72. Breeding Highly Resilient Nguni Cattle in Botswana | Dirk Luus

In this interview we discuss Dirks's discovery of Nguni after failed attempts with Bonsmara cattle, amazing attributes of Nguni in harsh Botswanan conditions including longevity, fertility, parasite resistance, failings of commodity beef market, regenerative grazing practices to improve the landscape, his long term vision for the preservation of Nguni and much, much more. 

Dirk Luus is an expert Nguni cattle breeder operating KwaMakhatini Nguni Stud in Ghanzi, Botswana. He brought a pureblooded herd of Makhitini ecotype Nguni cattle from Eastern Freestate in South Africa to the dry, arid and predator-infested area of, Botswana and is breeding for original traits of adaptability and lack of need for human intervention.
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Transcript

Speaker 2: 0:08

Today I'm speaking with Dirk Lies. He is an Nguni cattle farmer currently living, working and raising his cattle in Botswana, africa. Dirk, thank you for coming and speaking to me.

Speaker 1: 0:21

Good afternoon, Max, or good morning, rather. Thank you so much for the opportunity. It's quite an honor to be a part of this.

Speaker 2: 0:32

Fantastic. Tell us about yourself. How did you get into Nguni cattle and maybe how you ended up in Botswana?

Speaker 1: 0:41

Okay, just a quick background. I did not grow up in a farming family. My grandfather was not a farmer, my father himself not a farmer we had family that used to farm and ever since I was little and it was also a dream of my father to one day own a piece of land and farm with cattle. So, briefly, the connection with Botswana and, I think, eventually, why I ended up here my grandmother's sister. They lived on the border between South Africa and Botswana and I as a little boy used to visit them and would go disappearing in the dunes, with the herdsmen riding on horseback after cattle and so on. So that's just a very fond memory of Botswana and how it started. I grew up close to Johannesburg, where I finished school and then studied law at a university in Botjestrum and then studied law at university in Botchastroom. I then practiced a bit of law for a while, but it was not really my scene. Much better to work with animals than to work with humans in some instances. So in 2002, we got the opportunity to buy a piece of land with my family close to Lesotho in the eastern free state, a beautiful mountainous area of South Africa, and there we started off, initially not coming from a farming background, it was quite easy to buy cattle because you would buy what the neighbor had. And it so ended that we started with a few Brangus cattle and we started growing the herd and we crossbred them with Angus and so on. In the meantime we were referred to as weekend farmers or weekend warriors. We came out to the farm on weekends and, yes, then we could purchase another piece. And in South Africa they have the Bonsmara cattle. And everybody said to me you know, that's the cattle you need to farm with. It's a composite breed that was developed in South Africa. And everybody said to me you know, that's the cattle you need to farm with. It's a composite breed that was developed in South Africa. And so we went around to auctions and we bought Bonsmara cattle the best that we could afford and from the top breeders and so on. And so I started with Bonsmaras on the new farm leaders and so on. And so I started with Ponce Morris on the new farm.

Speaker 1: 3:29

And they I can't really explain. When you are not a beef cattle farmer, you know you accept things for what they are. So if you have to pull out calves, that is what you do. Because you're a beef cattle farmer, you have to pull out calves. That is what you do. Because you're a beef cattle farmer. You have to pull out calves.

Speaker 1: 3:50

My background with animals actually originates from horses. I was since a young boy, I was also riding and showing horses. So you know, you have a good idea of keeping and running, uh, or owning horses and looking after them. So you, I could just apply that to the cattle and, um, yes, the herd grew and there was quite a lot of difficulties with the bonsmara cattle. Um, I mean, you would, uh, you would buy the best quality animals and you bring them to the farm and within a month or two, they start quality animals. And you bring them to the farm and within a month or two, they start deteriorating. They're losing weight. Um, the pure reason is they were not raised on the felt. Um, and they were not, um, you know, they didn't run in a natural environment. They were fed in a crawl and they were taken to the auction, to the bull auction. They look amazing and you pay money for them because they're really smart and they, they, they're going to do the job. And then they get to the bull auction. They look amazing and you pay money for them because they're really smart and they're going to do the job. And then they get to the farm and they fall apart. So it was, I think, in 2014,.

Speaker 1: 4:58

I decided to buy three Nguni cattle just to keep them around the house, just for the sake of the beautiful skins and the horns and, you know, just to be something like a garden ornament, basically. And these cattle I bought from Naledi Roberts. They were registered females, only three of them and we could buy them for slaughter price because they were like 18 years old, 19 years old, and I put them in a camp close to the house. So now on this farm I had the Nguni three Nguni cows in the 19 and 20 years old stage, and I had young, beautiful Bonsmara cattle which we paid a fortune for on the other side, and these three cows had calves. They didn't lose their condition. They kept their condition through winter, which Bethlehem is quite cold, and I looked at the Bonsmara cattle which we had to feed, feed, lick, supplement all the time and that's something triggered there. So, of course, for the three cows we had to purchase a bull and I was told by my lady that, michelle Smith, she was a neighbor quite close to us they're running Makatini and Goonies and that I could possibly buy a bull from them. So we went off to Michelle, we chose a young bull, we brought him back and, yes, I was just amazed to see how these three old ladies raising their calves fell pregnant again and they had subsequent calves and if they were borns Maros, they would have been rid off by the age of 10. So they double the age of the good animals that we're supposed to farm with and they are producing much better and physically they're looking much better than the Bonsmara cattle.

Speaker 1: 7:12

And that then made me decide that my plan is eventually to move to Botswana, that Botswana the farms are much bigger, it's vast. We have predators here. It would be better for me to rather run a herd of Nguni cattle, which I could see the difference, than to try and bring some of my fancy-borns Maras here, because you're going to feed them and you will have calving problems. I mean, I had premium heifers and of 32, I had to pull out eight calves from 32 beautiful heifers. And just because they are breeding them bigger than what they should be, they are making the animals larger to comply with feedlot requirements and not run them on the felt like you should run animals low cost and so on. And that's where the Lovewood and Goonie cattle started, cast and so on, and that's where the love for the Nguni cattle started.

Speaker 1: 8:31

We then purchased a few more and I then eventually moved them to Botswana. We moved the small little herd and that was also quite a mission to get the cattle across the border and into Botswana. Yes, and that's how I ended up with Ngunis. So subsequently sold, sold all the Botswana cattle and now just farming with Nguni cattle which I've never had to pull out a calf in the past nine years, our oldest female and Botswana can be quite harsh. It's the total opposite of what Bethlehem was, where it's very cold and the grazing a little bit better. Botswana is more harsh heat-wise, but then we also have the bush trees that the cattle can browse on. So I just knew that I had to rather start off with the Ingunia, and the herd's been going very well and it's not costing me a lot of money to keep and to run them. So, yes, what what I also intended to do?

Speaker 1: 9:40

Because I at that stage, uh, didn't live in Botswana. We only visited once a month, or sometimes once in six weeks. There was no injection program. I didn't deworm them, I didn't use any chemicals to, you know, get rid of ticks. A Khanzi district where I'm living is known as the Texas of Botswana, so if I can compare it, this is so. It doesn't have a lot of diseases for cattle and we do not have a lot of ticks in the area. But, like I said, we do not dose for ticks, we do not do for parasites and we try to keep them as natural as possible.

Speaker 2: 10:40

Well, that's quite an interesting story of your discovery of Nguni, and I'm just thinking about a geriatric obstetric ward. You've got these 20-year-old ladies carving again with no problem. And yeah, the slick bonsmaras that were supposed to be the optimal cattle for that region, they were leaving them in the dust. The optimal cattle for that region, they were leaving them in the dust. So how many more calves did you get out of those ladies that you initially bought?

Speaker 1: 11:13

We had another set of calves and then I decided, because they were a mixed ecotype the three old ladies, if I can call them that they were of a mixed ecotype but from a stud registered. And then when we bought the Makatini Bull, I then decided to rather go to the Makatini ecotype, which is the smaller one from the Makatini flats in Zululand. So I then ended up selling the three old ladies and I think I even got more for them when I sold them and their calves, and we could buy some registered animals from Michelle as well, but then pure Makatinis. I can vaguely recall the first time I ever saw Makatini or Nguni cattle was in Zululand, close to Kozi Bay.

Speaker 1: 12:11

As a young boy we used to go to the north coast of Kozi Bay, which is not very accessible except if you have a 4x4. And we had to drive through the villages to get to the beach and we were stuck behind this herd of beautiful cattle with their horns and the patterns, and never in my life and they in the South African culture they look down upon to a large extent to say, but they're indigenous cattle, and I think I had something like that not stuck in my brain, but I think it was always there. They're beautiful animals with colors but they don't really mean much. But I mean I had the opposite was proven to me after buying the three old ladies.

Speaker 2: 13:10

Can you explain the different ecotypes to the listeners who might not understand the difference between the Makatini and these other ecotypes?

Speaker 1: 13:19

Yes, there are four ecotypes in South Africa, under correction. I might not know all of them off by heart, but it's the Sangha and then the Makatini, and then down in the south it was the Xhosa people, the Pedis. They had Pedis and the fourth one I'm not too sure, but they were scattered, if I can say, to the north of the country, the Makatinis, to the east of the country, from the Lubombo Mountains to the coast, and they were considered to be Zulu cattle, the Makatinis, and they were also the smallest of the four ecotypes that you get in South Africa, get in South Africa and then down to the east coast of South Africa, southern east coast of South Africa, I would say, from Transkei, or that used to be Transkei, all the way to Port Elizabeth, that area, and then on to the northwest, northwestern part of Southern Africa. It's the same in Namibia. We just did a trip with Ed Schroeder on his northwestern part of southern Africa. It's the same in Namibia.

Speaker 1: 14:29

We just did a trip with Ed Schroeder on his pursuit to do another book on the Nguni cattle of southern Africa and we're also told that there were four ecotypes in Namibia as well, which it's referred to, the various parts in the country where they occur. So yes, and the Makitinis are the smallest one and they are said not to have been crossbred with the other Nguni ecotypes because of the location where they were and the size was determined by the grazing as well. They are much smaller in frame but very pure, very refined females, beautiful horns, beautiful dewlaps, like really the traditional indigenous cattle.

Speaker 2: 15:28

And were there, nguni in Botswana, prior to your bringing your herd over?

Speaker 1: 15:35

There used to be up in the northwestern part of Botswana, next to the Okavango Delta and to the north of the delta, which also borders onto the Caprivi Strip, which falls then in Namibia, caprivi strip, which falls then in Namibia.

Speaker 1: 15:52

They were scattered in villages and they were referred to as the Tawana breed, but they had similar traits and built as the Yunguni of Namibia and Southern Africa. But I think in the 60s I'm not sure the English name of the disease that caused the government to euthanize a lot of the cattle in that district. So most of them were euthanized in that particular instance and the people were given Brahman and Simantala cattle. After they eradicated this disease they gave them Brahman and Simantala and the rest of the country also became diluted in the Botswana breed genetics because people were importing Brahman, simantala et cetera. So there is no other known Nguni breeders in Botswana. We're the only people that breed them. There were pockets of them in the south I think, but also crossbred with Vermont to put weight on them in order to, you know, to have them ready for the markets that Botswana requires Pardon.

Speaker 2: 17:27

Yeah, and so tell us sorry, go on no, no.

Speaker 1: 17:33

so there are very few, very few left, or here and there, and you would spot them right close to the Caprivi strip, where the cattle almost like Namibian Nguni cattle, but one or not big herds of them, and they were also known. I've been told by the local people here that they were hardy, they survived through droughts and they had calves every year, and they had calves every year. But, like everybody else does, they need to keep the market happy and they crossbreed them and eventually they dilute the genetics and then there's nothing left.

Speaker 2: 18:25

Yeah, it's a theme that I've heard from other breeders in Africa, which is this idea, idea that and there's been introduction of supposedly superior genetics in the form of whether that's brahman or or other english breeds for the purposes of herd improvement in quotation marks but the irony is that, um you, you already had the improved animal, which was was the animal that had been evolved over thousands of years by the selection pressure of Mother Nature, exactly to adapt to the conditions and, in fact, these crossbreeding attempts were actually just watering down the bloodlines with inferior genetics.

Speaker 1: 19:09

That's absolutely true. That's absolutely true, and especially on the strip that we did with Ed. Now the local people said to us that's what happened, but some of them are realizing the importance of the indigenous breed and they are reintroducing the Nguni bulls into the herds in order to breed them up. The problem is the market. We are price takers, not price makers, and I think that's the biggest mistake for us, and I know everybody says that for us and I know everybody says that. But in order to swing people's minds exterior, things need to happen in order to make people see that. All right, no, this is better for us to have smaller, framed animals, to have indigenous animals that can survive a drought, that can push through that calves every year, and that doesn't cost you money. Your input costs are not as high, I mean, and just the overall. You know, long-haired animals in our area are crazy. They get targeted by ticks, by horseflies, you know. So it's so stupid to work against nature rather than to work with it. But it takes a bit of a mind shift. But it takes a bit of a mind shift and sometimes you feel like a crazy person to make people see what you have seen. But you know some people need to see it for themselves and most of the farmers continue farming with the animals that their grandfather bred or their father bred, or this is the best, and they don't really sit down to see what it costs them, how much more animals we can run on the same piece of land smaller framed than bigger framed, and the input costs. So no, unfortunately.

Speaker 1: 21:29

Unfortunately it has happened in Botswana too that people come to me and say where do you sell these animals? I say well, I slaughter them. He says to the EU, because Botswana has an EU market and carcasses need to be about 220 kgs for you to fall in the bracket of exporting and they go. But these animals don't have weight. I said yes. Usually I say if you farm with millis or corn, you don't want to farm with the biggest corn, you want to farm with the most corn, and that perception just needs to get through to people.

Speaker 1: 22:11

And I can see now the change in Botswana. I mean feedlots, the droughts that we've had. Botswana had the highest temperatures in 40 years. This year Feedlots will eventually disappear, I think, or I hope. In Botswana it's more regulated than in southern Africa. We are not allowed to use any hormones. They do a traceability on the meat because of the EU requirements, the EU requirements and it's not becoming. It's too expensive to feed animals in the Ghanzi district because we are 680 kilometers away from the capital city of Gaborone. There are no millies or corn planted or any bulk that you would use in your feedlot feed. Everything needs to get imported from Zambia or from Southern Africa, and the costs to that is just air raising. So I think there's a downward scale in feedlots in Botswana already, since I've been here and now just talking about the village where I live, there are a lot fewer people feeding their animals than there were 10 years ago.

Speaker 2: 23:46

Yeah, that's very interesting. And the point about paradigm shifts it's something that I talk about a lot and advocating for more lifestyle and root cause approaches to medicine. And what you said about farmers just doing what treat the diabetic patient with all these medications, you know, with a brief discussion of some ineffective lifestyle discussions, and really it's just because they're within a paradigm, and to change a paradigm and to change one's thought paradigm is difficult. It's incredibly difficult, especially in that context. Paradigm is difficult, it's incredibly difficult, especially in that context. So to me it makes sense and I really understand how that's really applying in Nguni cattle too.

Speaker 2: 24:37

But I like to think from first principles and it seems like you do as well. And, as you said, it makes so much more sense to work with nature, with the animal that mother nature has given you for that environment, than to bring in something that's been selected by man and try and prop it up with inputs, whether they're vaccinations, anti-tick treatments or for a feed and kind of nurse and mother, an animal in a situation that's clearly not suited for and not adapted to. So maybe that's a good segue into discussing some of these attributes, and you alluded to them earlier with regard to the working age, the fact that they're fertile into their later years, easy carving Just describe. What are these characteristics that you prize and you see the most in your herd in Botswana?

Speaker 1: 25:29

you prize and you see the most in your herd in Botswana, I think, the fact that they are browsers. Our landscape, we have grasses, we have shrubs, trees, and they really make use of everything that's available. So even in fall, when the leaves hit the floor, they start eating it, and some of the trees we refer to as post-toasties I don't know. Kellogg's used to do a breakfast cereal. They called it post-to toasties, I think. So it's a flattened little thing and the leaves look quite similar to that and the cattle thrive on that. They live on that. That's the main thing, I think. Also the hair coverage or the coat not being very hairy nice, fine, smooth coats. That's very important to me, and then, in our instance, the horns, for us very important. We just experienced wild dogs on the farm for the first time in nine years. We ever had wild dogs on the farm and we were lucky to only lose one heifer to these wild dogs. So they would come into a farm and they can really cause a lot of damage in a herd. Just to the eastern side of the village where I live, in the past week they've lost seven simmentaler bulls, two wild dogs. And the simmentaler bulls are bold, they are bulls. They are not cows or calves or anything. They are bulls. They are not cows or calves or anything. They are bulls. And I think in that respect, having the horns, a predator would rather go for something without horns than go for something with horns. So we have been very fortunate that we've lost seven calves at one stage in nine months to a leopard female but she was raising cubs and the neighbors lost a whole lot more. And the problem with leopard is that if you take them out of the area, your cheetahs then come in and they catch every day. So for us it's better to have a leopard on the farm that catches once in three or four days than to have cheetah on the farm.

Speaker 1: 28:24

And yes, in respect of predators, that is an absolute benefit to us not to dehorn them. I know in South Africa they are breeding them polled now, and some of the people polled them for purposes of feedlots and selling them onto the feedlots. But we keep ours as natural as possible, even the young bulls. When we sell them they are not dehorned or nothing gets altered on them at all. That's one of the other things. And then the heat tolerance. I mean they. We get temperatures of 40 degrees plus in summer and it's just amazing to see how these animals adapted from the free state moving here, the subsequent animals born here. They are very much adapted to it. And then their water intake. We have on the farm we have two large paddocks with one watering point and sometimes when it's cloudy, not too hot, they don't come for water in two days. The third day they might come for water. So they're just all in all tough and resilient and, like I said, the ease of carving. That's also a huge benefit for me, the fact that we've never had any problems with carving.

Speaker 1: 29:59

And the other attribute would be the percentage of bulls that we use on the females. Our circumstances are quite extensive. One of our paddocks would be 1,500 hectares. That's one paddock that they run in and I mean your bull can't be hanging around in the corner of the camp, he needs to be with the females. So that's also one of the. It saves you money If you need to use less bulls on your herd than to have one bull for every 25 females. I mean just calculate the cost of that. You can have double the amount of females and we've done it up to 70 females with one bull. Just think about the money that you save there.

Speaker 1: 30:54

So to me, I try to run the herd like we have the kudu in Botswana and southern Africa. It's an antelope that occurs, and I mean they have their calves in season. There's no period where's no uh, a period where the bull gets put in, where the females, they carve in the same at the same time of year they wean their calves themselves. Um, and that that would actually be the the way to go eventually. Um, but it's always not always not easy to do that.

Speaker 1: 31:33

I did in the beginning leave the heifers with their mothers so that the mothers wean themselves, and when the herd was smaller it was then easy to pick up if the heifer was still suckling on the mother and the mother didn't wean it when she has a new calf. But the herd has grown a bit big and it's not fair on the female to do that. So we have a weaning period where we wean the heifers. We take them away for about a month and then they get chucked back into the herd, and then they get chucked back into the herd and they run with the cows and if they are ready to mate to the bulls, then they mate. We don't grow them out for two years, or they need to be a certain kilogram. So the natural cycle continues and I find that works the best.

Speaker 2: 32:32

Yeah, the point that you made about the subsequent progeny who got born in this Botswan environment and their adaptation is interesting to me because it speaks to maybe perhaps a deep genetic pool and maybe an epigenetic toolkit that these animals have had from their ancestral past that allows them to adapt to a whole bunch of different conditions. So it sounds like the Inguni were doing well in South Africa, yet they were, immediately after even only one generation, able to still thrive despite a drier environment. Is that what you notice? What you notice?

Speaker 1: 33:18

yes, absolutely, absolutely. They um, uh, I mean from bethlehem to here. The altitude was about two thousand, about two thousand meters above sea level in bethem, with cold, cold, exceptionally cold winters, snow on the mountains in Lesotho and we're down here to about 1,000 meters above sea level and the heat extremely. So they've just adapted. The calves born here we haven't had one that was struggling or that was not doing well.

Speaker 1: 34:02

It was really just amazing to see when I moved them here there was a bit of a shock to their system because it was a very dry year and the grazing wasn't good on the farm and they had to adapt. They really had to adapt and the oldest lady now is 22 years old that has moved from South Africa to Botswana and she's raising a calf which we have quite thick sand. We have quite thick sand here and in the dry the sand gets very hot and the distances for them to walk, like I said, 1,500 hectares, the paddock fences would be about three kilometers or four kilometers away from the water point, and they just adapt it and she thrived and she's carved every year. So it is, yeah, it's just amazing to work with these animals and to see what they are capable of, and I wish more people would do.

Speaker 2: 35:12

I think eventually, eventually it would do, I think, eventually, eventually, it would I mean a 22 year old cow and with with a calf is I mean, for a lot of my listeners aren't into cattle at all, they're not, they don't have a scale of understanding. But, um, give us an idea of, of a comparison to these other breeds, because from my, from my understanding, that's, that's almost unheard of to have a 22-year-old cow with calf.

Speaker 1: 35:39

It's crazy. If I can explain to you the Bonsmara cattle you would. Usually the heifers keep them away from the bull until they're two years old. By the time they are 10 years old you need to throw them out because then they are really weak. They battle to raise a calf. So you have maybe seven calves from one cow and then you need replacement cattle. So you need to.

Speaker 1: 36:12

If you run a herd of Bonsmara cattle, you can only go with a cow until she's about 10 years old and then replace it. So every year you need to keep replacement heifers With us. It's not necessary. You can sell your replacement heifers. You don't need to replace females every 10 years and that saves a lot of money too. You know, if you think about that, just the costs in replacing animals that actually still, if they weren't goony they would go on and they would have another five or six or seven calves for you. So just to give you an idea, and most of our females they reach about 17, 18 years old that they still keep carving and when we then see they are really battling, we would not put them to the bull and we would just slaughter them on the farm.

Speaker 2: 37:15

Yeah, interesting. And the other number that you mentioned that I think is interesting is that you run one bull with up to 70 females and again, that's a kind of an objective number that people can compare across breeds and give us an idea of the running rate that other breeds might have compared to these.

Speaker 1: 37:38

The Bonsamara bull. It is said that you need one bull for every 25 females. So you can calculate that, say, at about $20,000 per bull. Where you have one Nguni bull, you can you saving about forty thousand dollars compared to the other breed. So, one per 25. We have brought down the ratio to one to fifty bulls, one to fifty females, so just to make sure that all the females are covered then. So, yes, no, there's a lot of money to be saved in that way and you can possibly use a bull for about two years and then you need to replace it. So just the replacement costs for bulls to two bulls, I mean it makes a lot of sense Financially it makes a lot of sense.

Speaker 1: 38:40

And the beef quality, although a bit smaller and a bit lighter in weight, I mean it's still beef. If you take the skin off, you would not know, and that's what I also say to the people in South Africa. Well, if I put a carcass on a hook there of a Mguni and of a Bonsmara, with the skin off, you will not know the difference. You will not know, especially if it's been fed. So hopefully, hopefully, people will come around and see the benefits of these animals. And the problem is that the numbers are dwindling. People are not farming with them because of the pressures of feedlots and of the market and it's quite sad because those genetics are being lost. Namibia has gone through that effort and they have four farms which is owned by the government, where they breed Nguni and where they try to keep the genetics going. And we visited one of those farms and it's absolutely amazing to see what they have done there trying to preserve the genetics.

Speaker 2: 40:04

When I talked to Clyde Biggs rest in peace he mentioned the same thing about the bulls servicing the females and amazing ability of those bulls to maintain condition and cover so many females.

Speaker 2: 40:18

The the other um interesting point was about that these the horns, and in australia I know edwin rouse is, he's got a part of his herd which is polled and he's breeding polled. And again, it's because of the um, it's because of the australian, the australian market and um, the conditions are simply different and the market demands different things. But it totally makes sense that if you've got cheetahs and leopards and wild dogs, that the horns are an absolute asset. You want some form of self-defense if you're being attacked like that, and it just really paints such a picture of such a robust animal and such a well-adapted, robust, fit-for-purpose animal, and I think that's just so clear from what you've described, dirk. So, thank you, thanks a lot. The question that I just want to know with regard to the way you run your cattle I'm presuming that you just leave them in, they're just set stock, they're just put into a big paddock and they browse around. You're not rotating them or moving them regularly like in a more kind of strip grazing approach.

Speaker 1: 41:29

Yes, very interesting too is the grazing patterns to is the grazing patterns. And I was introduced to somebody that in Kanzi, in the village where I live, he did high-density grazing and when I was still living in South Africa I just sat down with him and listened to what he said and I went back and did it on the farm there or on the farms that we had, much smaller farms, much smaller farms, but um, it really worked well um, and they were following the Alan Savory idea um of um grazing it down and then resting it. So I try to do the same. I try to keep half of the farm not grazed to recover through a whole season, a rainy season. So we try to not graze half of the farm and then the other half of the farm really gets punished. So one section of the farm is divided into nine camps of about 200 to 250 hectares and the other half of the farm is divided into two camps of 1,500 hectares and 1,000 hectares. So we alternate the grazing.

Speaker 1: 42:51

We have three herds on the farm. We have the pregnant cows In order to, as they calve, we can catch and tag and register the newborn calves. They then get shoved into the herd of cows and calves with their group of bulls, their group of bulls, and then we have the young bull herd that we finish off and then sell on to to the markets or have them slaughtered and so on. So in we have three herds running on the farm at any time the heifers, when we wean them, we wean them with the young bulls, but then they get placed back into the herd with the pregnant cows so that they can then also run with bulls and be covered when they are ready.

Speaker 1: 43:42

I was told that, um, having your females grow out and then covering them when they reach a certain kg 250 to 300 kgs they might suffer from hormonal imbalances and they would then in future not calve every year. So that's why the practice of putting the heifers back with the pregnant cows and the bulls, and when they are ready they calve. We don't feed them extra. Pregnant cows and the bulls and when they are ready they calve. We don't feed them extra. They just get a lick with minerals and vitamins added to salt and that's basically all that we give right through the year.

Speaker 2: 44:33

Have you noticed? Parts of your farm have improved from a soil quality, vegetation point of view, using these techniques.

Speaker 1: 44:42

Yes, no, absolutely Absolutely, the fact that you can rest. When we started off on the farm, it was quite grazed down and there was always cattle in the specific paddock and we then started doing the alternate grazing and resting the camp for a whole rainy season. It's just amazing to see the amount of grass that's reappeared. I really thought that it would not be possible for it to happen. Very much interesting when we did this trip.

Speaker 1: 45:22

The Namibian people are really really up to date, especially there's George Friedrich. I really learned a lot from him just by visiting him on the farm and him explaining to us. He also did the high density grazing and now has moved over to a bigger paddocks because, um, yeah, it boils down to the, the bricks plants, the sugar quantities, different hours of the day, what the animals graze and then the variety of plants that the animal actually needs. So in the smaller paddocks he said that he fenced off his farm in very small paddocks and he wasn't getting the results, but it ended up not having the variety of species for the animals to to graze on. So, um, and that's the amazing thing about this, the the more we go on, the more we learn and, uh, the the better it gets for for man and for for animals. So, um no, we we really try to manage the farm, because if we don't manage the farm we won't be able to produce animals on that farm Very important for us.

Speaker 2: 46:46

It sounds to me like such a virtuous cycle because with this high-intensity grazing techniques, you're simply going to be able to increase the amount of animals that you can eventually stock on the property, and then you regenerate the land quicker, and then it's a virtuous cycle of improvement and benefit for the land and the animals. And are you introducing new genetics into your herd and, if so, where do you get them from?

Speaker 1: 47:17

We've had a problem. We we brought in genetics from south africa, especially bulls. Um, we have formed a makatini conservation group, uh, which all the dam lines and sire lines that came off the Makatini flats are recorded into and the bulls that we run in the herd. We know the sire lines and we try to then just introduce other sire lines in order to broaden the genetic pool. It is a problem for us because we are running out of sire lines, especially in the Makatinis, and one would then have to possibly consider to introduce some of the Namibian Nguni with a smaller frame, just in order to keep them, you know, to open the pool. So it's a bit of a concern. And South Africa has foot and mouth disease now and once they think it's under control, then it breaks out again and we are a bit stuck now. But fortunately we've spotted some nice genetics in Namibia in Namibia and we would possibly then import from there in order to just keep the genetics open and not breed ourselves into a corner.

Speaker 2: 48:46

Yeah, that makes sense. So it sounds like you're really operating almost in a conservation herd of Nguni cattle in where you are. So what's your goal from for your, for your herd and and for the, for the breed? I guess what? What's, what's your um?

Speaker 1: 49:05

I guess, yeah, long-term aim yeah, the long-term aim is to still increase the numbers. Uh, we need to increase the female lines. When we started this conservation group, there were only about 1,200 registered pure Makatini animals left in southern Africa, which is not a lot, and we are not lucky like Europe, where they have funds to try and preserve the genetics, or even like the Namibian people have done in order to keep the genetics going is to give land and to employ people by the government to run the farm, and the mission would be to increase the herd and also try to, if people see what they can do, convince a few other people to also start breeding. I know that it's not going to be easy, but the true fact is also the economy of this. We have seen and the same story happens in Namibia, where the feedlots discriminate in inverted commas, discriminate, but they still buy the animals for five rand or five dollars less than other weaners. So they still buy the animals, they still feed them and they still sell them on and and that puts a lot of people off the fact that they discriminate against them.

Speaker 1: 50:48

So we have seen one breeder in Namibia. He has played a huge role in Nguni society in South Africa and in Namibia and he, on his one farm, started crossbreeding the Nguni with the Boron from Kenya and it is amazing to see what these animals look like, you know. So you have the double bang of genetics indigenous genetics and the amount of weight that these small little animals then carry, and they're both Boron and Nguni indigenous. These small little animals then carry, and they're both the Boeran and Guni indigenous. So that would be possible for us as well, you know, to start off and do a bit of crossbreeding with the Boeran and just maybe get a little bit more weight out of them, but without compromising the genetics. So that's possibly also what we would need to look at at this stage. But yes, increasing the numbers and running a nice big herd of colored animals.

Speaker 2: 51:56

Amazing.

Speaker 2: 51:57

Well, the problems that you described with this commodity market and being a price taker is something that is universal.

Speaker 2: 52:04

It's not only in Africa, it's in Australia, it's in the US and it's really fundamentally because the market is selecting for the quickest carcass weight in the shortest amount of time and it's not pricing these.

Speaker 2: 52:16

What I believe, and I'm sure you and Ed Schroeder and all the other people that I've talked to believe, which is these priceless genetic attributes and this genetic endowment of hardiness, of fertility, of longevity and all the features and traits that we've talked about. So the market doesn't recognize that and I think one way of getting around it is doing something like Jake Wolke is doing down in Auburn, australia, which is selling direct-to-market, which is again another whole set of challenges in itself, because you have to operate a marketing agency and a lot more than just simply raising animals. But I guess it's one option. And then the other option that you've just described is maintaining your purebred herd and then introducing external genetics, whether that's brown or English breeds, and then having terminal sires and selling the terminal sires into the commodity market to keep the operation afloat but still being able to preserve the integrity of the pure blood genetics.

Speaker 1: 53:19

Yes, that's absolutely, absolutely, I think, what any Nguni breeder should be looking at. You know, it's always the fight if you keep them pure, keep them pure but you can still keep them pure. And, uh, you know, get the, the animals that you can breed with um, but also do a bit of a cross breeding program on the side. You know, in order to make um, ends not ends meet, but, you know, in order to um to survive or not survive, it's not the correct word, but you get what I'm saying is to just get the benefit of the little bit more weight that you can put on it.

Speaker 2: 54:01

Exactly that makes sense to me. Before we finish, I have to ask you about the meat. Do you slaughter your own animal? Do you eat the beef of your own animals?

Speaker 1: 54:13

Actually crazy. I was vegetarian for five years. I'm a cattle farmer but was vegetarian for five years. No, I can't get it over my heart to slaughter my own animals. I've never. I can't get it over my heart to slaughter my own animals. I've never. I can't do that. I sometimes even cry when I see the bulls go on the ramp on the truck. So, unfortunately, I have tasted in Goonie. Yes, yes, but I don't slaughter my own animals.

Speaker 2: 54:45

Fair enough, great. Is there anything that you want to mention that I haven't asked you about at all?

Speaker 1: 54:52

Yes, I forgot to just hardiness and disease resistant animals. And this is now a personal experience. When we bought the farm, the person selling the farm to us never informed us that he had contagious abortion in his herd. And we were neighboring him and we bought the farm and we put the Bonsmara cattle on and I think a year later I had a few sets of abortions and I had to phone the vet and say please come check what's going on, we need to find out. And my herd was found that they had contagious bricolosa, contagious abortion and that was quite devastating because you are under quarantine.

Speaker 1: 55:54

The measurements in South Africa wasn't that great. All the farms around me were supposed to be placed under quarantine. It never was and we had to start slaughtering the animals. And this herd of Nguni cattle that was earmarked to come to Botswana was running on the same farm and I don't know they didn't contract contagious abortion, it was just the Bonsmara cattle. And that was quite amazing to me that I had to slaughter the Bonsmara cattle because it spread like wildfire and then not even one of them tested positive for it. They had to be bled every month in order to see if it has spread in the herd and luckily none of them got it.

Speaker 1: 56:48

So I put out on a forum and I asked what would be the reason why these cattle didn't get the Bricillosa contagious abortion. And they said it's the higher ammonium levels in the blood that makes them more disease resistant. And that's just one. It's an amazing thing to think that your foreign breed gets pulled down by this disease and the indigenous cattle just. They thrive and they go on. So that's just another marker that I had to say. That was quite amazing to me to experience.

Speaker 2: 57:24

Yeah, it's incredible, and I have really I just described the Nguni cattle as the most advanced technology. I think that's really one way of thinking about it and this is the most advanced technology for raising beef for the reasons that we've just described in the past hour. So why, again, if we're thinking from first principles and we're not, um, clouded by um emotion or um simply uh, doing things as they've always been done, why wouldn't you want to use the best technology for for the job, and that translates into the highest animal ethics. I think that's another key point, which is, if you've got an animal that's fit for purpose, then it's not suffering because it's not getting all these problems that those other breeds, um are getting. So there's so many. It makes so much sense, to my mind, and and obviously yours as well, to to be using these, these animals, in this, in the environment that you are and here as well.

Speaker 1: 58:22

So I think, I think, um, if we, um, we as humans, will eventually reach the point where we say animals need to be treated in a humane way as well, and that would eventually then stop the whole cycle of the market and people being more responsible of what they're eating and how animals are treated before they are slaughtered, of what they're eating and how animals are treated before they are slaughtered. And that might be a long shot away still, but there is a movement in that direction and I think it will eventually suffice.

Speaker 2: 58:57

Yes, and that's something that's so important for me and that's why I advocate for regenerative agricultural practices, because if I'm advising people and patients to eat lots of beef, it needs to be the highest quality, for those animal ethics reasons. So amazing. Well, I hope that this conversation can maybe inspire some more people, especially in your area, to use Nguni and return to indigenous genetics. And, yeah, maybe we can hopefully increase the numbers of these amazing cattle.

Speaker 1: 59:30

Thank you so much Thanks. It was really an honor to speak to you.

Speaker 2: 59:34

Thanks, thanks, dirk.