Farm Nutrient Advisory Ltd.

12/05/2026

Thanks to Mark & Sophie at NextGen Agri for having me again. As Sophie puts it, my love & passion for minerals is like theirs’ for genetics, both of which play essential roles in achieving maximum farm efficiency.

Being that one student through all my varsity years who really struggled keeping to word limits, that has definitely flowed into my presentations so thank you to all those who stuck it out until the end!

Click the image for the webinar link. Hopefully there’s some useful content for everyone to apply in some shape or form.

Despite its impact on animal health, reproduction, growth and wool quality, mineral nutrition is often misunderstood or pushed aside, particularly in hill co...

07/05/2026

Thanks to those who took time out to attend!

Don't forget to join us tonight to discuss all things minerals, 8pm NZ time.

Join us on our next Hub LIVE to get back to basics on one of the most overlooked drivers of stock performance and farm profitability, mineral status.

Despite its impact on animal health, reproduction, growth and wool quality, mineral nutrition is often misunderstood or pushed aside, particularly in hill country and extensive systems.

Join Mark and Melinda Turner of Farm Nutrient Advisory Ltd. to hear about:

- Why mineral status is fundamental to optimal health and production
- The real efficacy and longevity of common mineral treatments, including injections and boluses
- The impact on pregnancy, lamb survival, growth and wool
- The role of monitoring in knowing whether your treatments are actually working
- How getting the mineral basics right can lift farm gate profits and unlock full genetic potential

📅 Thursday 7 May
⏰ 8:00–9:00pm NZST
🔗 https://buff.ly/kf2QQJ6

30/04/2026

Final call for anyone interested in a visit in Waikato in the next month I'll be confirming dates in the coming days.

👉fully independent advice, NO product to sell
👉all farm systems
👉soil/pasture health assessments
👉fertiliser recommendations
👉animal health assessments
👉dietary analysis
👉mineral recommendations
👉feed recommendations
👉discussion/farmer groups

30/04/2026

For those who don't follow LinkedIn, yesterday the CEO of the NZ Climate Change Commission put out a post stipulating farmers had to do three things to farm viably:
1. Increase productivity;
2. Absorb shocks;
3. Reduce emissions.

I agree with absorb shocks & I agree with reduce emissions but why on earth is the Climate Change Commission telling farmers they need to increase production in order to be sustainable⁉️ The implications of this can be catastrophic 😵 When you tell a farmer to "increase production", 'more stock, more milk, more nitrogen' is the outcome, the complete opposite to the resilience, sustainability & reduced emission’s they are striving for.

What should be encouraged is to increase EFFICIENCY - increasing production & increasing efficiency are not the same.

While there are many farming variables, everything comes together in the form of economics. Accurate economics (NOT averages) will tell you if what you’re doing is optimal or counterproductive & from there you can scrutinise with the right advice what actions are required to improve system efficiency.

💰Economists use the term production function to describe the relationship between inputs & the volume of output (product).

💶Technical efficiency is how you use your scarce resources (land, capital, labour) to MINIMISE INPUT but obtain your target output.

💵Production efficiency on the other hand is how we maximise output with effective distribution of our resources but within their limits (WITHIN LIMITS - something our industry leaders are very unfamiliar with/or don't care about to the detriment of the farmer's & the environment).

💷 When we combine both our technical & productive efficiency we arrive at our OPTIMUM ECONOMIC EFFICIENCY – this is where every business should or at least aim, to be yet most farms operate outside this due to bad, sales-driven advice.

Our economic efficiency is achieved where marginal cost & marginal product (the supply & demand curves respectively) intersect. This cannot be seen working with averages (Farmax & our GHG calculations to date) yet it’s all that NZ 'experts' ever talk about.

Economic analysis from Riden 2009, Ridler 2014 & Anderson 2020 showed nearly ALL dairy farms in NZ operate where their marginal costs exceed marginal return – the farmers are paying more to make less! The same issue occurs in sheep & beef with lambs on the ground above what can actually be fed well-enough to be efficient.

That’s not smart farming yet our industry promotes it based on massively flawed data & the drive to sell more fertiliser.

The simple concept of diminishing returns helps to understand PRODUCTION vs PROFIT. The point of the lowest marginal cost & highest marginal product for any given business is the start of the diminishing returns curve, for every additional input beyond this point there’s decreasing benefit from the extra 💲💲💲.
Operating within the 'stage two' of diminishing returns remains profitable & worthwhile up to that 'sweet spot', beyond which is pointless.

The trouble with our current system is that at individual farm scale, basic economic theory is replaced with benchmarks & averages completely ignoring the fundamentals of matching individual farm production with profitability. When this is done, it costs the farmers, the animals, the environment & public health.

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30/04/2026

I read an article published in the Business Rural Magazine today promoting a business as "independent" with "qualified" reps, neither true or correct in the sense of the promotion, needlessly misinforming farmers who will potentially pay for it 💰🚽

I'm curious as to whether media companies are responsible on any level for false advertising, the content they themselves edit & proof-read before circulating to thousands of readers. Or, does the accountability solely lie with the company who are knowingly making those claims & misleading readers in the first instance?

Should the media also be held to account publishing information that within a matter of seconds can be determined as false if they were to do any level of background research or due diligence?

In this particular article, there was a claim the business's fertiliser advice is "independent". The definition of independent needed to be clarified at least in the fine print because what the article is portraying, is "independent advice" yet this company also sells fertiliser so their independence isn't from sales, it still relies on selling product, whether needed or not to remain a viable business.

"Independent" for this company is only referring to the fact it's a privately-owned but the advice is far from unbiased or independent of the sales outcome.

Furthermore, it promotes "qualified" 🎓 staff but it appears their definition of 'qualified' is a very loose one with a 'qualification' only seemingly related to either previous farming or sales experience. The general public on the other hand, or more importantly the farmer audience, would assume "qualified" is in reference to at least a tertiary, degree-level qualification in the area of advice provided.

Farmer's cannot be expected to know or investigate every claim 'sold' to them but in its current state, our system is failing them. There are many 🚩that will help differentiate true advice vs 💩 but if you are not paying your advisor (a living-wage) directly, it's a good assumption they are relying on selling product that you may or often, may not need!

Take-away message:
👉don't believe everything you read
👉don't be afraid to ask questions
👉don't be afraid to challenge questionable claims!

24/04/2026

Join Mark & I in a couple of weeks to discuss animal health & what you can do to help stock come through the winter months in top nick 🐑 ❄️

Join us on our next Hub LIVE to get back to basics on one of the most overlooked drivers of stock performance and farm profitability, mineral status.

Despite its impact on animal health, reproduction, growth and wool quality, mineral nutrition is often misunderstood or pushed aside, particularly in hill country and extensive systems.

Join Mark and Melinda Turner of Farm Nutrient Advisory Ltd. to hear about:

- Why mineral status is fundamental to optimal health and production
- The real efficacy and longevity of common mineral treatments, including injections and boluses
- The impact on pregnancy, lamb survival, growth and wool
- The role of monitoring in knowing whether your treatments are actually working
- How getting the mineral basics right can lift farm gate profits and unlock full genetic potential

📅 Thursday 7 May
⏰ 8:00–9:00pm NZST
🔗 https://buff.ly/kf2QQJ6

03/04/2026

This week I had the pleasure to present a webinar for a farmer discussion group whose objective is to improve animal health 🐑🐮🦌🐐

With animal health largely driven by nutrition & nutrition being such a large, complex topic, we started with just the basics of trace element requirements.

Both farms in NZ & Australia tend to forget the fundamental roles (or rather don't get the correct advice) trace elements play in animal production with appropriate supplementation an area of huge opportunity for farm efficiency, sustainability & profitability 🫰

It's also an area that deserves full attention regardless of fertiliser policy - regular liming inputs will increase trace element availability but regardless if farming with conventional, organic or 'regenerative' inputs, no pasture management philosophy can remove the need for direct stock supplementation if animal health & welfare are important (which they should be in every case) 🤠

I've included just a few of the slides we discussed, for summary purposes:

🧪 the “pathological” ranges provided by the lab/vets are NOT nutritional ranges.

🧬 There is a clear economic difference between ‘adequate’ whereby clinical (visual) disease is unlikely & optimum, where actual growth is maximised & genetic potential can be expressed.

💉Selenium & zinc in the form of multimineral injections is not long-lasting. The liver may offer approximately 10 days buffer of circulating minerals but if you are relying on one injection for adequate supplementation there remains deficiency beyond that. Selovin LA or Smartshot Plus are long-acting forms.

❗️Iodine is not just required for sheep & blood inorganic iodine values are highly relevant given once incorporated into the thyroid the iodine in hormones cannot cross the placenta or in milk in levels sufficient for the growing foetus or suckling lamb/calf/fawn.

‼️You don’t not have to have goitre present or an enlarged thyroid to have an iodine deficiency.

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21/03/2026

Happy Saturday FaceBook Followers, I need some participation votes please for a bit of market research to assess options for business expansion.

I’m a big believer of independence & have a strong aversion to advice/consultancy driven by the incentive to sell which pretty much makes up the whole New Zealand & Australian agricultural industry, costing farmers tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands, each year in unnecessary inputs, reduced animal health, veterinary expenses, crop performance, profitability 💲💲💲

This doesn’t even touch on the negative implications on the environment, soil health, human health, all of which are given no consideration when 'the sale is what matters'.

I already provide fully independent advice for fertiliser & animal nutrition with absolutely no product or company bias & no commission or backhanders in any shape or form - I charge farmers direct an hourly rate plus travel (some companies acknowledge this whereby they then actually discount the 'commission' off the client's invoice!). Despite the apparent higher upfront costs in consultancy, the outcomes & farm profitability are significantly higher as a direct result of higher farm efficiency, inputs solely based on what is needed & a whole farm system's approach where soil, plant & animal health are all interconnected 🧑‍🌾🐑🌾🌱

Without that interconnection, the system is broken. Silo mindsets do not work for anyone other than the suppliers.

I am however often asked about cropping & spraying regimes which I’ve always avoided advising on due to insufficient knowledge to do such topics full justice & I'm a firm believer in 'staying in your own lane' rather than advising outside your qualifications (a concept many are unfamiliar with 🙄).

On that note, I've been toying with the idea of expanding business services by bringing in a specialist to advise on plant agronomy i.e. specifically seed & spray. This would follow the exact same business model I currently run whereby a recommendation provided would be based on seed/sprays that are best suited & actually needed, maximising efficiency & sustainability.

We do not supply any products so purchases would continue to go through the usual suppliers but removes the risk of getting a sales rep to provide a ‘recommendation’ when there’s clear incentive to sell a particular company’s seed, encourage application of more sprays etc. As with fertiliser & ‘nutrition’ reps alike, the ‘free’ advice always costs more in the long run as their objective is not the same as farmer objective.

I’m keen to gauge the wider current mindset & potential support of independent seed & spray advice to determine if there’s enough demand to warrant expansion or at least further consideration. I’d be grateful if you could participate by voting a 👍 for yes or 😆 for no (but if you’re a sales rep & vote no then I’ll be a bit suspicious 🤫).

15/03/2026

With April nearly upon us (eek!) I'm going to be confirming dates for my autumn travels to the upper North Island & all regions in the South Island for anyone interested (dates to be confirmed depending on the majority's availability). At this stage it's looking likely to have at least one winter trip South also.

This round of farm visits will largely be dairy based to ensure dry-off plans implemented prior are going smoothly with cow condition well up there, along with draft fertiliser & feed plans for the season ahead. A few deer, sheep & beef visits thrown in too for a nice bit of variety 🐄🦌🐑

Those who are not current clients but interested to learn more, I offer a free, remote no obligation consult to discuss what I offer & relative to your farm's requirements.

Where time permits, I'm always happy to meet with other likeminded RPs as I'm a firm believer collaboration is going to get everyone & most importantly the farmers a lot further successfully than egos & competition ☕

14/03/2026

Part III of III & the completion of the mineral chronicles (I think🤐).

As touched on in part II, when I discuss with a client using liver biopsies & bloods for assessing trace element status, I bet my bottom dollar when first requesting for zinc, that their vet asks “why” as for some reason it’s all too common for zinc to be disregarded as an essential element despite its contribution to animal health.

Well, here’s some of why…Zn plays key roles in nutrient metabolism, both the innate (first line defence) & adaptive immunity, skin & mucous membrane integrity, intestinal permeability/absorption, growth & musculoskeletal development, reproduction including oogenesis, oocyte maturation, fertilisation & spermatogenesis as well as being a major driver in the number of wool follicles & fibre strength 🐑

There are no long-term body stores of zinc therefore the diet must provide daily adequate intake. Neither serum nor liver zinc are perfect measures but both do provide insights to dietary intake with low levels indicative of deficiency. As with selenium, the liver provides a more ‘stable’ value of intake from the last 7-10 days but bloods can be useful if livers are unable to be done for some time.

Zinc deficiency leads to decreased feed intake, reduced growth as result of both lower DMI & lower feed conversion efficiency due to increased intestinal permeability (leaky gut syndrome, see an early post), impaired immune function, poor hoof integrity increasing susceptibility to foot rot, poor skin health/hair loss/scaly skin, drooling, lameness, decreased fertility & decreased wool follicles.

FUN FACT 🙌 Due to its role in mucous membrane/epithelial integrity, Zn deficiency is implicated in woody tongue development.

Multimineral injections include zinc (as well copper, selenium & manganese) however this would not fix a deficiency given it's been & gone in less than two weeks. The Cu from such injections is the only ‘long’ lasting element yet still only covers for a couple of months.

Ranges provided for Zn from labs/vets in NZ are not true or correct but based on averages with no applicability to nutrition. The upper range references the ‘danger zone’ ✈️ for stock on facial eczema treatment while the lower range is simply because it’s common i.e. the average – news flash 🚨, the lower range is deficient!

Such ranges illustrate the importance in knowing your subject & understanding how to interpret the data. Agricultural labs (soil/herbage) & pathology labs typically don't provide reference ranges that are meaningful or relative to nutritional assessment. Pathology labs provide just that, pathological ranges (to put it crudely, the animal isn't dead or it is indeed nearly dead ☠️) whereas my objective is to ensure we are farming animals optimally, efficiently & profitably & well from the borders of under performance.

Nutrition is complex & needs to be evaluated as such by a suitable qualified advisor specifically trained in nutrition 🤯

14/03/2026

Part II of III - The Chronicles of Minerals!

Following on from the part I, there is real need for increasing farmer & RP awareness of the true requirements for minerals & effective, efficient supplementation. It is well-known that animals with mineral deficiencies have higher energy requirements, lower immunity, fertility, growth rates, lower phenotypic expression. All unnecessarily resulting in lower farm efficiency & profitability.

When assessing trace element status, I request we look at copper, iodine, selenium, zinc & B12 with a combination of bloods & livers for which we need to collaborate with the vet. While the range the vet considers ‘optimal’ & what I consider nutritionally optimal are two very different things as per Part I, there’s no qualms in getting Cu, Se & B12 tested but iodine & zinc on the other hand always get ‘push back’ & questioned; a prime example of the limited nutritional knowledge in the industry.

Iodine is commonly incorrectly associated with only goitre with most (vets) under the impression there is no issue unless an abnormal thyroid is present. Similarly, there is an incorrect belief that only sheep need iodine & testing the blood is not a useful diagnostic tool because it only represents dietary intake over the last few days.

Well, here’s the thing….if your stock eats pasture all year round, then that ‘few days’ worth of intake is highly applicable to the farm system & expected dietary availability of a given nutrient in this instance, wouldn’t be expected to change significantly seasonally seeing as we have bu**er all iodine in our pastures.

The other reason to assess iodine in the blood is the fact once it’s in the thyroid & incorporated into hormones, it can no longer cross the placenta (& minimally in milk) for embryonic or foetal development hence requirement for actual circulating iodine. Iodine deficient pregnant ewes cause a permanent abnormal follicle development in the foetus thereby severely limiting the wool growth & quality of future generation wool (probably not a selling point for some but in fine wool breeds quite valuable!).

The thyroid & therefore iodine essentially controls every part of us; appetite, metabolism, growth, thermoregulation, neuromuscular function, immunity, reproduction, foetal development, lactation, cortisol (stress). There has been plenty of evidence globally that iodine blood levels are effective at diagnosing deficiency which similarly to any other, by the time you physically see clinical symptoms such as an enlarged thyroid, production losses have already been significant both in terms of reproduction, mortality & growth rate.

Oral drenches have no lasting effect at all on circulatory iodine levels so can be fine for pre-mating to increase conception rate but will have no prolonged effect to help with foetal development during pregnancy or lactation. Daily supplementation or long-acting injections are must haves.