Kaipara dairy farmers Stephen and Andrea Bracey heartily recommend the use of Speckle Park semen and bulls for the tail end of crossbred dairy cow mating.
For the past six years they have been rearing about 50 Speckle Park-cross calves along side 60 Angus-cross calves, all the female dairy calves, some Jersey-cross calves out of the dairy heifers and some Angus beefies.
The Speckle Park dairy-cross calves stand out for their vigorous feeding, right from the drop, and their quiet temperaments.
Andrea has also been impressed by the growth rates to weaning, at eight months when they sell the heifer calves, and at close-to-finishing, when they sell 18-month-old crossbred steers before their second winter.
Recently she consigned a little older group of 25 steers to Wellsford Saleyards, where they averaged $1250, or $3.20/kg for 390kg LW.
“We would like to finish them ourselves and go for the high yields and marbling levels, but the Kaipara climate, our flats and hills do not allow that. Our dairy replacements have to be the priority.
“Speckle-crosses don’t show up in the saleyards very often, because they sell privately on Trade Me with plenty of demand.”
Mating is a carefully planned season for the Braceys.
The 480 crossbred dairy cows have three weeks of dairy AI followed by 10 days of Ponderosa bull semen from neighbourhood Speckle Park breeders Below Sea Level.
The Bellamy family at BSL have the NZ ownership of Australian ET bull Ponderosa, with semen stored at LIC.
Then both Speckled Park purebred bulls and Pure Angus Bulls are chosen to run with the tail-enders.
Following the verified progress Below Sea Level has made with lower calf birth weights EBVs, all natural-born purebred SP bulls will be used by the Braceys this year, who need to have calf weights in the range 30-35kg.
Milk powder feeding takes about 12 weeks from birth, targeting over 100kg LW before weaning.
Born in August, 30 of last year’s SP-cross heifers were kept to February and sold privately at around 140kg in the Kaipara region for $650.
Run in two mobs of 50-plus head with the Angus-cross calves, they certainly attract a premium price, Andrea said.
The Braceys used Angus bulls over their later cycling dairy cows for many years but found that the crossbred calves tended to lose weight in feed pinches.
A Speckle bull from BSL was used as a stop-gap measure over the beef cows and the SP-Angus progeny outperformed their pure Angus herd mates.
“You can look at SP-crosses alongside Angus at the same age and they look bigger, but the scales say the Angus are 15kg heavier. It’s because the SP-crosses are lighter framed but carry more meat.
“We find that the SP-crosses don’t lose condition as readily and continue to look their best when it comes to sale time.”
Bracey keeps meat from SP-cross steers in the freezer for home eating, with good marbling from a cattle beast that didn’t get to two years old.
“He wasn’t that fat, but he still is good eating.”
Below Sea Level has a herd of 200 recorded Speckle Park cows, built up over 12 years and now one of the largest for the breed in NZ.
John and Jan Bellamy, with their children Cory and Danielle, aim for low-birth-weight calves, early gestation, high fertility and docility. Intramuscular fat on grass is also a target.
The beef cattle are run alongside a 600-cow dairy herd and around 20 two-year Speckle bulls are sold privately to repeat dairy and beef farming clients each year.
BSL sold 30 females last year and will do the same this year.
Everything is scanned and DNA tested before sale and reports of how the bulls have performed and the progeny results are eagerly received by the Bellamys from around the country.
BSL has imported semen and embryos from Canada and John and Jan have toured there twice, enjoying the popularity of the breed and the hospitality of the breeders.
On a nearby Ruawai farm BSL has 70 Speckle heifers, 150 calves and about 80 bulls.
“With the imported genetics, we like to rear the bulls to two-years-old to find out what they can do on grass alone,” Jan said.
Both farms have hard surfaces to stand off all cattle during wet periods, where they are fed silage, and the feet on imported Speckle genetics have coped well with extremes of both wet and dry.
“Speckles are doing what our clients want them to do, which is finish in prime grading within a two-year period,” Jan said.
The best expression of the spotted coats, which clients prefer for their stand-out markings, come from white Speckle bulls over dairy cows.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This story was produced and published with the support of Specklebeef New Zealand.
