The Rural Voice, 2002-09, Page 40A vision for beef
With the West's unsettled weather it
makes sense to produce more beef in
Ontario Don Shaver says
By eith - o lston
146,;
Andrew Shaver (left) has joined his father Donald in the Shaver operation.
Donald McQ. Shaver defies
expectations. Here's a guy
who has tried to change the
beef industry, not just in Canada but
around the world with his Shaver
Beefblend breeding program but one
of his gre1test concerns is the
survival of the small family farm.
Here'sa guy who has shipped
breeding stock around the world, yet
worries about the plight of the beef
industry in his own backyard in
Ontario. Here's a guy who is trying
to reshape the future of beef
production, but is a devoted student
36 THE RURAL VOICE
of history.
Shaver's ideas are often at odds
with many people's within the cattle
industry. "I've got some really good
friends and some awful enemies," he
chuckles.
"1 think everybody has a vision of
how they'd like (the industry) to be
and then there's the reality."
The Shaver family's vision .of
bringing to beef the same kind of
genetic revolution they created in the
poultry industry is definitely different
from that of many in the beef
industry and their reality is that this
vision has not been enthusiastically
embraced by the industry.
The Shaver Beefblend
development began more than 40
years ago with the goal of bringing to
beef the same benefits of hybrid
vigour that Shaver's father Donald
McQueen Shaver brought to the
poultry industry with his Shaver
Starcross 288 leghorn-cross pullets.
The aim was to create a blend of
the genetics of unrelated beef
breeds from different areas of
Britain that had long enjoyed
regional popularity. They later added
continental breeds. None of the major
breeds such as Hereford, Angus,
Charolais or Simmental are included
in the blend.
"Our object," explains a company
brochure, "was to offer 85 per cent of
the world's cattle breeders a stock
they could cross in their own herds
that would be totally unrelated to
their lines and thus maximize the
effects of heterosis for our
customers."
People often have the mistaken
impression that all animals have all
nine bloodlines in them, Shaver says
but generally there are only about six
in each of the Beefblend sire or dam.
The blend was chosen with goals
to create easy keeping, docile
animals with problem -free calving
and early sexual maturity. Strong
mothering ability, efficient feed
conversion, rapid growth rate,
excellent marbling, early finishing
capacity and superior carcasses are
also traits that were chosen for.
They test 150 bulls a year, selling
50-75 into commercial herds. Over
the years they're tested 2,500 of their
bulls.
Five or six herd sires are tested
each year with one selected for
semen collection and distribution to
Shaver's franchisees.
Like the poultry lines which were
licenced to hatcheries, the marketing
of Beefblend stock is through six
licenced co-operators or franchisees
across the country. They buy their
stock from Shaver, then build up
their own cow herd to the critical
numbers needed. "Once they reach
that they're basically just buying
semen or bulls."
"Our ability to have franchisees
willing to purchase our leading
genetic products is what finances our