With a change in emphasis in our beef herd, from selling bulls to trying to run a profitable commercial beef herd, our cattle are very different from ten years ago. Conscious effort has been placed on lowering mature cow weight, to better fit our environment, without any detriment to early growth. We’ve also incorporated North American Hereford and Stabiliser genetics to increase the levels of hybrid vigour in the herd.

The use of North American Hereford and Stabiliser genetics has seen us lowering mature weight and hence maintenance requirements significantly. We are now able to out-winter most of our cows. We also now usually manage to finish a proportion of our cattle off grass at 16 months old, while selling the remainder as forward stores at the same point. A draft of breeding heifers is usually available each spring.

Cows are all calved outdoors in May/June and heifers have been calved at two years old for almost twenty years.

The use of calf creep has been limited to a very short introductory period, immediately pre-weaning in order to help with selection of our best female bloodlines. Concentrate feed use is then limited to weaned calves and any twin-bearing cows. Yearling cattle are summered on a rotational grazing platform which really brings out the best in this type of genetics. Our suckler cows are the real pasture managers on the farm and spend most of their lives following behind sheep to reset pasture quality for the next rotation.