Herd Manager

Ashmount Farm is a large new dairy farm conversion located at Chertsey. Due to a previous team member needing to head home to be with ill family we are seeking a motivated and knowledgeable herd manager to be part of the fantastic team running this operation. The farm is in a great location, only a 10 minute drive to Rakaia or 15 minute drive to Ashburton!

About the farm

The farm is 620 ha in total and milks 1800 cows through a brand new 80 bail Read shed. We have ACRs, Protrack and in-shed feeding with Cowmanager tags for heat detection. The farm is irrigated by pivots and some fixed grid, with a small amount of dryland corners. We operate a system that strives to maximise pasture harvested while feeding cows to their potential.

The opportunity

The successful candidate will be a part of a large team lead by equity manager Peter O’Connor and be responsible for one of the four herds on farm. You will be expected to manage grazing and allocation for a herd (with assistance from the manager or 2IC where required) as well as completing other tasks on farm with the rest of the team. These include but are not limited to

·       Milking cows

·       Treating cows and recording treatments

·       Assisting with calving cows and identifying calving issues

·       Identifying and treating lame cows

·       Driving tractors to feed out supplement

·       Assisting with pasture measuring and allocation

·       General farm maintenance

Your skills

To be able to successful in this role, you will need to be able to work well in a team environment and be open to new ideas and learnings. We will support you to learn new skills and pass on our knowledge to help you achieve your goals but expect that you are able to

·       Communicate well with the rest of the team

·       Milk confidently and efficiently

·       Identify sick cows and have good animal health knowledge

·       Be reliable and punctual

·       Have some understanding of pasture management or have a desire to learn this

The salary range for this role is between $75,000-90,000 (total package value) depending on skills and ability. There are different housing options to suit your situation from shared accommodation to a new 3 bedroom house. You must have a full NZ drivers licence and be allowed to work in New Zealand. We are not accredited employers.

This is a great opportunity to gain confidence and improve your skills in team leadership, pasture management and overall farm systems in an operation with scale.