Traditional breeds on the bounce as numbers rise
Calf registration figures for the first half of this year have shown that the trend towards traditional breeds and away from larger continental-sired animals on Scottish farms has been growing over the past five years.
Commenting on official statistics released by the British Cattle Movement Service (BCMS) for the first half of 2018, Quality Meat Scotland (QMS) economic analyst Iain Macdonald said the comparing these with the same period in 2013 highlighted the change: “Back in 2013 the three main continental breeds – Limousin, Charolais and Simmental – collectively accounted for 65.4 per cent of the beefsired registrations but by 2018 this had dropped back to 57.8 per cent.”
He said that native breeds had shown a significant rise in popularity, helped in some instances by a premium in the marketplace for finished native breed cattle, most notably Aberdeen Angus: “Aberdeen Angus went from a 19 per cent share of beef-sired registrations in the first half of 2013 up to 21.6 per cent this year. Meanwhile, Shorthorn went from 3.6 per cent to 5.4 per cent, and Hereford doubled from 1.2 per cent to 2.4 per cent.”
But he added that it was
not only the native breeds that had been increasing. Between the first half of 2013 and 2018, the smaller French breed, Salers, saw their share of beef registrations rise from 1.9 per cent to 2.8 per cent, while the double-muscled British Blues rose from 3.1 per cent to 3.9 per cent.
However, he added that overall calf registration numbers were down by 1.6 per cent over the same period. The BCMS data revealed that overall beefsired registrations were down by 2.3 per cent on the year – while dairy registrations, which had been declining recovered by 3.9 per cent.
Following the downturn in the 2015 dairy market, dairy-sired registrations fell back significantly for two years, suggesting greater use of beef bulls within the dairy herd.
“This appears to be supported by regional data
pointing to increases in beef-sired registrations in traditional dairy-producing areas,” he said.
Macdonald said that with the birth-to-beef production cycle averaging around two years, calf registrations could provide advance notice of likely beef supplies: “Animals reaching processing plants this autumn and winter will be largely drawn from early-finishing cattle from the calf crop of 2017 plus the bulk of the animals from the autumn of 2016 and the slower-finishing spring-born 2016 cattle.”
Adding together beefsired registrations from the March to May period of 2016 and 2017 to beef-sired registrations from September to November 2016, he said, indicated a potential increase of around 1 per cent for the coming autumn.