Dear Customers

This newsletter contains information regarding pricing, product X and a bit about recent off farm activities. I’ve also included a couple of copies of our new brochure, have a read of it and then if possible please pass it on to another calf rearer who isn’t using our product. If this calf rearer subsequently buys one tonne or more of Aoraki Calf Meal we will send you a $75 gift voucher.

Pricing

As stated in the last newsletter my preference is to have a floating price rather than a fixed price for the whole season. And some years this means the price goes up as the price of raw materials increases and some years it drops. Last year it dropped three times.

Calf Meal prices effective from July 1 2016

High Octane Aoraki Calf Meal 40 x 25kg: $630 + GST ex Feedmill
Low Protein Aoraki Calf Meal 40 x 25kg: $595 + GST ex Feedmill

For our barley and wheat we have no fixed contracts, which presently is very advantageous as the spot market grain prices are the lowest they have been in a number of years. Latest indications are there is a more chance of further price drops rather than increases (though it can change quite quickly). This year we do have most of our peas contracted and the reason for this is that often peas are hard to source especially later in the year. On paper peas are usually not cost effective to use in calf meal, however I have always been a big believer in the benefits of feeding peas to a young animal.

Soybean Meal is always the tricky commodity to deal with. If you have a look at the top graph which shows $NZ per tonne you will see earlier this year it dived below $600 per tonne before rebounding and peaking at $840 per tonne just a few months later, currently it is sitting around $700. I have contracted 75% of what we used last season when it was below the $600.

The combination of being able to buy barley and wheat on the current market along with the soybean contracted at a low price is a proving to be a very good mix and giving us an even bigger competitive edge this season when it comes to low cost/high value. The question now is how much soybean meal will I need to buy on the spot market and what price will it be?

Info on ingredient Product “X”

For most of us sweetness (chocolate, cakes, sugary drinks, yip all the bad stuff) is the most attractive taste. Taste also plays an important role in calves as they have 25,000 taste buds compared to us humans having only 9000. Research has also shown calves have a strong preference for sweet solutions. Calf meal with a sweet taste significantly increases feed intake.

We have been using a sweetener in our calf meal since our visit to the animal feed flavouring factory in France 2012. The product we use, for commercially sensitive reasons, we will call product “X”

Driving feed intake and feed palatability is important in aiding calf development. In order to achieve rapid rumen development, early transition from milk to a solid based diet is encouraged. A study in the UK and one in France showed similar responses to product “X” and its ability to improve feed intake in calves, with calves consuming almost twice as much feed. This solid feed consumption drove a higher body weight at weaning.

Product X also has a “Gut Effect” in that it increases glucose, water and sodium absorption and acts on the epithelial structure by stimulating intestinal development.

Or to put it more technically, these gut effects increase the number of glucose transporters on gut epithelial cells, which absorb nutrients from the intestine. Higher glucose absorption provides better nutrition of the villi and gut mucosa, and thereby increases the intestinal surface area and villi height, improving the intestine’s integrity and absorption capability.
Gut effects and gut chemo-sensing is a relatively new field of study. However, more and more research is headed in this direction as they understand more about the function of the gut. The chemo-sensing ability of the gut enables the gut to control absorption of nutrients and therefore has implications in the utilisation of feed and feed conversion efficiency.

Product “X” offers a practical means for enhancing glucose utilisation while at the same time increasing feed palatability, driving feed intake. This leads to better feed conversion efficiency and improved growth on farm and all the consequential benefits that this brings to the producer.

During the summer of 2014/15 we hosted Yara, an exchange student from Austria for four months. Recently Yara visited us again for 10 days however this time she was accompanied by her identical twin sister Florentina. We always enjoy hosting people from different cultures and it often makes us take time out and have another look at some of the tourist activities that are on our doorstep. Spending at least a day in the MacKenzie Country is always a must however a couple of places we hadn’t been to before was the Steampunk HQ in Oamaru and EnkleDooVery Korna in Waimate.

EnkleDooVery Korna is owned and operated by a lady in her seventies and you get to hand feed and pat the wallabies. The girls were lucky enough to hold a baby wallaby, this normally wouldn’t happen until after Labour Weekend. Both places are well worth a visit and maybe at times we are guilty of taking such places for granted as there is no guarantee they will still exist in a few years’ time.

Cheers

Ken Buckingham