THE Bull selling season is well and truly upon us with close to 40 bull sales scheduled in coming weeks and months, including many accessible remotely via Auctions Plus and Stocklive online bidding platforms.
So many bull sales, so many different breeds and composites, one can’t help but be amazed by the amount of choice.
Each breed and breeder espousing virtues of productivity and commercial reality.
Claims to improve your bottom line, enhance your business and make management easier are all made every sale every year. Easy promises to make, hard prophesies to fulfil.
“And one was there a stripling” – A favourite line from a favourite poem.
No breed has made a bigger impact since Jim Craig rode off the top of that hill than the Brahman breed. Creating a revolution from the 1960s onwards, the breed dragged the northern grazing industry into the future and profitability.
Originally maligned and not even able to exhibit in livestock shows, Brahman cattle transformed ‘unsustainable’ into ‘hugely successful’.
Has this come at a cost? Yes, the breed now is constantly under attack from those wanting to get a share of the market. Geography and diversity of type and breeder don’t help in defending the breed’s honour.
The Commercial Promotions committee of the Australian Brahman Breeders Association has coordinated three events this year to promote and display the qualities of purebred Brahmans in commercial production systems:
- The Clermont Commercial Female Sale
- The Woolooga Commercial Female Sale, and
- The ABBA Feedlot Trial and Carcase Competition.
All proved to be great promotions exceeding all expectations.
Clermont Commercial Female Sale
On Friday May 9, local agent Hoch & Wilkinson yarded over 300 females in the second annual Commercial Female Sale run in association with the Australian Brahman Breeders’ Association.
Hoch & Wilkinson’s Jake Passfield commented that due to the Brahman female’s survivability, thrivability and easy-doing profitability, they were in high demand for terminal sire operations. Providing buyers with a one-stop-shop for quality Brahman females was a good idea – if not a necessity – he said.
With a sale delayed due to rain the market had moved in a more positive direction after a very lacklustre start to 2025.
Riverside Pastoral, Moranbah topped the PTIC heifer market with a pen making $2110 per head, $600 to $700 dollars ahead of the market on the day.
Ibis Creek, Mt Coolon also impressed with EU yearling heifers making $1080 dollars per head, a cents per kilogram equivalent of 366c/kg well above the market of the week.
Click here to read a report recording the strong depth of buyer interest and solid prices in the sale.
Woolooga Commercial Female Sale
On Thursday 10 July Sullivan Livestock together with Australian Brahman Breeders launched the inaugural Woolooga Commercial Brahman Female Sale. With close to 350 females penned, the day was met with a large local audience and competitive buyer gallery.
Jim Bauer from Gin Gin kicked of proceedings with a good pen of PTIC cows making $2250, while Royce Sommerfield from Brahrock, Maryborough also had some great yearling heifers making $2250. Topping the Sale was a beautifully presented run of PTIC Grey heifers at $2800 consigned by Sandy and Jamie McCartney, Bucca Station, Bucca.
All heifers presented made considerable premiums on the day, with values claimed to be $500 to $700 above the market of the day. Full credit must go to the Bucca team for the way their heifers were presented. These heifers were EU accredited PTIC to calve in a very good window to low birthweight Charolais bulls.
Sale co-ordinator Sandy McCartney credits the success of the sale to the quality of cattle offered and also believes the sale has a good future due to the large demand for high grade coastal bred Brahman females in the Wide Bay region.
Click here to read a report recording the strength of the market and buying support at the Woolooga sale.
Australian Brahman Breeders Feedlot Trial and Carcase Competition
Culminating in a presentation evening at the Great Western Hotel Rockhampton on 14 August, the inaugural Australian Brahman Breeders Feedlot and Carcase Competition was launched.
A total of 381 steers were fed at Barmount Feedlot for 112 days and then processed at JBS Rockhampton. The carcases were judged on quality, yield and weight gain, nominated in pens of five with the best three head becoming the competitors entry.
Overall the cattle performed extremely well with the entire cohort averaging 2.04kg/day whilst only consuming 13.6kg of feed per day. Whilst only averages of feed consumption can be calculated, it is believed that the average profit margin for these steers was conservatively $100 a head.
With weight gains exceeding 2.6kg/day in the better pens, this created a profit margin in the vicinity of $240 a head, surely bringing into question the whole of breed discounting system.
Click here to read a report on the Feedlot Trail and Carcase Competition.
Weathering the storm of criticism levelled by competing breeds, who have yet to really prove themselves in Australia’s north becomes a constant battle for the Brahman breed. Having our heartland swamped with competing breeds is now the norm, but whether competitors can cement their future still remains to be seen. Most things work in circles.
When contemplating your next genetic move in the north, take some time to consider, is it worth following the breeds that perform very well in certain traits, or maybe is it best sticking to an old best friend, an animal that can perform a little bit above average in all traits – the Brahman.
For further information visit https://brahman.com.au/