next time we catch up, it'll be near the end
of September and we will have gumdrop buttons falling from
the sky, courtesy of the big yellow and little Lambo
gangs running around all over the show. Appreciate your time
as always.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
Sounds awesome. Good story.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Peter Gardine, based in Napdale. Hoggart lambing, certainly interesting the
way it's evolved.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
We talk about this more often than not, but interesting
Pete's mindset around it too. If it's a dry animal
not producing until late next year, why bother with it?
Simon Hotcroft's up next from the Southland Rural Support Trust.
You're listening to The Muster.
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