Charolais Tradition Continues at The Throne

David Dillon’s family has backed Charolais for over 30 years and the superior performance of the breed has given this Marlborough farmer no reason to change his tune.

His grandfather Sankey Critchley established the Tirohanga Charolais stud in the late 1960s and at one time David was stud master. These days he runs Charolais bulls with the commercial herd of 300 Angus cattle he farms at The Throne in the Waihopai Valley with his wife Sue and their three adult children Henry (who is in London),Tom and Hannah.

“The Charolais are quiet and very high yielding beef which give more bucks for the kilogram. There always seems to be a string of buyers wanting to purchase our stock. When I have other breeds running amongst them they seem to be head and shoulders above them in size,” says David.

The Throne, so named after a huge rock, is good cattle country. The 1500 hectare property is north facing and ranges from 180-820 metres. Due to exceptionally dry seasons for the last five or six years the Dillons have been selling store calves via on –farm sales.

“This past year The Throne has been blessed with a record 1050mls of rain when we normally average 675 mls allowing us for a change to help drier areas down the east coast by grazing their cattle.”

Ever since David can remember, the Dillons have been buying bulls from Bruce and Brent Fisher’s Silverstream stud at Greenpark near Christchurch. Temperament is David’s top priority when selecting these big bulls as with any breed.

“After that I pick on the performance figures and of course they have to look right too. I like well structured animals with strong muscling and a masculine head, which, despite today’s emphasis on weight gain, I still hold as important.”

The Throne’s Angus Charolais cross heifers consistently kill over  240kg at 18 months without any grading problems, and 20-month steers at around 320kg. The Charolais and Angus gel well together, with the Angus cows good foragers around the hills handling both dry and wet conditions well.

“Compared with pure Angus calves though, the hybrid animals are better converters more efficiently using strong pastures’ potential.”

 All cows are bred with a Charolais. This policy means some replacements need to be bought in each year maintaining genetic diversity. These are sourced from Woodbank Station at Clarence.

David is a strong believer in diversifying income streams both on and off farm so as well as running Angus cows, The Throne  has about 7000 Corriedales and fattens lambs using South Suffolks. There is also 100 acres leased for grapes.