Recording supplementary feed for the Fonterra Farm Dairy Record

By Dave Wilson. Published 3 October 2026.

What the Farm Dairy Record is

Under Fonterra's terms of supply, every Fonterra farm must complete a Farm Dairy Record (FDR) during May and June (Farmers Weekly, May 2025). It is filled in online through Farm Source and covers how the farm ran over the season, including the feed that came in.

What is filled in for you

From the 2025 record, Fonterra said up to 70% of Farm Dairy Records would be pre-filled with data from LIC, CRV, Ravensdown, Ballance, Agrifeeds and DairyNZ. The farmer checks the data and accepts it (Farmers Weekly).

Agrifeeds is the only feed merchant in that list. Farm Source also lists data connections to farm software, including Trev and FarmIQ, so if you already record feed in one of those, check whether it flows through. If your feed comes from any other merchant and you don't record it in connected software, the feed numbers are typed in by hand.

Why the feed numbers matter

Fonterra uses the information farmers give in their Farm Dairy Records to estimate each farm's on-farm emissions (Fonterra, July 2019). Fonterra's guide to its emissions approach lists both the type and the volume of imported feed as things that change a farm's emissions number (Fonterra, November 2023). So it is worth getting the tonnes right, and having the dockets to back them up. The same PKE tonnes also tell you your PKE per cow per day, which affects your FEI fat grade.

What Farm Dairy Record feed questions ask for

Check the exact questions in your own record on Farm Source before you start, since the form can change from one season to the next. For each supplement you bought in, have:

• the feed type: PKE, DDG, barley, maize silage, minerals and so on
• the total tonnes delivered over the season the record covers
• the merchant it came from
• if the record asks for dry matter, the dry matter percentage of each feed, from the merchant's product information

Blended loads need splitting first. A blend of PKE and DDG is two feed types, not one, so work out the tonnes of each from the blend recipe and the net weight on the docket.

Step by step

1. Gather the paper. Every delivery docket for the season from every merchant, plus each merchant's statements.
2. Split the blends. For each blended load, multiply the net weight by each feed's share of the blend.
3. Total by feed type. Add up the tonnes of each feed for the season, across all merchants.
4. Check against the statements. Each merchant's total on your dockets should match what they billed. Chase up any missing dockets now, not in June.
5. Enter the totals in the feed part of your Farm Dairy Record, and keep the dockets with your farm records.

Make next May easier

Most of the work above is finding dockets and adding them up months after the feed arrived. It is easier to do as each load comes in:

• Photograph each docket when the truck leaves, so a lost or wet docket doesn't leave a gap.
• Split blended loads when they arrive, while the recipe is known.
• Keep a running total by feed type and merchant through the season.

FeedTally does these three things. Workers photograph the docket on their phone, the app splits blends into each feed, and the owner sees tonnes by feed type, shed and merchant. At the end of the season, the full delivery log exports to a spreadsheet, where you can total each feed for the season. A season summary laid out like the Farm Dairy Record feed section is coming soon, with no date yet.

How docket scanning works and feed delivery records by shed and supplier

Sources

• Form filling just got easier on dairy farms, Farmers Weekly, 28 May 2025
• Understanding data connections, Farm Source
• Every farm to get a unique biological emissions profile, Fonterra, 31 July 2019
• What this emissions reduction approach means for us, Fonterra, November 2023