Lady luck shines on Wagin farming family

Kara and Jai Jeffery are tearing through their seeding program with buoyant hay prices and strong demand prompting them to up their oat plantings. The couple farm 20km north-west of Wagin on Piesseville-Tarwonga Road with Kara’s parents Austin and Di Dohle. Kara and Jai have been on the property since harvest 2014, when they returned to the farm Kara grew up on as a child to join the family partnership. The Jefferys and Dohles were about halfway through seeding this week, with all of their oats for grain, and lupins in the ground after their traditional April 15 seeding start. They plan to move on to oats for hay, barley and wheat next week. Austin and Di have more than doubled the size of the property since taking on the Dohle’s family property in 1984. Without elaborating on how big the farm was, Jai said it was “hopefully big enough to keep our two boys busy” — referring to his and Kara’s two sons, Leo, 2, and Max, four months. Jai grew up in Beverley, and met Kara, a civil structure engineer, when he was working on a fly-in, fly-out roster as a diesel mechanic in the Pilbara. The pair met at Jai’s brother’s wedding in 2013 and married in 2017, three years after they first moved back to the farm. “Kara wanted to get back to agriculture and when her parents bought the property we are living in now, they offered us the opportunity to try our hand at farming,” Jai said. “Austin and Di needed help during harvest, so we came to help and we haven’t looked back.” Together they run the 50/50 cropping and sheep farm, mating 6000-7000 Merino ewes a year. Depending on the season, the family could run between 10,000 to 15,000 Merino sheep, and also have a “small flock of Dohne” sheep. Their main target is to cut a lot of wool, after selling their last crossbred sheep about four years ago to simplify the operation. It is a team effort at harvest, with Austin and either Kara or farmhand Simon Dawson on the headers, Jai driving the road train, seasonal staff driving the chaser bin, and Di serving as the “occasional chaser bin driver, who just keeps everyone going”. At seeding, Austin is in charge of spraying while Jai is in charge of the sheep, fertiliser, sourcing seed, picking grain, and other odd but important jobs. Now in his sixth year of farming and fifth seeding season, Jai said he had learned a lot after moving to the farm in 2014. “I was surprised at how many jobs a farmer has to take care of, marketing, accounting, veterinarian, mechanic, fencing ... a lot of labour jobs,” he said. “There is nothing they (farmers) can’t do, you try your hand at a bit of everything yourself.” The Jefferys and Dohles are feeling good about the year ahead, with plans to seed more than half of their operation to oats. While oats have always played an important part in their program, this year they increased their plantings to capitalise on a reasonable base price for oaten hay. About 60 per cent of their oat program is targeting grain for delivery to CBH and UniGrain, while about 40 per cent is for hay. About a third of the program will be planted to barley, while the rest will be put to lupins and a small parcel of wheat. “We had good rain in March and lot of our clover germinated and was going quite well,” Jai said. “But a lot of that has died since because it has been so dry. “We started going with seeding, thinking it was dry. But some of our oats have already come up.” Most of the hay is contracted to Gilmac for export, while the oats are sold to CBH and UniGrain. “We are really happy with the prices for hay,” Jai said. “We have had a number of good years of hay and the before-contract hay prices are looking pretty good. “We are increasing our hay hectares this year, and we have the capacity to cut it in time and have Big Bale Company bale it.” The buoyant hay price has offset some of the farmers’ concern about the dampened wool price. The Eastern Market Indicator has dropped 735c/kg year-on-year after trading at 1960c/kg clean this time last year. Jai said the farmers sheared Dohne sheep and Merino lambs in January, and the adult Merinos in September. “The wool price has come off a bit,” he said. “But you are still selling Merino ewes and lambs for a good price, if you can keep them in good nick. “Grain prices are all in 90 percentile ranges, and we had good early autumn so we hope some of our program will be up this week.” Jai said it had been a dusty start to seeding, but there had been a “bit of green popping up”, with some oats already out of the ground. “We have had the odd dewy morning that has come through, and that seems to have helped,” he said. While Grain Industry Association of WA has flagged canola plantings to rise this year, Jai said they dropped canola from their program about four years ago. With about 6mm rain recorded this week, adding to the 40mm recorded since the start of the year, Jai was feeling optimistic about the year ahead. “Last year, it was completely dry at this time of year ... the whole program came up off a May 15 rain,” Jai said. “There is a bit of optimism there, and it is good to see some crops up and about already. “Sowing early so far looks to have paid off, even if the decision to start comes more from a lifestyle perspective than an agronomic one.”