Deer Farming: A Big Export Business In New Zealand

With large exports of deer venison and antler products worldwide, New Zealand deer farmers are at the top of their game. Gerhard Uys spoke to Bill Robinson of Raroa Red Deer Stud.

Bill Robinson has been managing the Raroa Red Deer Stud, near Cambridge, New Zealand, for the past 20 years. The farm’s primary income is generated from the sale of velvet antlers, the early-growth antlers that have not yet hardened. Raroa also sells stud stags to commercial deer farmers who breed deer for venison exports.

VELVETING The farm runs approximately 350 breeding hinds, which produce about 300 calves a year. All the stags are velveted (dehorned) at one year old. They are then kept until the end of their second year, when Robinson selects the animals to keep in the stud (usually about 90) and those to place in the velvet herd (about 50). The remainder (about 30) are sold to commercial breeders as breeding stock for venison production, and approximately 10 are culled.

A stag grows a new set of antlers every year, with growth beginning in August. Before calcification, the new antler is covered in velvet. After about 60 days of growth, and before the antler calcifies in December, it is cut off. The product is graded, frozen, and exported by agents.

Velvet antlers were initially used in Asia as a traditional medicine or aphrodisiac, but are now sold to a younger Asian market as a health supplement.

New Zealand exports more than 700t of velvet antlers a year.

“It used to be 500t a year,” recalls Robinson. “The industry thought that that amount would saturate the market. But even with over 700t sold a year, there’s still huge demand.

“The market for velvet provides our biggest income. A stag grows beardicles [the first growth of antlers] in August at a rate of about 25mm a day. We allow the antlers to grow for about 60 days, then we cut it above the coronet so it’ll grow again.