TUTORIAL
USING FARMAX LITE FARMAX TUTORIAL 1. OVERVIEW The main screen of Farmax Lite is made up of a navigation pane on the left and the main screen on the right. The navigation pane has two areas; the upper pane contains the objects, such as the farm, blocks, mobs, crops and supplements that make up a feed budget. The lower pane contains the tasks that you perform on these objects such as creating, editing, or deleting them. So to create a feed budget you simply need to start at the top of the upper pane and work progressively down until all the objects are created. Upper navigation pane showing objects Lower navigation pane showing tasks to be performed on objects Figure 6. Setting up the farm using the upper and lower navigation panes. 1. SETTING UP THE STARTING PROPERTIES The first step is to set up the farm by choosing a start date and starting pasture cover. Farmax Lite can be set up to start on any month and run for a 12 month period. When you click on an object and a task, then a wizard will appear in the main screen. This will take you through all the steps required to set up the object. As you add blocks, mobs and crops these appear in the main grid.
When selecting an object and a task a Wizard appears in the main screen. This takes you through all steps required to complete the task. Figure 7. A Wizard appears each time you choose an object such as Farm and a task such as Start New Farm. 2. CREATING BLOCKS To create a block simply click on Blocks and choose Add block from the task pane. This activates a wizard that takes you through two screens shown below; the first asks you to apply a name and area while the second asks for monthly pasture growth rates you can enter this yourself or choose from the regional library by clicking on the drop down box.
Figure 8. The Wizard takes you through all steps needed to set up the object such as the Block being set up above. Now we have some land to put our livestock on. 3. MOB CREATION You now add mobs by clicking on the Mob object and selecting the Add mob task. A mob is a group of animals of the same age and sex. We are now going to add our Breeding ewes. The first screen in the Wizard asks you to create an enterprise for the ewes. Enterprises allow you to differentiate your mobs by having them in separate entities such as a Breeding ewe enterprise and a finishing lamb enterprise. As you will see later this also helps arrange them in the main screen and enables more meaningful reports. You also need to add names for your enterprise and the mob being created. To assist the mathematical model in Farmax Lite the next screen asks for numbers, how big they are and when they are shorn.
Figure 9. The Wizard ensures all the elements that determine a mobs feed requirements are entered. Pregnancy is also a very important in determining feed demand. In any 12 month period ewes may be pregnant at the start date of the 12 month feed budget and may be tupped again in the current year. In this case ewes were not pregnant at the start date of this feed budget but will be mated in March. Finally we may want the lambs that will result from weaning to be present in the model. It makes sense then for Farmax Lite to create these while we are working in the ewe mating screen. We can choose to create these by clicking on the radio button which states Yes, create then now.
Figure 10. Pregnancy (screen on left) is an important determinant of feed demand. For convenience you can create the lamb mobs whilst in the pregnancy screen (Right hand). You may want to create these mobs with different names and attributes than those that Farmax Lite suggests. In the screen below you can see what Farmax Lite predicts the number and weight of lambs at weaning will be using the Farmax mathematical equations. You can override this for example by overtyping the eventual replacement lamb and sale lamb mob numbers you will have after you have weaned and drafted. Numbers and weights predicted by Farmax based on ewe tupping weight and feeding from lambing to weaning Your overrides based on the numbers and names you want to use for lamb mobs. Figure 11. Farmax Lite predicts lambing percentage based on tupping weight and divides numbers into female and male. You can however re-arrange this in the table below. You can add as many mobs as you wish. Let s add the ewe hoggets by clicking on the mobs object and add another mob. We will choose the Breeding ewe enterprise, as these are replacements for the breeding ewes. Again we need to provide details mob name, numbers, weights and an age (because they are not mixed age).
Figure 12. Setting up a non-mixed age mob. Age is defined relative to the start or end of the feed budget (left screen). This mob will be mated for the first time this year. They will be mated 3 weeks later than the main ewe mob and are only expected to wean 80%. Figure 13. Setting up the mating date for a non-mixed age mob which is the same as for a mixed age mob. All these lambs will go into a mixed sex mob. We can put both sexes into one mob by simply deleting one line (by deleting the name) and putting all the lamb numbers on the single line.
Figure 14. Choosing a single mob to send lambs to. Deleting the mob name deletes the whole line. 4. EDITING PERFORMANCE Now we need to fine tune liveweight gains and stock numbers. We can display liveweight gains in the main screen by clicking on the magnifying glass (on the main screens toolbar) to display the display list; this will add rows to the main screen. You can select or de-select these to save on screen space. Whatever row we click on in the main screen displays an appropriate detail graph. By clicking on the ewe liveweight row we get to see the ewe liveweight Main screen s toolbar Display list Main screen
Figure 15. Displaying the details list by clicking on the magnifying glass in the main screen toolbar (left screen). The graph that is shown depends on the row that you highlight. Notice how it shows all the details that make up liveweight - wool growth is shown accumulating up to each shearing and the lamb is shown growing from mating to lambing. This helps you interpret clearly what is happening see how much weight the lamb contributes to overall liveweight in late pregnancy! 5. EDITING NUMBERS AND WEIGHT We can change the liveweight profile by dragging it - this changes the ewe s feed demand immediately (which can be viewed in the main screen if you tick the We can determine the liveweight gain of lambs). Figure 16. Editing the liveweight screen by dragging and dropping the liveweight profile graph. If we choose the numbers row we can quickly draft lambs (Using the details screen drag the numbers down to 3000 1 st of January). Notice that the software asks whether we are drafting from the top or bottom of the mob. This helps it to recalculate the weight of the remaining animals. If we want to draft more precisely we can go to the transaction detail page and create a specific transaction. See how we can draft using specific rules such as drafting all animals above 37kg on the 16 th of January.
We can choose to sell all to clean up this mob (Create a sell all 8 th of Feb) We can also draft the mixed lambs we created from the ewe hoggets. If we are not interested in drafting optimisation we might just say they are all gone by mid February. (simply pull the lamb numbers down to 400 in mid Feb). Figure 17. Drafting can either be done by dragging the numbers in the numbers graph or by setting up individual sales using the transaction details. Finally we need to merge the Ewe hoggets, now 2ths, with the ewes. Again we can simply do this by pulling their numbers to zero (simply drag the numbers graph down to zero in mid January). Figure 18. To balance up the numbers 2ths are dragged to zero when they enter the ewes (as these are matched by ewe sales).
We could have been more precise by selling cull ewes, at scanning and at the annual draft ewe sales but I m keeping this deliberately simple. 6. THE FEASIBILITY TEST We now have a feed budget It shows that we are not going to be feasible in September. That is the minimum cover we need in September to meet our production targets will not be met. What can we do about this? Figure 19. The feasibility test. The green line (predicted cover) must remain above the blue line (minimum cover needed) for a farm to be feasible. One option may be to loose some body weight from ewes in September. If ewes lost around 55 grams per day in August and 20 grams/day in September this would be feasible.
Figure 20. A feasible scenario looking at loosing weight on ewes. Another option may be to put Nitrogen on in autumn. Lets add 45 kg/ha to 250 ha in April. This would give us an equivalent result to loosing weight on ewes.
Figure 21. A feasible scenario looking at applying Nitrogen. 7. ADDING SUPPLEMENTS> To add supplements simply choose Supplements in the object pane and Add supplement in the task pane. If you do not find one suitable you can scroll to the bottom and choose <New feed type> and you can make up your own. Figure 22. Setting up a supplement. Once the feed has been selected then it becomes a row in the main grid to be filled in. 8. ADDING CROPS If you are feeding out crops then it is likely that you will have grown them on the farm. If so, the land that has been taken out for growing these needs to be removed from the effective area. To add crops simply choose Crops in the object pane and Add crop in the task pane.
Figure 23. Setting up a new crop. I have added a crop of Pasja the land is taken out of pasture in mid September and is still out at the end of the feed budget. You should always remove land we if is not available to stock and return it once it has been regrassed and is at approximately the average height of the farm. REPORTING Farmax Lite contains well thought through reports that you can use to communicate across your business. All reports are found by clicking on the Farm. THE FARM SUMMARY REPORT The first is the Farm Summary report. This shows, at a glance, how the farm is performing.
Figure 24. The farm summary report. In the left hand graph you can see the forecasted farm cover against the minimum cover required. Here you can see the feed budget is feasible. In the right hand graph you can view the fit between feed supply and feed demand. The farm has quite a good fit demand is however expected to exceed supply in November and December. The table shows the potential pasture growth and the net pasture growth. The difference between these are pasture losses caused by pasture becoming too long or too short and by pasture decaying. The demand is broken up into the enterprises that have been set up here we have only one enterprise; the Breeding ewes. The difference between supply and demand is shown and this is what changes the pasture cover on the bottom line. THE PASTURE REPORT The pasture report provides a detailed outline of pasture production. Firstly the effective area is shown taking into account any crops grown. The next section shows the area that received nitrogen applications, the amount of elemental N and the response rate. We have needed to add some Nitrogen to make this farm feasible. The next section shows the potential pasture growth rates that have been used. These growth rates are adjusted for any crops that were grown which alter the effective area. Any Nitrogen boost is added on to the potential growth then losses in pasture production are removed. Pasture losses are caused by pasture becoming too long or too short and by pasture decaying. The minimum and forecast covers are also provided to show the total pasture picture. Finally the annual totals are provided as key performance indicators; the potential growth, how much Nitrogen was added, the amount of pasture lost and finally how much net pasture was grown.
Figure 25. The Pasture report. THE STOCK REPORT The stock report is shown for each mob set up. Just choose the appropriate tab. It shows graphically the liveweight of stock and the intake Farmax Lite has calculated. This is also captured in the table along with Numbers and Bodyweight gain.
Figure 26. The stock report THE SUPPLEMENTS REPORT The supplements report shows the amount of supplements fed and on a second tab the percentage these supplements are of total livestock demand. This helps you to plan supplements in proportion to overall demand. Figure 27. The Supplements report.