Speaking at a venison production field day hosted by the Elk and Wapiti Society of New Zealand and the Falconer family at their Clachanburn Elk farm in the Maniototo last week, she said despite those market signals, Alliance still processed 80% of its deer outside the optimum August to October period.
"It's our Achilles heel," she told about 50 farmers.
In addition, the deer industry was shrinking, with the kill halving from 736,000 in 2006 to an expected kill of 385,000 this year.
But the owner of Clachanburn Elk, John Falconer, said deer farmers could address some of those venison supply concerns and improve profitability by crossbreeding.
Half his deer are off the farm by September at a rate of 125 a week and an average price of $480, and he aims to have them all gone by the time hinds start calving.
He kills 40% of his crop in October and 10% in December.
"We believe crossbreeding is the simplest way to do that," he said.
In his case he used elk, a breed he said was providing results.
Mrs Allan said that ideally, exporters wanted deer from August to October to match the European tradition of eating game meat during their autumn.
Those deer should ideally have a carcass weight of 50 to 65kg to give processors cutting options and meet the portion size requirements of food service and restaurant customers.
An animal lighter than 40kg provided few leg muscle options, and over 70kg there were too many commodity cuts.
Mr Falconer said years of focusing on breeding quality venison sires had resulted in above-average carcass yield.
The average liveweight to carcass yield was 59%, the average carcass to bone-out yield was 67.92% and total live weight to bone-out was 40.1%.
Mr Falconer said elk could be used as a terminal sire over other deer breeds to meet the kill pattern required by the market, and Mrs Allan said consumers did not favour one breed of deer over another.
"You only need elk or wapiti-cross sires. You can use them across red deer to get the same result," said Mr Falconer.
Mr Falconer is the third generation to farm Clachanburn, with parents Charles and Jane starting it 22 years ago, but deer have become the farm's main focus under his management.
Venison production was the primary source of income and he had a long-term aim of killing 1800 elk weaners.
Sales of sires, velvet and trophy stags were also good sources of income.
Four-year-old bulls yield 7kg of velvet and the Falconers sell 20 trophy bulls a year.
Hinds are first mated at 15 months of age, with bulls put out to hinds in late February or early March and removed in late April.
First and second calvers are weaned before the rut in early March, and mature deer after the rut in May.
All dry deer are killed.
On being removed from the hinds, bulls are drenched and given copper and selenium, which is repeated twice more during the year.
Commercial hinds live on the hill, and are pregnancy tested and given an annual drench and copper and selenium in the middle of winter.
Mr Falconer said that this year, they spent only four days off the hill.
Weaners first come into the yards four weeks before being weaned to be tagged, drenched and vaccinated for yersiniosis.
On weaning in early May, they are vaccinated a second time.
They are then kept on saved pasture for four weeks and, after getting a second drench, are wintered on 50ha of swedes and fodder beet for 12 weeks.
The average live weight of his commercial weaners on May 15 was 75kg and on September 1 it was 95kg.
But Mr Falconer said that this year his weaners came off the fodder beet the lightest ever, which he said could have something to do with the supplementary feed of pasture and whole crop silage.
CRT technical field officer Scot Pollard said fodder beet was expensive to establish at between $2000 and $2500 a ha, but yields were three times that of swedes and it was an excellent second-year crop, without the dry rot issues plaguing many farms now.
He said the lower live weight issue appeared to be a problem with the supplementary feed and it was being investigated.
Mr Falconer said he had a programme for his paddocks of one year swedes, one year fodder beet, which he manages to establish for less than $2000 a ha.
Some of the winter crop area is set aside for whole crop silage but paddocks are then sown in pasture, which he aims to last for 10 years.
He tries to target a quarter of the hill each year with sulphur fertiliser and seed.
The Falconers irrigate 350ha but, faced with a $50,000 annual electricity bill, have built one dam and are building three more to be filled from a mountain-fed river.
This allows them to gravity supply 30ha of border dyke and 320ha of k-line.
Clachanburn Elk
- John and Mary Falconer
- Clachanburn Elk, Patearoa.
- 2300ha deer fenced, of which 2200ha is effective.
- 1800ha oversown hill country, 400ha paddocks, of which 350ha is irrigated.
- Stock wintered: 800 Elk cows, 1200 hybrid hinds, 750 Elk weaners, 1150 hybrid weaners, 100 Elk R2 spikers, 80 Elk R3 bulls, 120 Elk bulls.