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Beef InFocus

Milking the meat market with InFocus

Using specialist dairy-beef semen in a three-way-cross herd has eliminated bobby calves and opened a lucrative new income stream for one southwest Victorian dairy farm.

And there’s expectations this move could deliver a windfall of up to $100,000 a year, without any extra work.

Garvoc dairy farmers Josh and Lilli Philp have joined more than half their 800 head herd to ABS In-Focus this year – after successfully trialing the dairy-beef semen last year.

“This year’s program has just been sexed semen and ABS InFocus, we haven’t used any conventional semen,” Josh said.

“It means we don’t have bobby calves, and yes, that’s one of the plans, but the other plan is to value add our crossbred herd.”

Milking Red, Jersey and Holstein-cross cows the Philp family hasn’t had the option of selling “black and white” heifers to the live export market to diversify their income, like many other dairy farmers.

ABS InFocus has enabled them to boost the value of their calves while also providing a market for male and female offspring.

“Previously, the value of bobby calves was $20, these InFocus calves are worth $200 at 10 days old,” Josh said.

“We could potentially turn what was a $20,000 business into a $80,000-$100,000 a year business.”

ABS InFocus is an evolution of the traditional beef on dairy programs in Australia, with the beef semen developed through a comprehensive breeding program to ensure the highest value progeny from dairy animals.

InFocus delivers healthier feeder cattle that grow faster, efficiently convert feed and deliver high yielding, quality meat.

The Philp’s do not run herd bulls, all animals are bred via artificial insemination across nine weeks.

Female replacements for the milking herd are bred from about 200 of the milkers using sexed semen. The rest of the herd is joined to InFocus.

Cow health is one of the most important traits for determining which animals are mated with sexed semen.

Josh uses cow manager tags on the milkers to help record important details that assist this selection process.

“Cows have to have had at least two (reproductive) cycles, be in 40 days-plus, and had to have no calving difficulties, no health issues – including mastitis and lameness – since calving,” he said.

“Basically, if that is the case, they get a sexed semen straw.”

This year 400 sexed semen straws, plus a small amount of InFocus was used across the first 2.5 weeks of joining.

Calving a large herd in a tight seasonal window, Josh said the ability to sell the InFocus calves at 10 days old was a bonus.

“A contract calf rearer picks them up, most of ours go at 10 days to 2 weeks old, as we don’t have the capabilities to rear 250 heifer calves ourselves plus all the beef ones.”

Initially cautious about using beef semen to breed crossbred dairy animals, Josh was pleasantly surprised when there were no calving issues during last year’s trial period.

His trepidation about the appearance of the crossbred cows’ progeny was also unfounded.

“The majority came out black, some had a little bit of a red tinge through them,” he said.

“But the backgrounder was happy with them, and they are growing well.”

ABS has developed a network of certified InFocus calf rearers, backgrounders and feedlots, delivering a reliable market for dairy farmers.

A milk management tool with a cash bonus

Flatter milk production, a shorter spring joining and a ‘second opportunity’ for quality cows, these are just some of the benefits one Gippsland family have obtained from using a specified dairy-beef insemination program. The fact they also get valuable ABS InFocus™ animals delivering a “cash cow” later in the season is just a bonus.

The Boyd family, Ranleigh Farms, at Foster and Yanakie have 37 ABS Beef InFocus™ Jersey and Friesian-cross calves that were born in December. Grazing in the paddock at their dairy farm, Estelle Boyd said “you couldn’t tell half of them were out of Jerseys and half were out of Friesians”.

Earmarked to be sent to the family’s out block, until market or seasonal conditions dictate a sale date, Estelle and her son Brett have used ABS Beef InFocus as a ‘tool’ to manage milk and cashflow. “Because we shortened our spring joining, we created more empty (cows),” Brett explained. “But instead of being culled, we gave them another joining chance in February, to calve in December, and if they are any good, we move them into our autumn calving group. It gives our good cows another chance to get back into the herd but breeding them to ABS Beef InFocus means they are also producing a beef calf that has value.”

The Boyds will now breed more of their lower genetic merit animals to ABS Beef InFocus, using genomic results to guide these decisions. Estelle and Brett were both impressed with the fertility of the ABS Beef InFocus semen, and they never had any issues with calving. Their carry-over cows that were joined to ABS Beef InFocus were bred as part of a fixed time artificial insemination program across five days.

“When you think about it, we are starting with the dodgy ones – cows that didn’t get in calf – but in saying that we were still getting 50 per cent of them in calf with the PG program,” Brett said. “I think that is pretty good as that’s what we are getting from our maiden heifers in a similar program.”

The mother and son team are joined on farm by Estelle’s husband Geoff, Brett’s wife Kelly and their children Jase 7, Charlie 6, Gordy 4 and Zoe 1 month, as well as Kelly’s dad, Trevor Jury. The family milks about 550 cows, depending on the season, across two farms with the herd containing about 60 per cent Jerseys.

They chose to use ABS Beef InFocus after doing a similar program with Angus a year earlier. Brett said they opted for ABS Beef InFocus the second year on the advice of local ABS sales representative Alan Blum and the knowledge there were buyers wanting the animals.

For Estelle, the ABS Beef InFocus calves provide a “quicker turn around” than the Jerseys. “ABS Beef InFocus provides a positive cash market for calves from 10 days old, whereas with Jersey heifers, there is no real market until they are 200kg-plus or 12-15 months of age, unless someone is specifically chasing them,” she said. “This means there’s a lot more risk for us to carry Jersey heifers through, especially in unfavourable seasons.”

Unlocking efficiency with dairy-beef

Beef InFocus™

James Couch | Unlocking efficiency with dairy-beef

Improving his dairy herd was the impetus for James Couch to use dairy-beef semen.

For the Nullawarre dairy farmer, it was a simple equation. Joining the bulk of his herd to ABS InFocus™ – semen that includes three proven high fertility Angus bulls – delivered in-calf cows, but more importantly, it helped cut costs. It’s not only cheaper semen compared, to what he’d normally use, but it provides a valuable and saleable animal.

James knew exactly where to spending the savings.

“It meant we could spend an extra $4 to $5 a straw on our Sexcel™ to get the exact bulls that we absolutely wanted,” he said.

“It’s instead of trying to skimp and save a bit of money and hoping for a black and white at the end of the day.

“Now we are going to get the best animal that we can get and for the rest, we are going to have Angus calves hitting the ground that we can make extra money out of.”

James milks about 270 cows, his herd includes Jerseys, Friesians, Ayrshires, and their crosses. Next door his brother Pat has a herd of 290. The two work closely and rear their calves together in southwest Victoria.

Maiden heifers had been calving in mid-April at James’ farm before the herd began calving for six to eight weeks in May.

Seasonal calving works well for the business, but James has plans to move this forward to boost cashflow and better target his use of Sexcel™ to improve genetic gain.

“Using Sexcel™ on heifers, we will plan to join them that extra bit early and eventually calve maiden heifers in January and the remaining cows in April and May,” he said.

“It is changing our cashflow mainly, but it gives us a bit more security calving heifers earlier as we will have certain pregnancies from heifers. Then we will only need to say get an extra 100 cows in calf to Sexcel™. So we can go and buy 200 does of Sexcel™ then the rest of the herd is joined to InFocus™.”

“Then all the replacements come earlier, and it is a lot easier for us (in the calf shed) and we can take our time before the InFocus™ calves come in later.”

Fertility is one of the primary breeding focuses for James because of his seasonal calving system.

No bull is considered if it has low fertility – regardless of its other traits. Other breeding focuses include production, shorter stature, and stronger cows as well as better feet and legs.

Sexcel™ is used to join heifers as part of a fixed time artificial insemination program and any return heats are also joined to Sexed Genetics – but those with a shorter gestation.

Sexcel™ is used across the “top” cows in the herd. These are determined by James and includes the most fertile and youngest cows.

This was the first season James and Pat used InFocus™. Next year they anticipate about 400 of their cows – across both herds – to calve to InFocus™.

“I’m pretty confident they are going to come out black and with beef characteristics,” James said. “I have no issues with them coming out of a Jersey because we have bred our Jerseys that way, to spit out whatever we join them too. Plus, InFocus™ are sold as a calving ease bull, so it was a no-brainer for us.”

InFocus™ sires have been proven in more than 300 herds globally and are the only beef- dairy cross product with validated dairy calving ease data, according to ABS.

InFocus™ was intriguing for James and Pat’s because of its potential to provide an additional income stream for their business.

Previously, the brothers had sold bull calves on the local calf truck or via private sales.

Now, they will decide on the market for their InFocus™ calves based on the season.

“With the InFocus™, if it is going to be a good year and we have excess grass we will continue to rear them and have that revenue stream to later sell-off to a feedlot or abattoir,” James said.

“If not, ABS has a calf rearer and people are always looking for black cattle, it will be easy to move them on.”

Having the ability to easily breed dairy-beef and an organized market is something James has been waiting for in the Australian dairy industry.

“Over in America and pretty much everywhere else around the world, apart from Australia, dairy farmers have that opportunity for extra revenue with beef,” he said.

“With the last couple of seasons we’ve had up north (in Australia) there has been a lot of destocking and I’m sure many farmers would be looking towards these dairy-cross cattle to restock because they still have that look they are chasing.”