The birth of an exceptional Savanna stud

The award-winning, top-performing Maize Valley Savanna Goat Stud, run by Andrew Roberts and Ju-mari Pretorius, came about by accident due to broken communications and poor Internet connectivity

- Annelie Coleman.

In November 2021, Andrew Roberts, co-owner of the Maize Valley Savanna Stud, alongside Ju-mari Pretorius, placed a bid in an online auction on some Boer goat rams, but the connectivity was extremely poor.

In the process of getting his bid placed, without realising it, he accidentally placed a bid on two Savanna ewes as well. These two ewes formed, in a manner of speaking, the rock on which the Maize Valley Savanna Stud was built.

“It was only when the animals arrived on the farm that I realised I had accidentally bought two Savanna ewes as well. I wanted to sell them again right away. After a week they started to grow on me, so then and there I decided to start farming with them,” says Roberts.

The Maize Valley farming concern also includes a Boer goat and Kalahari Red stud, summer crop production and a Brangus stud. The Savannas are kept in Hoopstad in the Free State and Vryburg in North West.

HARDY AND RESILIENT

According to the Savanna Goat Breeders’ Club of South Africa, the uniformly white South African Savannas are meat goats that were developed from the outset to not only survive, but to thrive under extreme conditions. They are hardy, productive and resilient.

A group of farmers in the 1950s started to select white animals with specific traits out of the indigenous veld goats of Southern Africa. Traits like fertility, hardiness, and very good mothering ability were the traits they concentrated on and eventually the Savanna goat as is it is known today, was developed.