Page 70 - NZ Hereford Magazine 2023

Trading bolsters

breeding at Tikokino

Tim Mouat, left, with his father-in-law David Holden, and some of Springvale's sire bulls.

Words and photos: Kate Taylor “It was hard to get through the summers with that many
cows,” Tim says. “We needed flexibility. We have a good creek
raditional breeding has been joined by a more running through the farm and we used to feed silage to
flexible trading component at Central Hawke’s Bay the cows on the stones, but now they’re fenced out of those
farm, Springvale. waterways. When I came back to the farm we had 450 cows.
The rolling Tikokino farmland is home to The first drought I experienced took away 100 and the next
THereford breeding cows and Romney ewes, as well drought took another hundred. After the third year of paying
as trade cattle to help combat changing weather seasons, for grazing for the cows, something had to change.”
especially longer, drier summers. David says biosecurity was also making it harder to secure
Springvale was first farmed in 1857 by the great-great- that grazing.
grandfather of its current owner, David. David and Sharron, “Overall, we now have more cattle on than we did before,
their daughters Anna and Lucy, and Lucy’s husband Tim but they’re flexible cattle; a lot of them are Friesian bulls so we
Mouat, farm what is now 1400 hectares (1150ha effective). can get rid of them. They can go.”
“I’m fifth generation, so my grandkids are seventh Springvale has been buying bulls from Te Taumata
generation,” David explains. Tim and Lucy have three children Hereford Stud every second year for more than a decade.
– daughters Daisy (8) and Nellie (4) and son Dalby (6), named The majority of the herd is a Simmental-Hereford cross, and
after his great-great-grandfather. a low birth weight Angus bull is used over their heifers. Beef
“The original farm was 300 acres [120ha]. The title was a progeny are killed by March, at two to two-and-a-half years
lot larger, but most of it was bush,” David says. “It got up to old, and are processed by Silver Fern Farms. They’re finished
something like 12,000 acres [4856ha] running virtually from State at a lease block owned by David’s mother on the outskirts of
Highway 50 to Smedley’s boundary. A lot was sold over the years Havelock North.
… and some has since been bought back, to now sit at 1400ha.” “We want them gone in November because the flats are then
The original two-bedroom homestead is still on the farm, used for cash crops like sweetcorn.”
as well as a family cemetery on the hill looking across to the Back home, the cows have to work for a living and are
farm’s current homestead and its amazing garden, where definitely not pampered, David says.
David and Sharron live. “The cows are there to groom the pasture for the sheep,
Breeding stock is still the priority stock class, but there’s a so we’re not hell-bent on trying to get a big calf and a heavy
larger trading component now than ever before, mainly due weaning weight. If we were in the weaner market we would
to environmental priorities and climate change. Over the past probably have to change the whole system and look after them
six years, they’ve reduced from 500 Hereford cows to 270, and a hell of a lot better to get them up to weight as weaners to
from 5800 Romney ewes down to 3500, and introduced 800 get good money. But we’re not chasing that because we know
trade cattle. they’re going to grow out as two-year-olds, averaging 350kg.”

68 HEREFORD MAGAZINE Year 2023