.png)
Ohuka Polled Devon Stud
Ohuka Red Devons are purpose bred for dairy beef production.
Docility, ease of calving and early maturity define our cattle.
Dairy beef is the way to go
Sending 4 day old calves to slaughter will become less acceptable as time goes on. More dairy beef calves will need to be raised alongside traditional beef herds and the selection of suitable beef bulls becomes an important decision for dairy farmers. That means more dairy beef calves from dairy heifers. Beef calves from dairy heifers cash in on the early season premium. Red Devon bulls lead the way.
Benefits of our Devons
- Easy calving with shorter gestation
- Early maturing medium sized cattle
- High yield carcasses with meat marbling
- Extremely docile, will come through the shed
- Will fatten where other breeds starve
- Fully electric fence trained
- Suitable for mating with dairy heifers
NZ leading sires
Our bulls out of top NZ registered cows and Australian bulls selected for polling and ease of calving are leading sires in their breed.
Dairy Beef Trials
One of our herd sires, VJ Awhitu, is the first Devon to be accepted for the NZ Beef and Lamb Dairy Beef Progeny evaluation trials
Tough hill country
Our registered cattle are not spoiled and bred on coastal hill country. They are expected to clean up their paddocks.
Grass Fed
Our cattle get no other feed than pasture, silage and hay.
Electric fences
Our calves get weighed and tagged at birth and trained for electric fences from day 1.
Docility
Temperament reigns supreme, only docile cattle are retained for breeding.
Calving Ease
Bulls are selected for low birthweights, short gestation and easy birthing calf shape.
Ohuka Farm Operation - Visitors Welcome
Alongside our dairy operation where we first started using Devon bulls over our heifers and cows, we run an autumn calving Devon herd and the Devon calves get weighed and tagged at birth. They get weaned in late spring when there is ample grass. Calves get weaned in a paddock next to the cows which makes for low stress weaning for both dam and calf. The calves continue to be rotated in front of the cows so they get the best of the grass and the cows, released from the burden of having to produce milk for their calves, clean up the paddocks after them and put weight back on as they do so. At the same time the flats are shut up for silage and hay and in early autumn one paddock is sown with Italian rye grass which gets about three grazings over the winter when other growth has slowed down.
Our Breeding Program
All our animals are registered but our animals get treated like a commercial herd. Our heifers get mated as yearlings. We retain and select animals on:
- Ease of Calving
- Docility
- Fertility
- Birthweight
- Weight gain
- Polling
- Milking ability
- Structure
- Inbreeding coefficient
