08 Aug Moo, Milk & More – Dairy Trust Taranaki’s Science Digest

Posted at 02:09h in Blog, Science Trials by

Welcome to our blog “Moo, Milk and More – Dairy Trust Taranaki’s Science Digest” brought to you by the science team at Dairy Trust Taranaki.

 

Why a blog?

The mission of Dairy Trust Taranaki is to deliver relevant, word-class research, demonstration and extension to the dairy farmers of Taranaki and New Zealand.  We will use this blog as a platform to share our science and knowledge with Taranaki and New Zealand dairy farmers.

What will we write about?

We will share results from our ongoing science trials and technologies that we are testing on our research farms. In addition, we will write about topics relevant to dairy farmers such as greenhouse gas emissions, diverse pastures and diverse pasture species, body condition scoring and soil quality to name just a few. We also aim to have some guest blogs from industry experts, rural professionals and farmers.

Our first blog posts will be related to science you can do on your own farm, greenhouse gas emissions and results from some of our own trials related to reducing greenhouse gas emissions on farms. So, stay tuned!

We would also love to get input from Taranaki and New Zealand dairy farmers on what topics or science trials you would like to hear more about.

Who are we?

The science team at Dairy Trust Taranaki is an enthusiastic crew who enjoys working in dairy science. Our team consists of our head of science, a science analyst and two science technicians:

Mags Bremer is our head of science. Originally a pharmacist from Germany, she came to Aotearoa thirteen years ago and fell in love with dairy farming.

3 favourite things about working for Dairy Trust Taranaki: the purpose and vision of DTT, my team and working in Taranaki.

Least favorite task: calibration cuts

Marianne Read is our science analyst. Her main task is to collect and analyze data from our science trials. Marianne is an organic chemist from Norway turned dairy farmer and dairy scientist.

3 favourite things about working for Dairy Trust Taranaki: get to work with interesting and relevant science for the dairy industry, the cows and nice colleagues.

Least favourite task: cutting plot trials

Louise Kay is one of our science technicians who moved to Taranaki from Hamilton at the beginning of the year after finishing a masters in environmental science with a focus on soils and soil nutrients.

3 favorite things about working for the Dairy Trust Taranaki: the cows, working outdoors, and learning about the dairy industry.

Least favorite task: Sorting plot trials

Taylah Dagg is our other science technician who moved back home to the Taranaki region at the beginning of 2024 after finishing a microbiology masters.

3 favorite things about working for Dairy Trust Taranaki: the calves, the team and gaining experience in the dairy sector.

Least favorite task: Sorting plot trials

The Dairy Trust Taranaki science team

 

  • Marianne Read

    Marianne started working for Dairy Trust Taranaki in August 2023. As a science analyst her main focus is collecting and analysing the data from our science trials. Marianne is relatively new to the dairy industry but has over 13 years’ experience working within various fields of science. Marianne has a Phd in Organic chemistry from the University Oslo in Norway. She moved to New Zealand in 2020 and is now living on a dairy farm in north Taranaki with her husband and two boys.