In South Otago farm owner Scott Johnstone and partner Louise Oldham say the weather, and therefore the pasture, can go quickly from wet and cold to very dry. On the outside, their cows seem to adapt to weather and pasture changes reasonably well, according to Brett Russell (farm manager) and Louise Oldham. The cows looked like they were doing normal production, and the rumination and eating times from the wearables seemed to be in the accepted range.
Back in January 2026 Nutritech’s Otago Area Manager, Steph Paul, and Dr Marjan Sprock from Nutritech’s Technical Team visited Scott and Louise’s farm in Milton. While most people think that looking at cows in the rain doesn’t show anything, this was not the case on this farm. Although the diet on paper was good and the cows were fully fed on pasture with some in-shed feeding, some cows seemed to be losing weight. There were also cows that appeared normal, but when the farm owner Louise checked the rumination and eating of these seemingly healthy animals, they saw that the rumination of these animals was lower than the average of the herd.
At the same visit Steph Paul did some manure sieving to look at the fibre digestion of a random sample of several manure pats. During the manure sieving it became obvious that too much fibre had been excreted and was not well digested in the rumen. Louise and Brett wanted to increase their feed efficiency, stop weight loss and help cows with the digestibility of their diet. The Nutritech team advised Levucell SC® live yeast to be added to the feed in the shed.
Levucell SC® is a natural and well-documented rumen specific live yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae CNCM I-1077) and is selected among thousands of strains for its metabolic activity to enhance rumen functions. Levucell SC® helps optimise rumen pH and increases fibre digestibility to maximise diet potential. This maximising diet potential leads to more milk production and more income over feed costs.
After more than two weeks being on Levucell SC®, Steph revisited the farm and sieved some manure again. This time the fibre percentage in the manure had decreased dramatically. Louise already knew that things had improved as the ‘normal’ dip in the milk production curve had not happened. The cows had kept their level of production, had stopped losing weight and looked significantly better. Louise reaction to the change in production was; ‘I should have put the Levucell SC® in before mating!’
This herd started on Levucell SC® on the 1st of February 2026. In the above milk production graph from this farm, it is obvious that the production did not follow the previous year’s ‘normal’ drop. In this case, the extra milk production in the vat more than covered the cost of the Levucell SC® for Scott and Louise.
Looking at cows, reading their behaviour and signals, going over cows’ diets in every period of the year are some of the many skills that Nutritech can bring to the farm. Nutritech has relationships with several different wearable companies, meaning the nutrition knowledge of Nutritech can be used to help prevent problems as well as solve problems. Talk to your local Nutritech area manager to combine your technology data with nutrition knowledge.