Hawkes Bay Advance Party sixth on-farm
meeting
Wednesday 22 October 2014
John, Marie and Daniel Spiers
“Maranoa Deer Farm”
256 Ormondville Road, Takapau
Agenda:
Visit will follow on from the visit and lunch at the Middelberg/Hilson property,
immediately after lunch. Start from the deer shed and at this stage no bikes
will be necessary (we will email or call the day before if that changes).
1.00: Introductions and plan for the day followed by lunch (provided). Tony Pearse
from DINZ and Hamish Best from Agricom are also attending.
12.45: Tour of Maranoa- start at deer shed then look at crops, deer.
3.00: Return to homestead, smoko and group discussion for Maranoa.
Maranoa stock numbers for winter 2014:
Stock class
Total area
Effective area
Deer fenced area
Effective deer fenced
area
MA hinds (in fawn)
R2 hinds RWS
R1 hinds
R1 stags
R2 stags
R2 stags venison
R3 stags
MA stags
Sire stags
deer
MA cows
R1 bulls
R2 heifers
R2 bulls
R2 steers
R3 steers
cattle
MA and 2T ewes (sil)
Lambs and hoggets
Rams
sheep
Total
Maranoa
307 ha
292 ha
292 ha
292 ha
su
334
170
168
184
185
2.4
1.9
1.7
1.7
2.5
2.5
3.2
3.5
3.5
87
251
12
1391
212
11.6 deer su/deer ha
5.5
4.5
5.5
5.5
5.5
5.5
212
30
Total su
4585 su
15.7 su/eff ha
802
323
286
313
463
278
879
42
3386
1166
1166
1.1
0.7
0.8
33
30
33
1633
4585
NB: stock units based on DINZ for European red deer and on BLNZ
information for sheep and cattle
John and Marie came home to Maranoa in the mid 1970’s to drought, cull ewes
grazing the roadside and works on constant strike. Initially looked at the goat option
but chose the begin deer farming instead. Deer fencing began in 1978, with the first
deer being $600 red weaners from the South Island.
After initially aiming to run just 100 deer on 30 hectares the effects of share farming
(Maranoa kept 60% of all progeny) and tax benefits for deer farming saw the process
snowball- the fences kept going up.
An opportunity with a share farmer saw a bold move to import Yugoslavian
bloodlines from Jelen Park, with well known sires Branko and Broz part of that
importation.
Stock policy and performance:
Sheep
Not much to the sheep policy- lane and shed area cleaners as well as muttons. We
will not dwell on sheep policy for Maranoa!
Cattle:
Finishing R2 bulls. No calves purchased. Flexible policy to kill or opt out at any
stage.
Deer:
Breeding, venison and velvet operations alongside a stud business.
The emphasis from a breeding perspective is on growth rates for venison. Therefore
velvet, while it is a significant component of farm income, is not the main objective in
sire stag selection.
MA hinds are all single sire mated and fawn in those groups. The entire R2 hind mob
are spiker mated (always early mated and scanning range 86 -97% last five years,
average 92%) with replacement hinds selected after scanning and all other pregnant
R2 hinds sold for breeding.
All stags are taken through to two years for velveting and assessment. Culling cut off
is about 2.0kg and culls are killed. Up to 90 stags are taken through to three year old
and about forty potential sale stags identified. All are velveted and those not put into
the annual sale are either enter the velvet herd as replacements or are culled further.
Identified issues for Maranoa...



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Loss of weight for velvet stags over rut
Drought and the effect on lactating hinds
Pasture persistence- grass grub, drought and persistence in general
Utilisation of recorded information for selection and sale- how much is too much?
o Recording weaning, winter, spring, yearling and two year weights plus
velvet and regrowth weights
o Selected sale stags and all replacement hinds have DeerSelect BVs
generated from this data but cost to do all animals is probably
prohibitive

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o Member input is sought on current policy
Irrigation possibilities and future farming policy
Selection of outside genetics . Currently using Deer Improvement semen for AI.
What are appropriate genetics to build on current performance and will they
perform?
Identified group member issues at 2013 meeting...
Ru, Hugh, Ben:
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
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Completed AP on-farm meeting 10 April 2014
Identifying late born small fawns to their dams so dams can be culled
Adding terminal sires into the breeding programme
Improved weaner growth rates
Use of crops for R1 deer in particular
Developing a firm long term direction- venison and/or velvet?
Grant, George and Matt:

Improving velvet production through DNA or use of a spotting scopecost/benefit and use of data
John and Matt:

Weight loss in stags over autumn- management (feed, space) or science
Matt and Paula:
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Feeding two year olds at pinch periods and effects on lifetime performance
Improving velvet production through DNA or use of a spotting scopecost/benefit and use of data
Weight loss in stags over autumn- management (feed, space) or science
Karen:



Completed AP on-farm meeting 4 September
Completed AP on-farm meeting 31 July
Better lactation performance from hinds- wean better weaners
Improve weaner weight gain in autumn
Start a velvet stag herd
Karen and Richard:

Improved weaner weights and continually improved velvet production
Evan and Linda:


Completed AP on-farm meeting 2 July 2014
“Blank canvas”- any input on development plans welcome
Want to hold hind numbers but develop a plan to utilise the extra deer fenced
area- velvet, improved feeding
 Do things “better”- feeding, genetics source and pairing up hinds/fawns
 How to best tap into potential genetic gains