Ayrshire Club presentation by Grant Taylor.
Both of my grandparents were Ayrshire breeders, Royal stud for the Taylors & Hylton studs for the Stevens family. Hylton had 1 of the first Ayrshire bulls on AI, Lakeside Majestic.
Glenmarie was created later at Kumeu.
As a young teenager I spent a lot of time researching the successful studs & cow families in NZ. I also looked into overseas genetics a lot too.
What made those studs successful or what happened when they changed their breeding policy.
I researched every stud that sold animals annually & how those animals performed for their new owners.
Which studs were more successful in producing bulls that bred well in other herds?
This information allowed me to research further what made one herd or cow family successful or not.
I then formulated a “Aim/vision “for our herd, but particularly what we wanted as a family and a business.
This then created the framework of what we would buy & how we would breed the herd & then selection in the herd going forward.
From the Kumeu farm we had a show team of 8 cows most times or a combination with young stock, (what we could fit in the truck), but at the Kumeu show we had up to 23 animals.
At Kumeu we had a herd of 120 pedigree Ayrshire cows. Temple View farm was a herd of 180 pedigree Ayrshire cows. Gordonton farm we had a herd of 300 pedigree Ayrshire cows.
Balclutha was a 600-cow farm which included 100 pedigree Ayrshires, built up from the young stock from Gordonton.
Since then, our business has expanded with farming interests which has included several farm equity investments & dairy livestock trading.
We have created 10 herds.
Owned & traded approx. 20,000 dairy stock in the last 15 years.
That is not including our farming operation.
Leased out approx. 4500 to 5000 dairy cows.
In the herds we have owned or been involved in, we have strived to increase production, value & indexes.
Glenmarie Dairies is now owned by our son Luke in Southland. 650 cows.
BW 125 PW 168
Maitland is our farm at Gore. 560 cows
BW 117 PW 158
425/ cow 1300 / ha, a very rolling farm.
Our farm at Okaihau won the 2019 Supreme Award for the “Dairy Business of The Year” for all of NZ.
The 1150 herd is now producing 580 kg /cow & 1860/ha.
Herd BW 126 PW 181
The main subjects I will talk about are:
Observations learnt from buying or selling dairy stock.
Aims for herd improvement.
Using information to help the selection to improve your herd.
Herd or cow selection
Selling or buying technics to improve your herd.
Challenges going forward.
LINK TO NOTICE OF MEETING: