The Business of Farming

Joe and Steph have purposely taken a strong position in the premium end of the supply market as their passion for farming is driven by a desire to achieve high standards. Concentrating on the premium end has allowed them to develop product which is in demand by consumers.

In turn, this has created an opportunity to reinvest profits back into the farm in areas such as sustainability, infrastructure and the environment. These are also increasingly areas of high importance to consumers and suppliers at the premium end of the marketplace.

Joe and Steph’s view, that farming is best done to meet consumer demand, acknowledges that consumers increasingly want to know that the product they are buying is developed sustainably and ethically. There is an increasing interest by consumers to understand an animal's welfare, and this is starting to include areas such as animal health, even including areas such as pain management.

Documenting the 'paddock to plate' traceability of each animal will become increasingly important, and new technology such as blockchain, will likely be a future end point for the transparency of these records. Today, customers and suppliers are already asking for compliance and documentation for practices such as a documented euthanasia program.

This cycle has set up a positive feedback loop, which by design, reinforces the continual focus on developing a premium farm that produces premium product.

Of course, not all of the sheep and cattle that are produced meet the high standards of the premium end of the market. By necessity these are sold into their respective market supply categories, but the overall objective of operations is premium supply, with a keen eye on the consumers increasing interest in paddock to plate transparency.

Joe and Steph are supported in the daily operations of the farms with a total of seven employees, including son Hain. They also work very closely with the owners of ‘Eastlake’ Gordon and Wendy Williams in their lease operations on that property.

Hard Lessons from Drought

The unprecedented drought of 2018-19 hit the farming community of Uralla harder than they could have imagined. The previous years of developing allocated infrastructure and setting aside enough feed and water to straddle the next inevitable drought that was sure to come, had always been based on previous droughts in the region. By 2018/19 Everyone had run out of feed and water.

Joe and Steph have embarked on an ambitious infrastructure development program across all farm holdings to ensure that they are not only prepared for the next drought to come, but that they can farm more safely and sustainability today and long into the future, despite variability in the climate.

The emphasis on safety is for the wellbeing of both livestock and staff. Getting people out of the danger zone when handling livestock is a priority as is the desire to decrease stress on the animals at the same time.

Pasture improvement, fencing and water infrastructure are large projects currently underway, and the next project will be the cattle yards, where amongst other jobs, they are Investing in a hydraulic cattle crush, which is both quieter and safer.

All cropping on farm is solely for feed production to meet the needs of the farm’s operations. The goal is to store 12 months worth of feed on farm at all times. The current capacity allows storage of 1000 square bales on farm but there are plans in place to increase this significantly, with four new silos on the drawing board, along with additional storage.

The operation is still rebuilding the herd coming out of the last drought, but currently run 1800 breeding cows, with a plan in place to increase this 2500 in the next 5 years, subject to favourable conditions. The objective with cattle is to turn them off as young as possible to reduce carbon footprint and increase carrying size of the operation.

Normally spring calves are weaned coming into winter but this year they were weaned a month early and this seemed to show overall benefit. Next summer a selection of these cattle will go off to market and the remaining herd will be finished on oats and rye to get to 520kg prior to slaughter. The cattle breeding cycle is run annually to the above cycle and the farm also carries an average of 100 bulls.

In addition to the cattle is the sheep operation.

The farms are currently carrying 2000 merino wethers as trade stock, that have been shorn this season. Merinos are very good for pasture and weed control, they help reduce bloat in cattle on clover rich pasture and are also good for blackberry control.

Joe started the Shalimar White Suffolk Stud in 2016 as the White Suffolks are a good terminal sire for Merinos that produce high-yielding carcasses that provide excellent eating quality. When seasons are good, as they have been in 2022 and 2023, the stud ewes are joined twice a year to boost lambing percentages far higher than a single joining allows.

Windee Poll Merinos was registered last year to indulge the van Eyk family’s passion for Merinos, even though it only makes a tiny proportion of their business as beef production is the main focus and makes up the largest portion of the enterprise.