Shane Simpson: No Silver Bullet To Success

In 2020 Simpson & Son Farming was crowned the overall winner and national silage king in Plaas Media’s Santam Agriculture National Silage Competition.

- Izak Hofmeyr

The victory, however, was bittersweet for the Simpson family, with the passing of St John Simpson in a veld fire just weeks before the announcement.

Their winning silage bunker was entered by Meadow Feeds Natal and achieved an overall score of 87,6. According to Prof Robin Meeske of the Outeniqua Research Farm and chairperson of the competition’s protocol committee, various aspects of this silage stood out – the overall compaction, top-layer compaction, silage stability, high starch content, high energy content, and excellent preservation stood head and shoulders above the rest.

The Simpsons entered the competition for the first time in 2019 and achieved tenth place overall that year. This, said Prof Meeske, is a clear indication of the competition’s value in respect of improved silage practices.

Putting pastures to good use

Patriarch Shane Simpson is the fourth generation to farm in the Kokstad area. It was his idea to change the farming enterprise’s focus to a pasture-based dairy. They currently milk in two parlors: 450 cows on Misty Hill Farm and 1 200 cows on their home farm, Cooperdale. In all, they have 80ha of irrigated maize and 37ha of dryland maize fields.

Apart from the dairy herd, they run an Angus beef herd of around 350 cows in order to utilize the veld on the farm. “The New Zealanders taught us how to farm grass for dairy cows. They effectively structured a very complex enterprise to get the most out of the grass,” says Shane.