10 CATTLE COUNTRY May 2017
Nerbas family take home the 2017 TESA award BY ANGELA LOVELL Winners of The Environmental Sustainability Award for Manitoba (TESA) are the Nerbas family, who own and operate Nerbas Brothers Angus near Shellmouth. Their family beef operation, which is mainly cow/ calf, consists of 100 purebred Black Angus and 500 commercial cows. They also market breeding stock and their focus has been to produce cattle that thrive on a forage based diet. “We’re trying to produce a smaller frame maternal type cow that basically can thrive on forage,” says Arron Nerbas, who farms with father, Gene, mother, Cynthia and brother, Shane. “We want cows that can calve on their own at pasture and don’t need high input feed.” The Nerbas’ have always taken a holistic approach to the management of their farm, but took a formal Holistic Management course – facilitated by Don Campbell – about 12 years ago. “We were never non-holistic in terms
of our approach, so we agreed with the general principles of profitability, environment, sustainability and family, but we thought that there are always other things we could learn and apply to what we were doing to make it better.” Double the Forage Production Their ultimate goal is to work with nature, the land and their animals to produce the most beef they can on grass. One of the biggest takeaways from their holistic management course was the grazing principles and management, which have helped them double their forage production on a per acre basis. “Our system isn’t as intensive as some, but it’s definitely a form of planned intensive grazing,” says Nerbas. “In summer we split the cows into two main groups of around 250 head each, and rotate through a series of around 100 paddocks. They’re generally on an 80 acre piece for three to five days. We like to leave a lot of residue
GRUNTHAL LIVESTOCK AUCTION MART
Check out our Market Report online UPDATED WEEKLY
Regular sales every Tuesday at 9:00 a.m. Saturday, May 6 at 10:00 a.m. Equipment Consignment Sale Monday, May 8 & 29 and June 12 & 26 at 12:00 p.m. Sheep and Goat with Small Animals & Holstein Calves Saturday, June 10 at 10:00 a.m. Horse & Tack Sale For on-farm appraisal of livestock or marketing information, call
BRAD KEHLER - Manager/Field Rep. 1-204-434-6519 office or 204-346-2440 cell 204-434-9367 fax Box 71 Grunthal, Manitoba R0A 0R0
www.grunthallivestock.com g_lam@hotmail.ca
Nerbas Bros. Angus captured The Environmental Sustainability Award for Manitoba at the MBP AGM in February. The family has a 600 head operation near Shellmouth. Photos Courtesy of Nerbas Bros. Angus.
behind for a lot of reasons, for snow trap, for the plants to re-seed themselves, for shade, water infiltration, a lot of different things. It’s like leaving behind a bit of a solar panel so the grass regenerates faster, whereas if you graze it right off your solar panel is gone.” The Nerbas’ grazing system achieves increased productivity through using the animals and their grazing to cycle nutrients and maintain soil health for more maximum grass production. “We’re continually trying to improve our forage base on our top land more or less through grazing principles, with long rest and recovery periods,” says Nerbas. “Nutrient cycling through bale grazing is a big thing for us. It works extremely well to bring in outside nutrition through the bales and build up thatch and organic matter in the soil. Our top land is quite sandy and light and it responds to it extremely well. We get 10 times the forage production in the areas we bale graze, it’s quite amazing. The only problem is we can only cover a small portion at a time. So we’re just trying
to, year after year, build our soils in terms of organic matter, microbial activity, and just general soil health, thatch, organic matter, and biodiversity of species. We’re using some seeding principles to incorporate legumes into our pastures as well through the seed drill and then some broadcasting and through mineral fed to the cows.” Coping with Flooding Their biggest challenge has been continuous flooding on around 1000 acres of their land along the Assiniboine River valley. “It used to be highly productive, tame forage stands, but due to perpetual flooding it’s reverted back to wild type hay,” says Nerbas. “It’s not something we can control, so we have had to adapt to it and we do some salvage grazing and haying there when we can. It’s highly difficult and challenging in terms of management.” The Nerbas’ have
SOUND BEEF NUTRITION Now available from
Winnipeg Office:1-866-626-3933 | Gilles: 204-805-2094 www.mbbeef.ca
worked with their local Conservation District to implements projects such as off-site watering sites, riparian area fencing and forage establishment. They have certification through the Verified Beef Production and Holistic Management programs. Their environmental goals for the future include continuing to improve soil health, fertility and productivity through continuous improvement of their holistic management practices. They want to increase biodiversity in their forage stands to increase nitrogen fixation and overall grassland health. They want to keep pushing the envelope to try and decrease days on feed versus grazing season, and believe in a philosophy of regenerative agriculture that will leave their land in better condition than when they started. A Huge Honour Tere Stykalo of MNP,
one of the sponsors of the annual award, presented the TESA award to the Nerbas family during the banquet at the Manitoba Beef Producers Annual General Meeting in February. TESA recognizes producers who go above and beyond standard industry conservation practices and set positive examples for other cattle producers and the general public. “I knew about the TESA award, and always found it interesting to see who won it on an annual basis and read their stories, so in the back of my mind I suppose I knew that what we do on a daily basis sort of applied,” says Nerbas. “Although it wasn’t our goal to be nominated for the award, it is certainly a huge honour to win it.” The Nerbas family will represent Manitoba at the CCA's national TESA competition in Calgary in July.