Next time you sink your teeth into a delicious sausage, be thankful you weren’t alive and hungry in England in the 1800s.

 

Sausages back then were so dodgy they were commonly called ‘bags of mystery’, because nobody knew what went into them.

 

Bags of mystery are still with us today, just in a different form.

 

These ones won’t give you food poisoning. But they may cause sleepless nights nonetheless, especially when it comes to feeding your animals.

 

Prefer to avoid the stress? No problem. Just ask yourself a couple of quick questions: What’s really in that bag of cheap pasture seed? And how can I be sure it will deliver what my farm needs?

 

Risky business

There are enough risks in farming. Sowing dodgy seed shouldn’t be one of them. So we spend years making sure our seed is fit for purpose the day it reaches you.

 

When you are working hard to get all the aspects of pasture renewal right, from seedbed to contractors, you don’t want one thing letting the whole process down.

 

Seed germination, endophyte, genetic purity, performance – what you get in our sacks is all thoroughly tested, and independently inspected and audited by Assure Quality.

 

When we say ‘certified proprietary seed’, think progeny testing, traceability and breeding values for bulls and rams.

 

You wouldn’t want some unknown sire messing up years of careful animal breeding and leaving an embarrassing legacy you then have to live with. Seed is similar. The less provenance it has, the riskier it is.

 

‘Absolute standout’

Richard Tosswill has experienced both ends of the seed quality spectrum.

 

The Wairarapa sheep and beef farmer understands full well the fine line that sometimes must be walked between investing in value, and screwing costs down

to survive.  

 

Four years ago, in search of independent, validated performance data comparing many different ryegrasses in the same growing conditions, he sat down with his seed rep to look through the National Forage Variety Trial results.

 

He picked Forge tetraploid hybrid ryegrass as the ‘absolute standout’ for his needs, namely tonnes of premium feed to max out dryland meat production on his best land, which makes up just 5% of the farm.

 

“It was fantastic – fast growing, high yielding. We got four years out of that first paddock in our climate, and, with good management, we’re hoping on average to get three to four years from others we’ve sown.”

 

But 2024 was different.

 

 

Up against it

“We had a phenomenally dry season that lasted right through autumn. Product prices were way down. Our backs were against the wall, both financially and in terms of feed.

 

“We had an area we needed to re-grass – there was no greenery, not even weeds, and for financial reasons we made the call to stitch in a cheaper, non-certified annual. I knew it was a patch up job, just to get something in the ground, and it worked really well.

 

“It got us through winter. Now it’s run out, it will be stitched in again with either Forge, or something more permanent.”

 

Would he do it again in similar circumstances? “Absolutely.”

 

That said, however, it’s not his preferred choice.

 

Bells and whistles

“For longer term pasture, I want to know it has all the bells and whistles to mitigate risk from pests and poor longevity, to give me the performance I need from our stock, and last as long as possible.”

 

He’s particularly mindful of endophyte – first that it is actually present when he expects it to be, and second that seed containing endophyte has been stored properly to ensure it’s alive when it reaches the farm.

 

“There’s a lot of risk in not using endophyte, or sowing seed that doesn’t contain it. If something like Argentine stem weevil gets in early, it can completely smoke your new grass and your financial investment in that grass. You may not have paid a lot of money for the seed, but pests can take two or three years out of that pasture pretty fast…”

 

Seeing first hand Barenbrug’s cool store management for endophytic seed on a recent visit was a real eye-opener, he says.

 

“Before that I didn’t realise how vulnerable endophyte was. I wasn’t the only one in that farmer group who came away thinking I needed to change the way I store seed on-farm.  Asking how seed has been stored before you get it is important too, no different to asking how your animal vaccines have been stored. You wouldn’t use a vaccine that hasn’t been refrigerated.”

 

The extra mile

Cool storage is just one of many steps we take to protect seed quality and mitigate the risk of stress and disappointment in your pasture renewal.

 

But as Richard learned, it is a critical one. Which is why we’ve gone the extra mile this season, and opened a new cool store at our re-developed seed mixing site in the heart of the Waikato.

 

Built specifically to keep endophytic seed at the right temperature and humidity until as close to sowing time as possible, it was full of autumn orders by mid-January.

 

Unlike those dodgy sausages in the 1800s, there’s no mystery in this. And none in any bags of our seed, either. Just quality, stewardship, provenance and productivity.

 

Remember, we’re always available to talk over different options for pasture renewal and improvement. Book your free personal Pasture Health Check today.