Dairy Beef Solutions 2023

DAIRY BEEF SOLUTIONS

Beefing Up Your Bottom Line

Belgian Blue X Jersey

Value-Added Dairy Beef Solutions

The New Zealand dairy industry currently produces over two million bobby calves each year. As of June 2023, Fonterra has announced changes to its terms of supply that will insist all calves are given a “useful” life.

As consumers become more interested in the food production process, the New Zealand dairy and beef industries have a huge opportunity to reduce the number of bobby calves produced and breed value-added dairy beef offspring from New Zealand’s dairy herds.

In the near future, there will be major changes to beef production, and many beef farmers will begin to assess the carbon cost associated with each kg of beef created. A value-added dairy beef animal removes the need for a suckler cow and, therefore, the inefficiency associated with maintaining that suckler cow.

Many of New Zealand’s dairy farmers have begun to use Sexed Dairy Genetics to gain valuable replacements from their best cows, while using Dairy Beef Genetics on the tail end of their herds to breed that value-added beef animal.

With the right selection, dairy farmers can turn what is potentially low value offspring into a value-added beef animal, gaining a tighter calving season and extra days in milk (short gestation), easy calving, easy identification (colour marking), and sought-after offspring (a second income stream).

Included in this Dairy Beef Solutions catalogue, you will find breeds and

sires available for every dairy herd in New Zealand. A large portion of New Zealand’s dairy herd has a heavy Jersey influence. Samen NZ has solutions that cater to these herds and even has sires bred for Jersey populations such as the Danish Blue. With many happy farmers already here in New Zealand, you can see examples of these offspring on both the front and back covers of this Dairy Beef Solutions catalogue.

The importance of using the right dairy beef sire has never been more important. Many of our dairy beef sires come from breeding programs that have been running for decades. This kind of focus on dairy beef with these specialized genetics is something our competitors simply cannot compete with.

Our breeding consultants are farmers themselves at heart and trained to help you maximize the value of each pregnancy. Our team loves to visit herds and can help you select the right Dairy Beef Solution for your herd.

Delivery to any on farm bank, private technicians or LIC/CRV technician service.

Speak to your local Samen NZ breeding consultant for your best option.

Discounts for large volume orders may be available.

Myostatin Gene, Double Muscling

Featured in the Dairy Beef Solutions catalogue are a variety of DM (Double Muscling) breeds/ sires. These animals have natural modifications to their Myostatin Gene, originally found in Belgian Blue cattle, which controls the amount of muscle developed on an animal/mammal’s carcass.

The benefits of a Double Muscled dairy beef sire are its ability to pass on a copy of the Myostatin Blocker gene. When crossed with a dairy animal, our experience has shown that offspring tend to exhibit rapid growth rates from birth, offering farmers, the meat industry, and consumers a faster-maturing, tender beef option with low fat

content. While fat is often referred to as flavor, the lean tender beef produced by these animals requires fewer resources (carbon) to produce and indicates a healthier beef product for consumers.

With the faster maturing capabilities of the Double Muscled animals, farmers aim to keep the offspring until about 18 months of age, then slaughtering those animals before the second winter.

Double Muscling genetics have been successfully used in the pig, poultry, and sheep industries. The Double Muscled genetics have a lot to offer offspring from crossbred

Unique to the world, breed right here in New Zealand

Continued efforts to reduce bobby calves and emissions in order to meet consumer demands have led to the development of a world-first: The KiwiBlue™. A collaboration between Woodleigh Belgian Blues and Samen NZ is set to offer New Zealand dairy farmers an efficiencyfocused, polled, and doublemuscled solution to meet future demands on how we produce beef.

Here in New Zealand, Rt Hon Sir Lockwood Smith has been breeding his own Belgian Blue stud, Woodleigh Belgian Blues, for 36 years in Matakohe since 1987.

“Belgian Blues are traditionally a horned breed, so I focused on

KiwiBlue™

Solution

retaining the polled gene from my Angus base. I also wanted to smooth out their shoulders to seek natural calving and made sure I had animals with shorter gestation lengths, which can also contribute to calving ease,” explained Sir Lockwood.

The KiwiBlue™ combines Sir Lockwood’s unique Belgian Blue stud with Samen NZ’s European Belgian Blue genetics that have been specifically bred for dairy cattle for decades.

The result of this breeding program has been unique to the world: a team of pure white (colour marking), double-muscled, polled KiwiBlue™ sires.

The KiwiBlue™ is a unique polled Belgian Blue option offering our white sires guaranteed to colour mark.

$16 PER STRAW

Dairy Beef Game Changer

“We have used a variety of beef in the past to try to reduce Bobby numbers, but most recently, our Belgian Blues have outperformed previous crops of calves from other breeds.

We didn’t have to pull a single one in our last autumn calving. The Belgian Blue are vigorous and take to the feeders, unlike any other breed we have seen.”

Killout Data Speaks For Itself

With our Belgian Blue offspring spreading across New Zealand, our farmers are excited to see the results of their dairy-beef animals.

The following killout data is offspring from Belgian Blues over Holstein Friesian’s, harvested on 9 Aug 2021.

Glenn Taylor Drummond Southland

Short Gestation Belgian Blue, KiwiBlue™, Danish Blue and British Blue

Demand is growing for a dairy beef solution that offers easy calving, short gestation and can be crossed over the tail end of your dairy herd to create a high value sought after calf.

Our Blues have it all and are already performing on numerous New Zealand farms in a big way.

If you are looking to reduce/remove bobby calves then contact your local Samen NZ sales rep today.

• Short Gestation Beef (more days in milk)

• Strict Selection Criteria

Ensures: Easy Calving

• Colour Marking

• Easy Care & Great Feeders

• High Demand from Rearers & Finishers

• Rapid Growth Rates

• Used Over Crossbreed, Jersey & Friesian Herds in New Zealand

Double Muscling Charolais

Solution

Double Muscling Charolais offers similar growth rates to the Belgian Blue due to the lean beef production of the Charolais breed.

Traits

+ Calving Ease

+ High Growth

+ Colour Marking

Double Muscling Blonde

Solution

Our Double Muscled Blonde d’Aquitaine is sourced from elite proven dairy beef programs.

Traits

+ Calving Ease

+ High Growth

+ Colour Marking

Speckled Park

Solution

Selected for his balance of Calving Ease, Gestation and Marbling this white Speckled Park bull will be an excellent Colour Marker, enabling you to tap into the thriving calf market for Speckled Parks.

Traits

+ Calving Ease

+ High Growth

+ Gestation

$15 PER STRAW

DM Charolais

$15 PER STRAW

DM Blonde d’Aquitaine

$20 PER STRAW Speckled Park

Homozygous Polled, Double Muscling Angus

Brave PP

“Wow, impressive calving ease! Averaging a birthweight of 35kg and being born 6 days early (based on dairy gestation), these calves are off to a great start and seem to be growing rapidly.” said Glenn Taylor, Southland

Inra

Solution

Locus is a super Easy Calving Inra companied with Short Gestation making for yet another amazing bull that has been breed specifically for dairy beef.

Traits

+ Calving Ease + High Growth

Charolais PP

Solution

Sourced from elite proven dairy beef programs, our Charolais option offers the benefits of PP polled genetics.

Traits

+ Calving Ease + High Growth + Colour Marking

Red Wagyu

Solution

Teaming up with Southern Stations Wagyu, our Red Wagyu is being offered to dairy farmers across New Zealand with lucrative dairy beef contracts. The Red Wagyu animals produce high-quality marbled meat and has been developed for the Japanese and Korean market.

Traits

+ Easy Calving

+ Marbling Meat

+ Lucrative Contracts

$15 PER STRAW

Inra

$15 PER STRAW

Charolais

$15 PER STRAW Red Wagyu

NZ Angus

Solution

Meet the Real Deal of short gestation NZ Angus. With -11 days gestation Stokman Real Deal is a gestation length Angus breed leader with 95% accuracy. Stokman Real Deal is perfect for those dairy farmers looking to cross their heifers with a quality NZ Angus bull.

Traits

+ Extreme Calving Easy

+ Appropriate for Dairy Heifers

+ Extremely Short Gestation (Angus Trait Leader)

+ NZ Proven Son of SG Murati Reality 839

+ No. 1 Proven Bull in NZ for Calving Ease Direct

Black Hereford

Solution

Black calves with a white face traditionally fetch a premium in the market and a large portion of the New Zealand dairy herd carries the red gene. To combat this our Black Hereford is Homozygous Black, Homozygous Polled with great Calving Ease.

Traits

+ Homozygous Black

+ Homozygous Polled

+ Easy Calving

+ Easily Identified Offspring

Hereford Solution

Our Hereford bulls are a key component of our Dairy Beef Solutions, with some of them ranking in the top 5 for the Beef & Lamb Dairy Beef trial.

Traits

+ White Face

+ Short Gestation

+ Calving Ease

+ Good Beef Performance

$15 PER STRAW

NZ Angus

$15 PER STRAW

Black Hereford

$15 PER STRAW

Hereford

Peaking The Sales

Having been heavily promoting the Short Gestation Belgian Blues for over four years now, uptake has been huge and so we begin to see the performance of these animals around New Zealand.

We have seen various reports of our Belgian Blue cattle topping the sales. As word spreads about these outstanding animals naturally we are receiving more and more demand from beef farmers trying to source Belgian Blue offspring.

Many of our dairy farmers have also recognized the potential of these animals and diversified their businesses to accommodate them, adding additional income from beef to their thriving dairy operations.

Dairy Genetics

In developing an efficient Dairy Beef program, it can be beneficial to consider the genetics of your dairy herd. Looking to the future, we see huge benefits in breeding a robust medium-sized dairy animal capable of dairy production and the ability to produce value-added dairy beef offspring when required.

Request

Anieka Templar

The Templers have used Samen NZ’s Short Gestation Belgian Blue for two years. On top of extra days in milk, the Belgian Blues from Samen always colour mark and look like a Belgian Blue.

They are easy to rear and grow like stink. Anieka comments, “when they are ten days old they are already filling out a lot”. Focusing on the future, the Templers are very excited about using high genetic merit polled sires to reduce/remove dehorning, and dual-purpose breeds are helping remove/reduce bobby calves from their system.

Josh & Phillipa Stainton

We ended up with about 80 of the Short Gestation Belgian Blue calves. We found they are very easy to identify because they all came out with that speckley look. They were very easy to teach to drink and very happy laid back animals, I couldn’t believe how quick they were to learn to drink. You would just show them once and away they would go.

We were after a Short Gestation Beef Breed and we found they were consistently coming through two and

Cameron Shepherd

My calves have an extremely good name in this area, with one of the few Friesian herds in this area. The Fleckvieh are strengthening this and the Short Gestation Belgian Blue are giving me more days in milk and a highly sellable beef calf.

I put around 10% of the herd to the Short Gestation Belgian Blue and while we use them over the bottom end of our herd, I am using it as a bit of a tool to tighten my calving period as well, said Shepherd.

Goods & Services

Packing & Dispatch

Samen NZ distributes both on farm as well as to other AI Companies throughout NZ. If you wish to use another breeding company technician, we can despatch your order to their main distribution centres for the semen to be placed in your technician’s bank.

Samen NZ does not charge a handling fee for semen received from other New Zealand based AI companies when that is to be added to your order. Our standard handling fee will however apply.

The standard despatch and handling fee is $60.00 per on farm consignment. For orders shipped to other AI companies our handling fee is only $25.00. Other company handling fees may apply.

AI Technician Services

Samen NZ can provide you with experienced and qualified AI technicians, where required.

Equipment

Samen NZ offer a wide range of AI equipment and supplies at competitive prices.

Bank Lease

Lease banks are available from Samen NZ, where minimum order limits are reached. Our lease bank service includes the first fill of nitrogen and costs $195 per bank.

Nationwide Breeding Consultants

We have a nationwide team of breeding consultants who pride themselves being on the road and available for discussion anytime.

Prices and Supply

Supply is subject to availability. All prices in this catalogue are subject to change without notice and are exclusive of GST.

Free Semen Storage

Semen belonging to Samen NZ clients will be stored between seasons, in our storage tanks, free of charge. Limit Applies.

Client tanks can also be stored with Samen at no extra cost, for convenient despatch the following season.

Colour Coding Programme

Our colour coding programme sets us apart from our competitors. Alongside carefully selecting genetics that give our clients more uniform, higher producing herds.

Heifer Genomic Testing

Heifer genomic testing available on request. Includes A2A2, polled, BPI and gNZI.

Terms & Conditions of Sale

A full explanation of our terms and conditions of sale is listed on the back of the customers copy of our order form. The semen and/or sperm contained in the semen provided to you is protected by intellectual property rights, including by trade secrets which have an indefinite term. We grant you a non exclusive, non transferable, limited, revocable, non sublicensable, one-off license to use such intellectual property rights and the semen. Full details can also be found on our website at www.samen.co.nz