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Tuivale, a 570 hectare farm near Waipawa is owned by Rob and Deb Wilson and managed by Doug Charmley who looks after the operation including 1,560 deer, 500 cattle and 100 sheep.

Recent changes to the farm’s breeding programme sprang out of discussions with others in the Hawke’s Bay Progressives Advance Party (AP), which has a focus on velvet.

Participants in an AP commit to sharing farm data, encourage each other to achieve their goals and share ideas. Advance Party Facilitator, vet Anyika Scotland, sat down with the group at the start of the process 16 months ago to work out what each farm’s goals were to lift their farm profitability.

Three goals were set for Tuivale:

·         increase weaning weight to a 50kg average within three years

·         lift R2 hind weights to 85kg by 1 January within three years

·         increase the velvet weight average and velvet herd numbers.

Performance was reviewed at the end of the first AP year, in November.

In November, the one year old hinds (R1s) were averaging 80kg and on target to be 85kg+ by the first week in January. However, drought hitting the region late last year affected advances towards the first two goals.

“The cut-off weight was going to be 82kg for selection, but despite a promising start, the R1 mob lost 2kg on average in December. Because of the conditions, I selected for type over weight because of the need to build the herd,” says Doug.

However, in spite of the recent drought, Tuivale’s velvet harvest is steadily increasing. In the 2015/16 season, the farm harvested 1,480kg of velvet antler off all its stags.

“We saw a 0.21kg average increase in the MA crop in the 2015/16 season. This season we budgeted for 1,600kg, but managed to cut a little over 1,800kg,” says Doug. “The average cut was 4.5kg from the stags over four years old, which I’m quite happy with. The aim is to eventually get to 6.5kg.”

Doug puts the good results down to trialling Tuivale’s MA stags on kale for the first time.

“Last year we put the MA stags on 5.3ha of Regal kale over winter, instead of the R2 stags. I’m very happy with the result because I think it lifted the velvet weights.” The 143 MA stags were block grazed using four breaks over 82 days.

The system is low labour, easy to manage and means that Doug retains some grazing control. He’s looking at shorter breaks on the kale and putting the hinds in to clean up some of the stalks after the stags.

The kale crop yield was around 15 tonnes per ha, more than expected. In addition, MA stags were given access to lucerne baleage.

This year, the kale planting has been extended over 8ha and, having had limited success with fodder beet, all age classes will get more lucerne baleage cut on another Wilson property finishing bulls.

“Given the results, I’d like to plant even more kale to get 120 R3 stags off pasture and to allow more younger stock onto it. This will also allow us to shut up more grass for button drop,” he says.

Another area Doug felt the operation was missing out was in genetic gain.

Traditionally, the purchased stags were being mated to the R2 hinds, he explains. “But, because of the smaller size of the resulting fawns, I don’t believe we were selecting replacement hind fawns for the following year from the first fawners. So, we started to pay attention to what goes where,” he says.

Last year was the first for an experiment mating Tuivale’s best R2 stags at a ratio of 1:10 to the first fawners, which were selected for size. Rob Wilson also buys three new stags a year, last year from Grant Charteris, which are multi-sire mated at a ratio of 1:35 with the second fawners.

“The system had already been proven elsewhere by other farmers in the area,” he says. “We’re on the right track. At weaning, the first fawners’ calves are much bigger this year and look similar to the second fawners’.”

Doug says he’d also like to look at ways of tracking single sire mating, maybe using electronic identification (EID) tracking.

Being involved in the Advance Party has been a good experience for him. “It’s given me the confidence to try new things like this. I’ve made new friends and it’s been great to nut things out with others in the group.”

With results like the ones he’s getting, Doug is excited for the future of the deer industry.

The Hawke’s Bay Progressives AP is one of a network of 24 nationwide, which are part of the Passion2Profit programme. The APs are supported with funding from DINZ and the Ministry for Primary Industries’ Sustainable Farming Fund.