Head Shepherd

Julia Jones shares her optimistic outlook on the future of the Agriculture industry this week. Julia grew up on the West Coast of the South Island of NZ, riding a horse to school. Now, Julia is head of Analytics at NZX, New Zealand's Exchange. With an infectious, positive view on life, Julia covers what she sees happening in the future of our industry, and the world.   A big thank you to our...

This week, Mark catches up with Chad Taylor of Mumblebone Merinos, of Wellington, NSW, Australia. Both Chad and Mark are fans of putting maternal traits with carcass traits on a wool producing animal. They discuss the benefits of putting fat and muscle in a Merino and how it has improved both Mumblebone's production, and also their clients. They also cover succession and where Mark and Chad t...

On this episode of the Head Shepherd podcast, Mark catches up with Georgina Gubbins. Georgina is not only a passionate red meat producer, but is also chair of Lambex and Great South Coast Food and Fibre. We discuss the future of Lambex, the need for new entrants in agriculture and also run through Georginas farming business focusing on giving the consumer a healthy satisifying eating experience. G...

Hunter McGregor gives us a great insight to the Chinese meat market this week. Hunter has been in China for fourteen years and now runs a New Zealand Venison import and distribution business. He has a fascinating insight into the cultural diversity when it comes to food in China and how they perceive Australian and New Zealand red meat. A great podcast this week with something a little different....

This week, Mark catches up with Jill Hill of Benambra.   After following her fathers footsteps to rowing, Jill reached the World Championships in Greece, 1998, returning home with a gold medal in the lightweight double skull. Jill then went on to nationals in mountain biking.  After her stint in sports, Jill practiced as a physiotherapist, before returning home to the family farm in 2017. By intro...

This week Mark catches up with Tony, Elise and Bernie Kealy of Curlew Merinos, Edenhope, Victoria.  The Kealys are a great example of successfully navigating the tensions of business and family being intertwined.  Their story is also a great example of how to involve the next generation in the business at a relatively young age.    We cover how they run their successful enterprise as individuals b...

Lachlan Campbell is the CEO and co-founder of ProAgni, their moto is “Improving Farm economics today. Ensuring farming’s sustainability tomorrow." How are they doing this?  Well, it started with the realisation that Kangaroos don't burp methane.  From a few bags of product in Dubbo to a national distribution network and now breaking into the huge lot feeding industry in the US, ProAgni h...

This week we hear from Andrew and Jamie Heinrich of Ella Matta, the first registered White Suffolk stud in the world. Based on Kangaroo Island, which suffered a devastating fire just over 12 months ago, Andew and Jamie discuss the impacts of that on both them and their community, the start of the White Suffolk breed and the work they are doing to make their sheep work for them- not the other way a...

Welcome back to the start of Season 3 of the Head Shepherd Podcast! Our first guest this week is Jana Hocken. Jana is a Lean consultant with more than 17 years’ experience working for Toyota and in Lean consulting. Since 2013, she has also been involved in supporting her husband’s 1000-head dairy farm in New Zealand, introducing Lean thinking to the business. She developed and rolled out the succe...

Bonus Episode! Today we're quickly catching up with Steve Cotton, founder of Dynamic Ag. We discuss his PhD in internal parasites, starting up his business in 2015 and also Steve explains what he will cover in his session, "World of Worms" in our upcoming course, Growing Ewe. If you want to sign up to, or find out more about our Growing Ewe course, follow the link below. www.nextgen...

In this episode we feature the role of EID in making more informed decisions within a sheep business.  We hear from Steve Kelly, Commercial Manager at Allflex NZ as well as Charles Douglas-Clifford who farms at Stonyhurst in North Canterbury.  Stonyhurst have been using EID in their sheep operation for over 15 years and have learnt a lot along the way.  You can see some great pictures of Stonyhurs...

"Why cant we have $140 cutlets?" Tom Bull speaks to Mark this week about the future of the sheep meat industry and how LambPro is hoping to achieve this astounding figure by the middle of this year. This is a fascinating chat, considering LambPro lambs contribute to over 1,000,000 lambs in the Australian market. Tom discusses branding and working with clients to achieve common goals. htt...

This week I had a conversation with Rob Hewett, a man who is involved in the primary industries at many levels: production, processing, exporting and education.  It is fascinating to hear his 'helicopter' perspective of these businesses and his view of the future of the primary industries in New Zealand.  A recurring theme is how carbon is shaping the discussions in boardrooms all around...

This week we caught up with Sandi Brock of Ontario, Canada. Sandi walks us through her indoor sheep production system, explains why and how she became Youtube's most popular sheep farmer, and also touches on the publics perception of agriculture in Canada. Check out Sandi's website https://sheepishlyme.com/ A big thank you to our sponsors, Allflex Livestock Intelligence https://www.allfl...

A great 30 minute discussion with Professor Wayne Pitchford of Adelaide University covering hybrid vigour, how he changed his views on feed-use efficiency based on his research on feed intake and the science behind the biological function of ewe and cow efficiency. A big thank you to our sponsors, Allflex Livestock Intelligence  https://www.allflex.global/nz/ Allflex Livestock Intelligence is the...

Nigel and Kate Kerin own and operate Kerin Agriculture, which comprises a trading enterprise as well as a Merino ram-breeding operation. Their focus is on turning grass into profit, with a highly flexible system that can optimise the class and number of stock for each season.  In this episode, we cover the principles that Nigel uses to manage the businesses, and the importance of external influenc...

Willy Gallia is the part of the third generation in his family to be involved in the textile industry.  He grew up in Argentina and is very passionate about the wool industry and the people within it.  His family are heavily involved in wool production in Patagonia with Fuhrmann which is part of the Schneider group .  Willy is now the Chief Sustainability Officer with the Schneider group and is ba...

This week I had a conversation with Elisabeth van Delden that we are both sharing on our podcasts. Elisabeth provides support to wool businesses around the world to help them communicate effectively online.  Elisabeth was heavily involved in the Schneider Group's Wool Connect conference held earlier in the year. Check out Elisabeth's podcast - Wool Academy https://www.elisabethvandelden....

Ken Solly has a lifelong passion for helping farmers be the best version of themselves that they can be.  This podcast contains some great tips from Ken as he reflects on a successful career making very real differences to farming families.  This is one not to miss. A big thank you to our sponsors, Allflex Livestock Intelligence https://www.allflex.global/nz/ Allflex Livestock Intelligence is the...

One of the privileges of our roles in neXtgen Agri is the opportunity to learn from the experience of others. Alistair Campbell is a passionate sheep and cattle breeder, high country advocate and a genuinely fantastic person.  I've had the pleasure of many evenings chatting with Alistair and thought that the world would like to hear from him too.  We cover a range of topics around breeding sh...

This week we are delighted to have Jo Scott on the show. Jo grew up on a farm in Otago, South Island, NZ. She has recently finished up after 7 years working with the Zoetis genetics.  She has recently started a genetics consulting business and is very passionate about the opportunity to optimise genetic gain across the beef, sheep and dairy industries.  We discuss a range of opportunities in genet...

Welcome back to Head Shepherd. It is great to be back with Season 2. For the first episode of season 2 we have featured Will Gibson.  Will works with us here at neXtgen Agri as well as being heavily involved with his parents at Foulden Hill genetics.  In this episode Will covers his combined passions for breeding coloured Merinos, breeding Hereford cattle as well as helping the clients of neXtgen...

This is the third part of this series. What exactly do you want to produce? What are the traits that you most want to improve?  How do you decrease the error in selecting rams and bulls?  This episode takes you through the decision making steps and the available tools to help you get the best genetics for your farming enterprise.   https://www.nextgenagri.com/on-farm-consulting https://www.nextgen...

This week I am joined by Dr Alison Van Eenennaam, Cooperative Extension Specialist in Animal Genomics and Biotechnology with the University of California, Davis. Alison and her team have recently produced a gene edited calf that carries technology that could be applied to all terminal breeding lines at some point in the future.  We talk about the 5 year project to produce this one calf and we disc...

On this episode it is my pleasure to host Dr Jo Newton, Research Scientist with Agriculture Victoria.  Jo has recently been awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) for her contribution to agriculture through her advocacy and support of young people, volunteering and contribution to dairy science.  In recent times she has also been named on the 2018 Australian Financial Review 100 Women of...