After spending 18 months chasing snow in Canada, Kristina Illston found herself longing for the rolling green hills of Taihape. Her parents had packed her off after high school to explore the wide world but she knew she always wanted to come back to the farm.
“Mum and Dad always encouraged me to gain some experience outside the farm,” Kristina said.
“So I went to Lincoln to study agricultural science and then worked for Agtrac in the South Island for a while, but snowboarding in Canada was always on the bucket list.”
She jumped on a plane after 18 months with Agtrac and spent her time working on a few ranches and chasing the snow before heading back to the family farm.
Arriving back she pulled on her work boots and got stuck into the farm business with her parents. It took a bit to settle into a rhythm but they found their feet and are enjoying the dynamic.
“Mum has taken a bit of a step back. She’s still involved in planning and decision making but she leaves most of it to Dad and I,” Kristina said.
Her parents, Mark and Lorraine Illston, had taken over the farm from her grandfather in their early 20s. He had it from his father, so it has been in the family for a few generations.
Mark grew up on the farm, which is in Mataroa just out of Taihape, and Lorraine was from Rotorua with Dutch parents who had moved over after the war.
They had three children, Michael, Tony and Kristina, and while the kids were young they moved the family to England and then the Netherlands, spending five and a half years abroad.
While they were away they had a manager running the farm and Mark would travel back to keep an eye on things.
The farm originally ran Drysdale sheep and Mark and Lorraine started out running ewes for Kelso. It was about 15 years ago they diverged to start their own stud, Minda Hill Genetics.
“Mum and Dad were interested in genetics and could see some opportunities.
“We were having trouble with high scanning percentages, which can be a problem with the snow storms that happen often in Taihape as triplets are highly susceptible to the weather.”
Getting stuck into developing their own animals, they focused on structure primarily. Anything with poor feet or poor confirmation is culled and they always look at any ewes and rams physically before looking at the numbers.
“We’re after a good meaty animal with good growth as well as good reproduction.
“We’ve essentially created a Perendale-looking sheep with a Texel bum and clean, open points.
“And with the Perendale they’re free moving, which is good for the big hills, they move a lot quicker, which can save a lot of time.”
They get good advice and support from sheep guru Dave Kitney, particularly around structure.
It was around 12 years ago that Mark and Trevor Cook, a well known veterinarian and farm adviser, predicted facial eczema was going to be an issue.They started bringing some Romney in to build some facial eczema tolerance in the flock.
Their testing results have improved substantially over the past 11 years with the majority of rams being tested at 0.6mg/kg, which is a high rate, and not being affected at all.
“It’s great, we are managing to maintain our structure and we are getting good repro and growth while introducing and making great progress with facial eczema tolerance,” Kristina said.
They have been growing their customer base but they do feel the challenges sheep farming has been facing.
“It is a dwindling market. With an increase in forestry and shedding sheep over the past five years, we certainly notice the challenges traditional sheep farming faces.
“But we have a strong base of customers around Gisborne and we are developing some good local relationships.
“The feedback has been great, farmers are pleased with our structure and seeing great scanning results, particularly in two-tooths, and our rams seem to increase scanning and weaning percentages.”
They run 1800 ewes, including the two-tooths, and 600 hoggets as well as 400 ram hoggets. Ram sales happen in early November, and they have around three to four clients visiting each day.
Kristina works with them to identify what they are after and she selects a number of rams that meet their criteria, showcasing at least twice as many as they are after.
“Some buyers will make their decisions just by seeing the rams physically, others will only look at the numbers and some will look at both. Everyone is after something different,” she said.
Kristina is responsible for the data. She is very interested in genetics and breeding and looks after the computer work. Mark looks after the farm strategic decision making, and all three of them discuss things together.
She appreciates having her parents to bounce ideas off and learn from. And they encourage her to get off farm as much as she can, too. She is an avid hiker and enjoys hunting as well as playing squash.
Eventually Kristina would like to take over the farm and she wants to keep raising awareness of the stud and the work they are doing, which will hopefully lead to an increase in ram sales.
In Focus Podcast: Full Show | 10 May
We chat with with Katrina Roberts, who is the new Dairy Woman of the Year. She’s a Waikato vet, working with dairy farmers to not only maintain cow health but also improve the efficiency of their farm systems.
Federated Farmers arable chair David Birkett joins us to talk about the arable industry awards, which are open to nominations now.
And, senior reporter Hugh Stringleman wraps up the dairy commodity season for us, following this week’s GDT auction.
