The married couple have been managing Lone Star Farms’ sheep and beef breeding and finishing operation The Wandle near Middlemarch for the past four years.
They were named the Otago supreme winners of the 2024 Ballance Farm Environment Awards and hosted nearly 100 people at an open day last week.
The terrain of the 2550ha farm ranges from irrigated flats on the Taieri River up to tussock country on the Rock and Pillar Range .
Livestock on the farm include more than 3000 Headwaters ewes and 280 Angus cows to target value-added markets, such as Alliance Group’s Lumina Lamb and AngusPure.
The rest of the livestock are trading options.
‘‘We strive to produce products that we are proud of and do that to a really high level.’’
The staff was the best thing produced on The Wandle, Mr Barr said.
Health and safety measures included making sure staff went home happy every day, Mr Barr said.
‘‘That is at the forefront of what we do.’’
Mrs Dwyer said it could be challenging to get people to enter the primary industries.
‘‘We have to make farming attractive and look after people.’’
The environment was a bigger consideration on The Wandle than it had been on farms they had managed previously, she said.
Lone Star supported them to identify the strengths and opportunities of the different classes of the land they managed on The Wandle, allowing them to improve it, Mrs Dwyer said.
‘‘We are managers but we behave like it is our own,’’ she said.
A statement from judges said the reasons for them winning the climate award included innovative ways to earn carbon credits through the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme, their ability to complete documentation including the greenhouse gas reports within Farmax and Overseer FM and for being part of a farmer research group about on-farm emissions.
‘‘This has produced opportunities to diversify and look at options to reduce your green house gas emissions,’’ the judges’ comments said.
Mrs Dwyer said they critically analysed their land classes through the New Zealand Farm Assurance Programme.
‘‘Being able to quantify and qualify the strengths, weaknesses and opportunities of all the different land classes is really, really useful and part of our continuous learning.’’
The process revealed how to better manage different land classes and ‘‘identify areas not worth continuing to farm and looking at alternative ways of monetising them.’’
Mr Barr said the 2550ha property included 500ha of hill and 500ha of irrigation, a mix of pivots and K-line.
The rest was dryland including grasses, such as fescues and cocksfoots, which were more resilient to dry conditions and grass grub.
Lucerne and other plants with deep taproots were plants on the river flats to protect the fragile soils.
The strength of the hill country in the system was being able to use it in the shoulder seasons as an ‘‘exhaust valve’’ but there was a risk of overgrazing the area, as it was once used to run deer, which had caused erosion.
‘‘A hell of a wind comes off the hill.’’
Reasons for the pair winning the Ballance Agri-Nutrients Soil Management Award included soil health being enhanced by annual measuring and monitoring through testing, identifying critical source areas and winter grazing areas and the use of catch crops.
Drilling crops across the wind at a 90-degree angle allowed the seed to stay in the ground and early irrigation reduced wind erosion.
Judges said reasons for the pair winning the Beef + Lamb New Zealand livestock farm award included producing healthy, high-performing, high genetic merit livestock by fully feeding them and using information including kill sheet data, pasture growth rates, and body condition scores to extract premiums.
The reasons for winning the Otago Regional Council quality water enhancement award included embracing and utilising technology, such as variable rate irrigation, moisture probes and temperature monitoring.
The pair were up to date with regulatory requirements including winter grazing consents and were well placed to compile a freshwater farm plan next year.
Farm development include about 80% of waterways being fenced and a large riparian planting programme.
Mrs Dwyer said being a farmer was about much more than running a team of dogs and managing livestock.
‘‘Farmers are business managers, bankers, vets, ecologists and experts in so many fields.’’
Lone Star Farms owner Tom Sturgess said he was ‘‘in awe’’ of the achievements of the ‘‘bright and energetic’’ team working at The Wandle.
‘‘It is really cool and they do neat stuff.’’
