Business Rural North Summer 2021

44 | Quiet temperament is key in Northland Philip, Shirley & Paul (top). Coastal lease (below left). Photographing yearling sale bulls (bottom right). View out to the Cavalli Islands (bottom left). Russell Fredric RURAL PEOPLE » Waimaire & Otengi Polled Hereford Stud C attle with a quiet temperament is high on the list of desirable traits in the progeny of Waim- aire & Otengi Polled Hereford Stud. Located in Kaeo on Northland’s east coast, the studs and the farm where they are based are run in partnership by Paul Shepherd and his wife Marie and Paul’s parents, Philip and Shirley Shepherd. Paul, the sixth generation, has raised three children, aged 18, 15 and 13, with Marie. The home farm comprises 250 ha/170 ha effec- tive and is supported by 180ha effective of leased land spread over three blocks; two of the blocks border the home farm. Much of the unfarmed land is in native bush with the majority, which includes steep gullies and waterways being fenced off. A planting programme of native and exotic trees is underway for erosion prone areas. The farm and stud has a long history. “We have been breeding Polled Herefords since 1968 and the family has been farming the same property since the mid 1800’s,” Paul says. “We are extremely tough on temperament, with the majority of our clients being dairy farmers we just don’t tolerate any temperament issues.” “We’ve had a few new clients come to us that have been referred to us because they want nice quiet cattle.” A significant advantage of Herefords in a dairy herd is the white face marking. “It’s so much easier with their staff having a white-faced calf as it reduces the risk of keeping beef-cross females.” Paul’s sister Louise is also involved in the family farm, providing soil testing and fertiliser recommen- dations through her job consulting for Nutri-Link. The studs currently support 220 breeding cows producing breeding bulls for both beef and dairy farmers, while the herd is split with 160 spring calving and 60 autumn calving. “We used to be closer to 250, but with two droughts in a row we’ve cut back a little bit.” All replacement heifers are mated as yearlings to fixed-time AI then run with a home-bred yearling bull. “Our cows are run under strictly commercial conditions on rolling to steep hill country. “Our main breeding goal is to produce structur- ally sound cattle that are easy calving, have a quiet temperament, plenty of muscle and good growth rates.” In this year’s sale, held online in early September under covid level 4 restrictions, the studs offered 21 two-year-olds and 53 spring and autumn-born yearlings, while the majority of the bulls were in the top 20% of the breed in Australasia for low birth weight and calving ease. Although sales were slightly lower than in previ- ous years which were held on-farm, and the aver- age of just over $3000 was also down, Paul was very pleased considering it was the first time they or the vast majority of their clients and had used an online platform for the sale. In the constant pursuit to improve the herd, the stud uses the very best of its own bulls as well as semen sourced from New Zealand, Australian and occasionally American studs with nearly 50% of the spring calving herd submitted for AI. “First and foremost, we’re trying to get that spread of growth curve from a high calving ease, low birth weight, to preferably above-average growth to high-growth. “We are also looking at the gestation length and carcass genetics.” “All the replacement heifers are scanned for eye muscle area, fat depths and intra-muscular fat and this year every yearling bull we sold was scanned for it as well.” “We also DNA test all our replacements and sale bulls which sire verifies them and increases the accuracy of their estimated breeding values.