Why Angus breeder prioritises health and forage-only diets

High health status, easy calving genetics and performance from forage are the foundations of Angus Stovold’s Aberdeen Angus herd.

His cattle, although largely sold for breeding, also have to succeed in a challenging environment.

“If they can thrive here, they can thrive anywhere,” he says of the drought-prone soils they graze in the Surrey Hills.

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Angus, who farms with his son Finn at Shackleford, near Godalming, runs a low-cost, forage-based system, with no bought-in feed.

He also places great importance on animal health: “If you want the basis of a good herd, that’s what we can offer, and using health schemes has cemented our position as the place to buy cattle.

“It’s like having O-negative blood [the universal blood type] – you can go anywhere with a disease-free animal,” he says.

Low maintenance

© MAG/Judith Tooth

The 150 cows at Lydling Farm and neighbouring Field Place spend all year outdoors, wintering on a dry hill and fed only straw (or hay in a cold spell).

“It’s natural for cows to lose weight over winter – we don’t keep cows fat, so they have very few calving problems.

“Over the years, we’ve learned to recognise the signs if something’s wrong, and we rarely intervene.

“99% of the time, the reason something is wrong is twins,” he says, adding that he minimises the prevalence of twin births by flushing cows nutritionally to get their fertility up prior to putting bulls in, before dropping fodder quality to reduce it again.

Calving takes place mainly from January to early March, with 25 calving mid-August to mid-September. Increasing risk of drought persuaded Angus to sell most of the autumn calvers four years ago, reducing herd size by 50 cows. First calving is at 24 months.

Silage is introduced via ring feeders prior to calving: “This is very important, to give the calves ‘heart’ – that way, they won’t get the plethora of problems associated with poor colostrum.

“We don’t need to vaccinate for diseases like rotavirus, as with the correct management, it’s controlled,” he explains.

Herd health

The 12ha (30-acre) calving field is scattered with thickets of bramble and tree cover to provide secluded calving areas.

Once newborn calves have been introduced to the herd, he walks them with their dams onto clean ground (or into a corral, depending on conditions), tags them, treats their navels with iodine and weighs them.

Each time 20 cows have calved, another field is opened for the newest born, so they cannot pick up disease from older calves.

“We have quiet cows and vigorous calves,” Angus says.

“Over the years, we’ve bred out poorly behaved cows – though looking back, it wasn’t because they were aggressive, it was more that I wasn’t behaving properly around them.

“The key is very gentle handling and giving the animal plenty of room.”

The 12ha (30-acre) calving field is scattered with thickets of bramble and tree cover to provide secluded calving areas © MAG/Judith Tooth

No vaccinations or wormers have been given to cattle in the past five years, while antibiotics use averaged 200ml across the herd, with none used in 2024.

A full-herd blood test is carried out each winter to maintain elite health accreditations – the herd is registered free of bovine viral diarrhoea, infectious bovine rhinotracheitis, leptospirosis and Johne’s disease, and has never had a TB reactor. It is also free of neospora.

Forage diet

© MAG/Judith Tooth

The following winter, after weaning at nine months, youngstock are separated by sex and loose housed in former pig buildings.

Hay is used to transition them onto conserved lucerne, after which maize silage is added to the ration.

Bulls are handled regularly by putting them through the crush and grow well on an ad-lib diet of maize silage and lucerne.

“They don’t need anything else – there’s high protein in the lucerne and starch in the maize,” says Angus.

Lucerne is grown on 16ha (40 acres), yields four cuts a year and remains in the ground for five years.

Experience has shown that the crop needs to be cut every six weeks and left in good shape for winter to suppress weeds successfully.

“We started growing lucerne as by July, it’s brown here,” he says.

“It’s a deep-rooting crop and it’s been a saviour for us quite a few times – though the long, dry spells of the past two years have even affected lucerne.”

The crop is ensiled, with the higher protein early cuts clamped, and later cuts baled.

“You really have to work at keeping the leaf on the plant, and the less you do with it, the better. We use a mower conditioner and row up once 24 hours later.

“It comes into the pit quite dry now, and with the leaf on it, but it’s taken a few years to learn.

“To begin with, it was too stalky – though this stimulates the gut – but we didn’t have enough leaf.”

Maize is grown on 18ha (45 acres) to fill clamps for winter. This crop has also proved its worth in recent droughts, says Angus, as he might be feeding silage from June.

Clover-rich leys have always been the mainstay of forage production, but even the clover suffered badly in the 2022 drought and recovered poorly the following year.

He responded by mowing/topping pastures and including deeper-rooting grass species such as tall fescue and cocksfoot in mixes when reseeding or slot-seeding into existing swards.

Summer shade for cattle © MAG/Judith Tooth

Breeding stock sales

Prior to Brexit, exports to the EU accounted for 70-80% of female breeding stock and 10% of bulls from the farm.

Now, Angus is taking advantage of a strong domestic market. His UK client base is a 50:50 mix of commercial dairy farmers and pedigree buyers – all repeat customers with easy calving traits topping their list of priorities.

“The market has changed a lot in the past three years – people used to buy bulls three or four months before they needed them.

“Now they want them this week, as they don’t want the extra cost, so we sell out really quickly,” he says.

“We semen test everything at 14 months and guarantee to swap a bull if it doesn’t work, but that’s only happened once.”

Angus is keen to tap into the artificial insemination (AI) market in Europe.

“All our cattle are DNA profiled, and we’ve been selecting high-figure animals to get our genetics right for success in the AI market. We’re pretty close to that now.”

Heifer sales, meanwhile, take place mainly on farm, with an entire year’s crop sold every few years, and just a few sales in between.

“It’s an opportunity to buy the best genetics,” he points out.