Borans: The heartbeat of a Northern Cape farming enterprise

It's easier to replace the roof of a building than having to replace its foundation and walls.

- By Koos du Pisanie

The same principle applies to cattle farming. "With a strong cow herd as your foundation, selected offspring as the walls and bulls as the roof, you can steer your stud or commercial herd in the right direction."

This is how Boran breeders BJ Visser and his father, Johan, describe their approach. They co-own the Vaalkamdor Boran stud which they manage in the Hopetown, Douglas, and Prieska area. They were able to recognise the value of Boran cows as the foundation of their crossbreeding programme early on and have since never looked back.

"The breed easily adapts to our Northern Cape conditions, where grazing is not always plentiful. The results we achieve with our crossbred animals are remarkable. We established the stud with the goal of producing superior breeding material, and today our greatest satisfaction comes from contributing to other breeders' success by offering quality, uniform animals," BJ explains.

Boran ticks all the boxes

BJ and Johan have been farming crossbred animals since 1993 under the name J & B Boerdery. Their search for a truly exceptional animal, however, only came to fruition in 2009 when they purchased three Boran bulls from Schalk van Oudtshoorn's herd. They later acquired a group of in-calf Boran cows that were bred to Simmentaler and Angus bulls. The quality of these calves confirmed that this was exactly what their commercial herd should look like. Today, they manage an outstanding commercial herd consisting of Boran cows and Simmentaler bulls.

Their farming conditions demand cattle that are shorter in the leg, fertile, and exhibit excellent maternal traits. This includes easy calving, strong calves at weaning, and the ability to reconceive within a reasonable period. The Boran met all these requirements. BJ experimented with various crosses, but the Boran/ Simmentaler combination ultimately delivered the best value in terms of kilogram meat/ha.