At a time when input costs are through the roof, commercial breeders are having to sit back and assess the best and most efficient strategy going forward to maintain business viability.
The answer for Kenny Macgillivray and his daughter Skye who run a commercial herd of 110 suckler cows, at Glastullich Farm in Easter Ross, is breeding for the store ring using the Charolais as a terminal sire and breeding Simmental cross females for replacements.
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“Going way back my father was one of the first people in Easter Ross to use a Charolais bull. That was more than 45 years ago, and we have used the Charolais ever since, because of the results. For us, the Charolais cross cattle demonstrate a fantastic performance compared to anything else, and it is what the buyers are looking for,” said Kenny.
“The breed has improved vastly over the years, in particular, to ease of calving, without losing the advantage of growth rates and carcass quality, which makes the breed a much more viable option for suckler herds looking to improve quality and efficiency,” he added, calves are weaned at six and half months with weaning weights averaging 356kg for 56 steers, and 337kg for 49 heifers last year.
From weaning to the first post-weaning weight all steers were doing 1.97kg a day, with the Charolais steers achieving 2.43kg a day. Last year 56 steers at Thainstone, aged between eight – 10 months, with an average weight of 446kg, sold for £1314, whilst the 27 heifers crossing the weigh scales at 423kg, achieved £1206 on average.
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“We personally find that most of our buyers are in the Aberdeenshire area and we do tend to get a better price for our product. Our cattle go down on Wednesday in time to clean up for the sale on Friday. The market staff is good to them by giving them straw and feed,” said Kenny.
Everything is sold in the store, with this year the team keeping 23 heifers for replacements.
“We kept a few more females than we normally do as we have a few cows ready to be culled, however, we do not buy in any cows and want to be as efficient as we can be breeding our own stock,” said Kenny.
The heifers will be put to a Saler bull for slightly easier calvings when they calve down at two years old, with second and third calvers now going to a red Angus. Thereafter the bulk of the older cows is then put to the Charolais and Simmental sires.
“The Charolais offspring certainly make the biggest money in the store ring being the faster growers by a fair bit. If you can get an easy calving bull, they are fine to work with,” said Kenny.
Also at Glastullich, a small herd of just four pedigree Charolais females is also housed which began a decade ago having purchased two females at Stirling. Firstly, was the in-calf heifer, Allanfauld Geranium, which is a previous Royal Highland Show champion, and secondly was a Thrunton cow which again was bought in calf.
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“I have always had a strong interest in Charolais, and I wanted to focus on pedigrees, unfortunately, it is just difficult to keep them all separate. I wanted to have a breed with size and power and that certainly describes the Charolais breed,” said Skye, with one of their own home-bred bulls used on the commercial herd.
Skye added: “The Simmentals are more so for the female side, the Simmental cross makes a good mother being that little bit more maternal. They have a good temperament and high milk production. As well as still leaving a well-balanced sellable calf.
“We used to do bull beef but at the time there was an oversupply for the demand, it is something we would look to go back to do, however, we just don’t have the shed space.
“The beef price is finally heading to where it needs to be and hopefully it lasts, there are fewer and fewer cattle which we think is causing the price to rise as people just can’t get their hands on cattle for the demand,” added Kenny, who is hoping that the price keeps up for this year’s calf crop which are just being born as we speak.
Everything is spring calvers and are all housed on straw-bedded courts, coming in from the end of October from grass and will be put out the early part of May.
Kenny grows his own straw which helps bring the cost down slightly when keeping the cattle indoors and in turn, this produces a lot of dung which is applied to the grass fields to flourish growth.
“The difference between dung and no dung across two fields is astonishing,” he said, with 300 acres of cereals grown each year, mostly spring barley and if any ground is rented out for potatoes, Kenny will put wheat in behind it.
“The area is good for growing crops, we are very fortunate of the mix of ground we have which a small section is class one, however, does vary across the farm,” said Kenny, with last harvest yields up to 3.8 tonnes of barley per acre.
The best of the barley will go for malting with the remainder of barley and oats fed to both the cattle and sheep.
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The winter diet also consists of draff which comes from the local distillery, Glenmorangie, Tain – and home-grown straw.
Once the cows calve, they will be supplemented with silage, although only around 250 bales will be made per year, due to the limited amount of grass available as sheep are out grazing all year round.
On the sheep front, lambing takes place at the end of March with the first of the fat lambs away by the end of June and the bulk of the crop will be sold come the end of August. The majority of the lambs are sold fat to Woodhead, Turriff, with last year, 331 lambs were sold off-farm, hitting the 18.7kg deadweight, to cash in at £107.59.
All lambs are finished on grass as well as the additional hoppers to get them away that bit sooner. It is a purely commercially run flock keeping everything as simple as possible for the family, with 55 ewe lambs kept for replacements.
What does the future hold?
“The rising costs of inputs are getting ridiculous, fuel, feed and machinery have been crazy. Our tractor is six-year-old and we would like to change it but it is now worth double what we paid for it, which makes it hard to justify.
“Prices have risen for lambs and calves but unfortunately not in comparison to everything else.
“Barley is the worst for inflation, and with a huge jump in price last year we were getting £285 from one of our malters, this simply doesn’t compensate. The amount the malters are making on one tonne of barley is crazy, and they could easily pay us more as whisky production is through the rough.
“One tonne of barley produces over 400 litres of whiskey, and we all know the value of whiskey.
“We can’t determine the price and that is a major downfall in the industry,” concluded Kenny.
Farm Facts
Who is involved? Kenny and his daughter, Skye, Hamish Mackenzie full time.
Background? Kenny’s grandfather purchased Glastullich Farm in 1925 for £11,000.
Farm acreage: 650 acres.
Livestock numbers: 105 suckler cows which are run along with a flock of 200 sheep of various breeds bred purely commercially.
On-the-spot questions
Best investment? Land.
Best advice? Go with your gut.
Biggest achievement? Continuing the good work my father started.
Where do you see yourself in 2033? Taking life a bit easier, and watching the next generation – Skye – continuing to make a good job of farming.
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