NZ Herefords:Red Rag October 2007

Breeders Show Support for Super Sires

President’s Note

Registry Report

Hereford Tour 2008

Better, faster beef

Hereford Prime leaves its mark

Growth For Miniature Herefords

Steak of Origin 2008

DEADLINE DATES

1. Breeders Show Support for Super Sires

The support and popularity for the Hereford Super Sires project is proven with just a handful of places left between the two grazing units.

Planning is well under way with both the North and South Island groups securing grazing properties and participating breeders being finalised.

In the North the Awhea property of the Langtry family (Manawatu) is being used and in the South, former Wairau Valley Hereford breeder Bruce McKenzie (Marlborough) has been secured.
Organising committees are currently working through the logistics of the project and will be calling for a commitment to participate in the near future. Confirmation of individual bulls will be required closer to January.

Both groups will be following the same guidelines,enhancing the competitive environment and providing continuity and consistency across the final 20 sires.

Both Super Sire properties can graze up to 15 yearling sires used in stud service with a minimum of 20 cows (10 registered). An unled class in the Hereford sale has been established at the Meat & Wool NZ Beef Expo for a maximum of 20 bulls from the Super Sires grazing properties. If a selection process is needed it will be carried out by the participating breeders of the respective property. The led class will continue at Expo.

If you’d like to take part and are not listed please register your interest with your respective organising committee chairman, David Morrow (South) ph 03)303 9749 or Graham Potter (North) ph 09)233 4878.

Interested NI Breeders*:
Hukaroa, Big River, Ardo, Beanbah, Leelands, Awhea, Craigmore, Otapawa, Kairuru, Koanui, Ngakouka, Karamu, Otengi, Glendale, Mahuta, Na Puteputi, Te Puna.

Interested SI Breeders*:
Duncraigen, Okawa, Beechwood, Locharburn, Lake Station, Westholm, Monymusk, Seadowns, Merrylea, Flagstaff, Waikaka, Merry Weather, Stoneburn, Grassmere, Capethorne, Richon, Moorpark, Koromiko, Limehills, Twynham, Eldin, Nithdale.

* Note these lists comprise of all breeders who intend to enter a bull for Hereford Super Sires this year or in the future.

2. President’s Note

I have just finished a rather lengthy phone call from an enthusiastic young man in Auckland. His name is Dominic. He has a web site; www.beef-semen.com which specialises in marketing beef semen.

Dominic has just conducted an internet semen auction for the Shorthorn Association. We discussed at length a shared vision of a “Trade Me” for livestock.

Costs are killing our farming industry. The internet has the potential to provide better market penetration and reduce selling costs.

People often ask me, “what is council doing about so and so?” or “what does council think about xyz?”

My replies are usually along the line of, “what would you like to see happen?” or “what do you think?”

It is the job of councillors to listen to the thoughts and ideas of members, then implement programmes that will benefit all members by adding value to their cattle. Councillors are not the leaders; we are the administrators of our great breed of cattle.

Every year registered Hereford breeders sell some 7000 registered bulls and, at a guess, 2000 females to a wide ranging commercial market.

Many of these animals are sold by auction and the balance by private treaty. My question to you is, “does Hereford need another option? Should your Councillors invest time and energy on exploring an internet selling option for registered Hereford?”

I also hear comments along the line of, “we are small breeders. What can we do to help our breed?”

My reply is, “strive to learn more about the beef industry. Decide your specific target market. Strive to breed better and more appropriate cattle for your targeted sector and support, as best you can, the activities of your society, club and fellow breeders.”

Last year Hereford, with four entries in the finals, was swamped by our competitors in the Steak of Origin competition.

Our breed produces superior beef; Hereford Prime is the best branded beef product in the market.

Hereford can better their rivals in the Steak of Origin, but only if Hereford are entered. This year please support the breed in the Steak of Origin with an entry from your stud!

John Morrison,
President NZHA

3. Registry Report

ONLINE REGISTRATIONS & PERFORMANCE RECORDING
Contact me at the Office if you wish to register or performance record your herd data online.

GROUP RUN CUT OFF
If you have 400-day weights, or any other data to be processed for inclusion in the November Group Run, they will need to be at the office no later than FRIDAY 26TH OCTOBER 2007.

ADLs are due back at the office by 31st OCTOBER 2007.
In order that calf entry forms can be posted out early November, there will be no extra time allowed for late ADLs. If you have not returned your ADL you will be billed for all females three years old and over that are prelisted.

AI SIRES
Please check your AI Sires are registered with the Association prior to purchasing, selling or advertising semen.
This can be done by checking in the Hereford Herd Book on page 63, or by contacting the Office.
Artificial Insemination and Ova Transplant regulations are documented
in the back of the Herd Book pg 708 - 710.

DONOR DAMS
Please ensure the registration of your ET calves by supplying the Office with donor dams DNA profiles at or prior to calf entry time. Recipient dam details can also be submitted.

DNA CERTIFICATES
When having DNA profiles processed, please inform your technician, of the animal details including, Herd Book number, name, sex, date of birth and breed to ensure clarity in the DNA certificate.On receiving your certificate back please check the details are correct, a DNA profile is printed on it and it has been signed by a technician.

OBSERVED PADDOCK MATINGS
A reminder to use the ‘Observed Paddock Mating’ service code ‘O’ when recording calves this year.
An observed mating date must be submitted, when entering the ‘O’ code.
This must be an actual observation of the successful mating – signs that a cow has been bulling is not sufficient evidence. The use of tail paint, heat detectors are recommended.

Linda Shailer
Registry

4 . Hereford Tour 2008

The South Auckland Hereford Club extend a very warm welcome.
Do come join us and enjoy our hospitality

Based at the
GLENVIEW INTERNATIONAL HOTEL & CONFERENCE CENTRE
254 OHAUPO ROAD, GLENVIEW, HAMILTON

Please click here for the Hereford Tour 2008 page

5. Better, faster beef

Now in its second year of good data collection, AgResearch’s project to demonstrate sustainable and profitable cattle systems on hill country farmland is showing interesting results that will ultimately benefit New Zealand beef farmers.

Funded by Meat & Wool New Zealand, eight focus farms – six in the North Island (at Kawakawa, Maungaturoto, Gisborne, Hawke’s Bay, Taumarunui and Raetihi) and two in the South Island (near Gore and Culverden) – are involved in the project, with half of the farms finishing beef in hill land and the remainder focusing on breeding cow production.

National project leader, Duncan Smeaton, says the original project had two key objectives. Firstly, to demonstrate improved beef cow productivity by 2009 through lifting the calving percentage from 81% to 86%, improving calf-weaning weight by 10%, and demonstrating the benefits of cows for pasture control. Secondly, to develop and demonstrate systems for producing finishing beef that provide a sustainable, successful and profitable alternative on hill country land.

“We’ve got some consistent data trends emerging from the focus farms. It’s been a particularly satisfying outcome given the nature of much of the data and the fact that the work is carried out on-farm where we have only indirect control of what’s happening to animals and pastures.”
The collation of good data has been central to the project’s success, Duncan says.

In particular, the increasing rigor in the calculation of the physical and financial impacts of breeding cows on pasture quality has important implications for beef farmers. One example is project results which show some farmers are successfully prioritising their grazing so that cows eat feed that is on average 1.5MJ ME less than that offered to other (higher priority) stock classes. This difference might not sound like much, but for growing cattle it can be the difference between not growing at all and growing at over 0.5kg per head per day. Results like this give farmers the biological and financial know-how and confidence to balance their mix of stock classes, stocking rates and pasture types accordingly.

The project has also observed consistent and very high levels of reproductive performance of breeding cows on some hill country farms. For example, on one farm, over an eight-week mating period, more than 97% of the cows present became pregnant, and beefthis occurred three years in a row in a Hereford herd with no hybrid vigor involved. Duncan can still barely believe it has happened. It’s also been possible to compare the performance of finishing cattle on extensive hill versus intensive easy country in a range of environments, says Duncan.
“Findings show that an intensive farm produced 274kgs of product per hectare per year versus 154kgs for an extensive farm in a similar cold and dry environment.”

All focus farms are backed by farm mentor groups, which provide input into on-farm processes and field days. Local Beef Councils and Meat & Wool New Zealand regional managers also contribute to farm field days, giving the project a strong local community knowledge base.
The Cookson farm at Kawakawa is one of the project’s focus farms. Its aim has been to achieve the beef finishing targets.

“At the first meeting of the mentor group the challenge was set to demonstrate high production beef systems for different classes of land on the Cookson farm. Lofty targets were set at 700kgs carcass weight gain per hectare per year for easy land and 450kgs for cattle finishing on steep land,” says Chris Boom, who co-ordinates the Northland focus farms.

“Our aim has been to test out best practice, high production systems on small areas of the farm, identify how much we can produce on different land classes, what the problems, risks and profitability are, and how the benefits could be extended across the rest of the farm.
“Our test systems have exceeded these targets in both years. The levels of production have been especially impressive on the steeper land, which has resulted in a lot of interest within the local farming community. This has involved annual field days with over 100 farmers attending each of them. It’s exciting work to be pushing the boundaries within a commercial context.”
The systems have been based on the principles of optimising pasture growth, maximising pasture utilisation and ensuring cattle liveweight gains are not constrained during spring and summer.

“These systems are not just productive but also profitable,” he says.
With the overall focus farms project running until 2008, the aim now is to continue to collect and consolidate results, presenting them to local farming communities at individual farm field days, Duncan says.

“We want to ensure that the project’s findings have an impact beyond when the fieldwork finishes in 2008. At this stage much of our information is new and we aim to precisely define, for example, the situations when it is or isn’t profitable for farmers to use cows to complement their other farming systems.”

6. Hereford Prime leaves its mark

Hereford Prime Beef continues to grace the tables of the most discerning cliental in New Zealand.
A function held for the elite of the New Zealand wine makers industry recently saw Hereford Prime matched with wines and eaten by Michael Cooper, Joe Babich and Brent Marris to mention a few.

A continual search for David Batten, function co-ordinator, to find wonderful home grown, NZ product lead him to his find of Hereford Prime. Portion cut scotch was the order for this event.
Recently at the Queenstown food show processor Bowmont Meats decided to promote Hereford Prime along with Fare Game. Fare Game harvest wild venison from Fiordland. “Hunting for the Wild” viewed on TV 1 on Saturday evening 7pm, hosted by Al Brown and Simon Logan of Logan Brown fame in Wellington, will be filming Fare Game in the next few weeks.

Bowmonts continue to hold a strong presence in the Queenstown region, with head chef from Stoneridge Estate Steve Mills coming on board as their ambassador chef. Steve also runs a company Encore Cuisine incorporating private functions such as weddings along with his restaurant businesses.

Hereford Prime has achieved some growth and the balancing act of primal verses subprimal always a demand for Magills and Bowmonts. The continual search for a processor who can produce product to our specifications is a work in progress.

The branding irons manufactured for the chefs to brand their steaks on presentation have been well received, hopefully forging an awareness of the HP logo, fantastic Christmas present for the “man in your Life”.

The new Hereford Prime beef branding iron
developed to help raise awareness of the
Hereford Prime brand

Growth For Miniature Herefords

The NZ Miniature Hereford Breeders Group had a recent AGM meeting in Matamata at which Graham Hunkin of Tuakau was re-elected as chairman along with Helen Russell as secretary and Elaine Retter as treasurer.

This meeting was well attended with guest speaker Tineke Verkade of Homeopathic Farm Support Ltd giving us an extremely interesting and useful lesson on natural remedies for beef cattle.

The group now has registered membership of 19 breeders and is still growing. A recent article in the Straight Furrow newspaper generated a lot of interest in Miniature Herefords and membership growth and interest in the breed is encouraging.

Calving has gone well and numbers are increasing.

The groups’ next meeting is 17th November and anyone interested in attending can contact secretary, Helen Russell 07) 880-9888.

6. Steak of Origin 2008

It’s time to consider an entry for the 2008 Steak of Origin competition,
held in conjunction with the Meat & Wool NZ Beef Expo.
Entries will be distributed in early February with the final and prize-giving occurring Monday, May 12.

An open meeting reviewing this year’s competition and preparing for the 2008 event is being held at NZ Performance Beef Breeders, Feilding on Thursday November 29, and past entrants or potential entrants are welcome to attend.

If you want to know more or to be added to the Steak of Origin mailing list contact Fiona Greig at NZ Beef and Lamb on

fionag@nzbeeflamb.co.nz or ph 09)489 0877.

7. DEADLINE DATES

Grouprun 400 day weights/scans due for 26 October 2007.

ADLs Animal Disposal Lists (ADLs) due 31 October 2007.

DECEMBER 1st RedRag copy due for December issue.

Office Enquiries

Natalie Campbell, NZ Hereford Manager, will be available between 8.00am - 5pm, Monday to Friday.
Linda Shailer, Hereford Registry, will be available to assist with your Hereford registry enquiries between 9am - 3pm, Monday to Friday.
Emma Carter, Tag ordering will be available to assist with your Tag enquiries between 8.00am - 4.30pm, Monday to Friday.

Outside of these hours, PBB staff will be happy to help you.

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