“Meeting a premium grass-fed market” The Land 30/1/25

February 2 2025 – 7:24pm

INHERENT carcase traits in the Wirruna herd are paying off for the Wald family, who are getting exceptional meat grading feedback with their Poll Hereford steers.

Hamish and Penny Wald, with their daughter Alex and son Callum, have a 350-head self-replacing herd at Banar, Condobolin, which is run alongside their 2000-ewe Tullinga Dorper stud and a commercial flock of 3000 Dorper ewes.

The family has run Herefords for many years but had Merinos for more than a century before switching to the highly efficient sheep breed.

“We’re in the heart of the wheat/sheep belt, but we’ve got some flood country for a couple of hundred cows,” Mr Wald said.

“It’s uncommon to have a cattle herd in the wheat/sheep belt, so the cows have to be low cost, and they’ve got to be efficient; otherwise, the numbers just don’t work.

“Herefords suit this district which is why there are still a few herds.”

Fertility, efficiency, conformation and temperament are the priorities in genetic selection.

“With Ian (Locke, Wirruna stud principal), he’s got his disciplined breeding program, so they’re fertile, efficient cattle with a moderate frame that will finish on grass and have the carcase traits.”


Hamish Wald’s fertile Hereford herd is producing progeny with exceptional carcase qualities, selling into a premium grass-fed market. Picture supplied

 

 

 

 

The breed’s ability to finish on grass led Mr Wald to the Teys Grasslands program, which pays a hefty premium for the best quality cattle.

“The tough thing for us is, our Dorper sucker lambs make $250 a head with minimal inputs, but with the steers, we need to grow them out to 17 or 18 months to get full value for them,” Mr Wald said.

“So instead of us growing them to feeder weight to sell at 15 months for $1500, we’re keeping them for an extra two months to meet the Grasslands program, which has a significant premium.

“Being a grass-fed product, we’ve got no overheads – we don’t need to build a feedyard. We just find another paddock for them to utilise the spring feed bulge.”

The Grasslands cattle need to be about 550 kilograms liveweight, but the lead will reach around 600kg.

Just being able to meet the grass-fed market and secure good prices with coloured cattle was an achievement, but the big bonus is in the grading, Mr Wald said.

In the most recent load of steers, sold in November 2024, all 90 made the Teys packing groups one to four, and 70 were in the top two – one to two.

“That’s the biggest premium available under that program,” Mr Wald said.

“It’s the beef the butcher takes home. The whole drop averaged in the top 10 per cent for all MSA (Meat Standards Australia) cattle. The cattle consistently marble score 2 and 3 and up to 4, off grass, combined with very low ossification scores due to the Hereford’s high natural growth.

“This means that instead of having coloured cattle that can be hard to shift, we’ve got cattle that are grading for us, so they’ll find the kill space for us and pay the premiums.”

The Walds have no trouble selecting bulls that will perform in the herd.

“We can’t buy the top end of the Wirruna bulls, but the quality is inherent through the whole herd – they have a consistent type.

“The quality of the Wirruna herd combined with the enormous amount of information the Lockes provide means in 15 years we have been happy with every bull we have bought.”

The highly fertile June calving herd is a reflection of the selection pressure on females in the Wirruna cow base, Mr Wald said.

“They calve unassisted and continue getting back in calf on time. We don’t buy low birthweight bulls as we have calving ease through our herd, and all bulls need to cover both heifers and cows.”

The property has a mix of native and improved pastures, and the young cattle are about to have more space to finish by adding some share farming country at Harden.

“As we expand the cattle herd – we’re still rebuilding after drought and we’d like to have about 400 cows – the steers will go down there to grow out,” Mr Wald said.

“The heifers also go into the same system, and there’s only a 5c/kg discount.

“We sent a small tail of 15 steers with 45 cull heifers this week and they’ve come back at 400c/kg liveweight, and through the yards they’d make 330c/kg.

“Coloured cattle have always been good at being efficient with a low cost of production, but it’s hard to get full value for them in the saleyards. We always suspected they were good, but we didn’t know how the carcase was performing and whether there was value in it for the processors.