Above Champion pasture fed steers RNA 2004 2 tooth – Av. Wt 725 kg

Our Cattle:

Please scroll down for information on both our Charolais and Charbray bull breeding programs and the reference sires used in both programs.

Overview:

Our emphasis has always been on commercial excellence which to my mind is maintaining a breeding herd that produces progeny with good weight for age at weaning, good shape or conformation and a degree of softness that produces a carcass that grades at the meatworks and tastes good when eaten.

Our idea of confirmation is a good soft head, length, top line and a hind quarter with muscle in the right places. We are wary of bulls with huge eye muscles as these seem to produce a lot of females that turn up empty at preg testing time. We have recently down sized our breeding herd to 400 cows consisting of 150 Charolais, 150 Charbray and 100 top quality grey and red Brahman cows.

Fernvale Almighty (P) at 2010 Sale sired 10 bulls to Av $5450 including bull below – Lot 2 Granville Dermot (P) Sold to AJM Pastoral, Burleigh, Richmond for $8000

Charolais Bull Breeding Program:

Our Charolais programme is orchestrated towards the breeding of terminal sires for use in crossbreeding programmes to produce well shaped functional cattle that will meet local and export grading standards.

After having worked in the cattle industry since leaving school at 16 some 44 years ago and having shown Trade cattle successfully for nearly 25 years and so keeping up with changing industry requirements we are confident we have put together an article that will compliment the cattle industry as a whole.

A well performed cow line, we believe is the most important part of any breeding programme. We purchased our first two Charolais heifers from Palgrove in 1994, one of them Fancy 16, being a full ET sister to Palgrove Murdoch. This cow has had a big influence on our herd. We have since purchased a limited number of cows from Glendyr, Dursby, Ballengara, Pembroke, Mandalay, Glen Kyle, Ayr, Conroy’s, Gunnadoo and Palgrove Studs.

Our selection criteria from the cows perspective is a cow with a moderate V shaped feminine frame with a good udder and quiet disposition. Cows with huge top tines are out for fertility reasons.

We have become part of Breedplan over the last few years and are finding it very beneficial especially in the areas of birth weight and growth performance. Charolais bulls for our 2011 Sale are on average higher than the Australian breed Average for 200, 400, and 600 day weight and higher for Milk.

Eyeballing cattle is still the number one selection criteria for us when selecting bulls and cows which is then used in conjunction with Performance Data. From observation over many years we notice that for the majority of bull buyers if they don’t like the shape of an animal then all the figures and breeding in the world somehow seems to pale into insignificance.

We think one needs to have both shape and performance to succeed in today’s environment.

Reference Sires:

Current Sires in use with progeny appearing at our 2011 Sale:

Fernvale Almighty (P) FENA50E
Shiloh Benji SCBB4E
Branchview Bit Tough (P) BVCB4E
Huntington Calico (P) WCCC5E
Ayr Fugi’s Isaac (H) AYRY424F
Ayr Inca’s Nick AYRY370F

Sires involved in our breeding programme over the last few years include:

EC No Doubt 2022 (P) OAUZ2022E
Fernvale Whomas FENW51E
Fernvale Ya Poker FENY64E
Granville Crusher GDAX9E
Platinum Windfall AJ1W75E
Riverglen X2970D JDSX2970D
Moongool Tamar DP2T11E
Palgrove You Too PKY129E
Palgrove Vertico PKV325E
Pinay (FR) OAFU413
Platinum Ultra AJIU37E
Sideline Yodell NLGY63E
Granville Duncan GDAU8E
Granville Polly 1 Boy GDAY9E
Averlais Up Start VAU16E
Avalon VIP SLMV50F
Glendaloch T13E MIDT13E
Ayr Extra's Hartley AYRT58F

Charbray Bull Breeding Program:

We have acquired some top quality mainly grey Brahman cows over the last few years and along with a line of F1 Charbray cows are producing F1 and F2 bulls that are performing very well in the north.

For these cattle once again, shape, temperament and underline are the main criteria for selection, plus good weight for age, out of cows that milk.

Above: Lot 34 (2010 Sale) Sold to Pickersgill Family “Geneva” Theodore for $5500

Above: Lot 35 (2010 Sale) Sold to Trevor Jensen, Barton Downs, Bauhinia for $5500

Above: Lot 33 (2010 Sale) Sold to David Atkinson, Coorumburra Pastoral Co, Marlborough

Above: Lot 12 (2010 Sale) Sold to Gordon Ballantine, “Wongaburra”, Bauhinia