14-year-old winner
The Supreme Junior Champion at last month’s NZ Dairy Event came with a great story for her 14-year-old owner, Toby Whytock.
In the mid-December, the Gilbert family probably wondered what they had signed up for in terms of workload. The family’s show campaign was shared between Luke Gilbert (Showcase Boarding, based out of Hamilton) and his brothers, Mike and Nick (Gilbert family), who milk 650 and 630 cows respectively at Ashburton. They prepared some of their team in the South Island while the balance was with Luke.
When they brought the team together, it involved transporting 18 head across the Cook Strait from the South to the North Island. It was the biggest collective team they had put together to date (21 in-milk and 22 heifers).
However, with the value of hindsight they delivered in spades for their clients, friends, and family when the results were washed out. Because within those numbers was the Supreme All Breeds Exhibit of this year’s show, the Supreme All Breeds Intermediate Champion, the Grand Champion Holstein, Reserve Champion Holstein, Intermediate Champion Holstein, and the Junior Champion in the Combined Breeds.
The Supreme All Breeds Exhibit of the show (and Senior, Grand Champion of the Ayrshire Show), Kiteroa Cream Bubbette (owned by Zane and Marie Kite who milk 180 Ayrshires at Ohaupo) had been boarding with Luke for six weeks before the show on behalf of her owners.
The Supreme All Breeds Intermediate was also an Ayrshire – Glenalla Reynolds Dawn – giving the Ayrshires a majority presence in the heavy-hitter awards. Dawn is owned and bred by the Gilbert family. The Gilberts also exhibited (and bred and owned) the Grand Champion Holstein (Glenalla Unix Maple-ET), they owned the Intermediate Champion Holstein (Joyclas Bullseye Moo-ET), and they prepared the Reserve Champion Holstein (Charbelle Tatoo Pix) with her owners, Charbelle Holsteins (Morrinsville).
Zane Kite said without staff on their farm, getting Luke to prepare Bubbette professionally made sense. He has also been grateful to the Fullerton family for their help in earlier campaigns. This win follows Kiteroa’s successful annual sale of 42-head (mostly calves) which grossed $120,000 in November.
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Bubbette was the 2021 NZ DairyEvent’s Intermediate Champion Ayrshire and while the eight-year-old was pushed hard by Glenalla’s Intermediate for Supreme All Breeds this year, the judges from Canada, Australia, the UK, and New Zealand came together to give her the ultimate award.
Zane described it as a “wicked Ayrshire” show, and while he was thrilled on the day it’s now business as usual for their Champion.
“Well, I was blown away at the time and of course it’s a massive buzz, but now it’s back to reality, I guess,” Zane said.
“I will say though that the achievement will live on for a fair while, and we’ll acknowledge it, accept it, and be really proud of it.”
Courting Offers
For Michael Gilbert – speaking on behalf of the Gilbert family – the campaign was a success on more than one level.
“The thing we were the happiest with is that of the 43 animals we prepared, we bought everything out as good as we possibly could,” Michael said. “Particularly the milkers. To get 21 milkers out in one day was something we’d never done before, and it’s pretty hard to get that right. Not to mention that we were obviously looking after other people’s animals, so there’s always that added pressure too. We tied in with Charbelle Holsteins for the week and we couldn’t have done it without their help.”
They are now courting buying offers on both their Supreme All Breeds Intermediate Ayrshire and Grand Champion Holstein. They only milk 30 Ayrshires themselves (within their combined herd numbers of 1280 cows).
It’s worth noting they have now owned two Ayrshires that have achieved Supreme Champion titles at the NZ DairyEvent, including Pukekaraka Elle Delilah, who was Supreme in 2021 and Grand Champion Ayrshire in 2025. Both of those cows go back to modest-priced buys Michael made from the Pukekaraka stud. He shared that he bought the dam of this year’s Supreme All Breeds Intermediate for $2400.
“Dawn’s dam [Pukekaraka Burdete Rose] was an older cow when we bought her, but she had been a successful show cow herself,” Michael said. “We’ve got a couple of daughters out of her now, and Dawn happened to be one of them. So, buying those Ayrshire cows at that particular sale is getting better and better for us, results wise.”
In the last decade Holsteins have found their way into their mostly Jersey herds and now number around 400 split between the two herds.
To breed and exhibit Grand Champion Holstein is another milestone they will savour for some time to come.
