Rearing to calf up profit

Calf rearing season has started and careful planning and budgeting is needed if this sort of venture is to be profitable. Meal and milk costs have risen this year but from early reports bobby calf prices at saleyards are similar to last year.

With the rapid growth of the dairy industry this by product of milking is an important part of the beef sector and historically attempts have been made to maximise benefits for both.

A market has been created with beef bulls that produce low birth weight progeny that are suitable for mating with heifers and smaller dairy cows, and sexed semen will allow more beef cross animals to be produced. And  PGGW ran a "Better beef" scheme where the company supplied the semen free to dairy farmers and guaranteed to purchase day old calves. They then contracted rearers and finishers to grow out the beef dairy cross animals and had plans to select for better genes by recording of sires performances.

I was involved as a finisher in such a scheme and was impressed by the quality animals produced but not impressed on hearing the costs and stories of animals transported from one end of the island to another. The ideas of this scheme had good logic but it failed to carry on.

Is the potential of the progeny of 4 million dairy cows being exploited by the beef sector, and if not, why not? Share your experiences with us on dairy beef contracts.

Successfully rearing calves for profit is all about doing your sums reports The Taranaki Daily. The purchase price of the calf, milk powder and calf meal costs all need to be balanced against the likely price when the calf is on- sold, usually at 100 kilograms, to a buyer who will farm it through to slaughter. This year rearers are faced with slightly higher calf prices and an increase in milk powder and meal costs. On Monday, white-faced hereford calves offered at PGG Wrightson's Inglewood sale fetched up to $255, with friesians getting around $140. Prices began at $82.

Lepperton's John Eichstaedt has been rearing about 20 calves a year for the past 15 years or so. He takes them through to weaning at eight to 10 weeks or until they're 18 months old, when he sells them for finishing. He says a 40-kilogram bag of milkpowder feeds four calves for about a month, and he thinks prices this year are on a par with last year. Each calf requires just over a bag of milk powder.

Former Taranaki rugby player Amos White milks about 60 cows on his 97ha farm at Purangi, east of Inglewood, to feed the calves he rears until they're 18 months or two years old. That system is much more economical than buying milk powder, he says.He buys in-calf cows in winter and keeps their calves. Once all the calves are weaned, he sells the cows or sends them to be slaughtered.

At Motunui, Peter Stokes rears about 1500 calves a year on his 16ha property.He has been raising calves for about 25 years, starting out with 120 and building up the numbers each year. He feeds milk powder and meal and rears them to 100kg, admitting he doesn't make money every year. This year he is raising 700 autumn calves and 1000 spring calves, rearing them on contract for finishing on sheep and beef farms. Using agents and procuring directly from the paddock, he buys friesian and jersey bulls, angus bulls and heifers and hereford heifers, looking for well-marked, well-boned, healthy animals. He says $50 to $70 is a good price to pay for a calf.

PGG Wrightson stock agent Jeff See says there is plenty of interest in this season's calf feeder sales. He says early calves always sell well because buyers take them through to finishing or to market in October, when two-year-old bulls have been slaughtered and beef farmers are looking for replacement stock. Taranaki is a feeder province, where rearers raise the calves to 100kg or to yearlings before selling them on the open market or on contract for finishing. He says the margins for calf- rearing, at $70-$80 per animal, are "not that great", particularly when losses are taken into account.

Mr See says calves offered at the sales are a minimum of four days old and up to 10 days old. They have to have dry navels and be capable of drinking alone. All calves arriving at the Inglewood saleyards are tagged for traceability, he says. Most calves reared in Taranaki go to beef farms in Hawke's Bay for finishing. Selling calves for rearing is a better option for farmers who might receive just $25 for a bobby calf sent to the freezing works, while they could get $125 at a sale, he says. Hereford calves, produced when farmers use hereford bulls at the end of artificial breeding to get their last cows in calf, fetch more than jersey calves.