TIMES are tough for Manawatu stud breeder John Druce but he is determined to stick with Salers cattle and see them through.
John farms with Chris and Staci Thompson in an equity partnership. John farmed on his own for over 20 years, but five years ago employed Chris as a stock manager and the relationship progressed into a partnership. The farm is now owned by a trust and the partnership works much the same way as a sharemilking contract.
“They bought stock and plant and lease the farm I own. It works out well for us both,” John said.
The farm covers 921ha in Woodville near Palmerston North. The farm is divided into two separate properties: a 190ha finishing block and a 731ha steep hill country property, Four Creeks farm.
The finishing block is used for calving cows and finishing lambs and cattle and the larger farm runs as a breeding unit.
The property stocks a 3500 composite ewe flock, ewes are half Romney, quarter Finn, quarter Texel. There are around 250 purebred Salers breeding cows and replacements, and about 300 Friesian bulls. There is also 40ha of maize on contract to be harvested soon.
The past three years have been a real challenge. The Saler breeding cows took a hammering with the drought.
There had been four dry summers in a row and the condition of the cows was getting “harder and harder” to maintain.
“We had a lot of empty cows, so unfortunately had to end up killing a few whose figures weren’t the best.”
John and Chris are reassessing some of their farming practices in a time where the exchange rate, lamb prices, and weather conditions have been making life difficult.
“We’re between a rock and hard place at the moment.”
But one thing is for certain. John said the farm would “never be without Salers”.
John got involved with Salers 21 years ago.
“I’d heard a radio interview about them and they sounded like the cattle equivalent of a modern Romney.”
At the time, the Romney was a very “fit” breed, narrow through the shoulders and very easy lambing.
He thought the Salers sounded interesting and decided to give them a go.
“I guess I was looking for a bit of an adventure and there was no way I was going to jump into the deep end of the Angus world.”
Together with his neighbour John Ramsden, who he was in partnership with at the time, they bought some heifers from a Hamilton farmer who had carried out embryo transfers with genetics from Canada.
“One Salers heifer sold for $10,000 – an extraordinary amount of money back then.”
They also bought a bull that had been imported into the country from a third party.
John said some very good genetics arrived from Canada, but so did some not-so-good ones.
In the end he decided to breed up to a purebred herd. Embryo work was too expensive and he didn’t agree with the stress the embryo transfer process put on the cow.
He used Angus Hereford cross cows and put a purebred Salers bull over them. It was a long process; occasionally he bought in a purebred cow, but not often.
“I found that my own stuff was best anyway, and I was more selective with what I bred.”
He now has one of the largest Salers herds in Australasia.
“I said I’d do one round of the alphabet then decide. The first heifer bought was an ‘H’ registration, and I have worked my way back around to ‘E’, only skipping ‘I’ and ‘O’, so I’m almost there.”
Clients that have bought Four Creek Farms bulls have been very pleased with their performance.
The breed has good growth rates, is easy calving, and calves are very active and quick to get the first drink. They are free ranging and very mobile.
Early on, some of the Salers genetics brought in from Canada were not good: cattle were feisty and hard to handle. But genetics have come a long way since then.
“It comes down to stockmanship. Any breed can play up, it just depends how they are worked. I don’t use my dogs around the cattle.”
John said that Salers are a dam breed like the Angus, not a terminal breed like the Charolais, but they will never be able to compete with the Angus purely because of the large gene pool Angus has in New Zealand.
“They will never challenge Angus for dominance, but for farmers that want easy calving and good growth rates they will offer something.”
Four Creeks will be one of the farms visited as part of the Salers conference on May 9 and 10. John hopes anyone with an interest in the breed will come along.
bsavage@clear.net.nz
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