By Judy Barnet, Ag Columnist
What glorious weather we have had this week. At home it has been cold in the mornings but the days soon warm up and break out those perfect blue skies that Queensland is renowned for. Last night Mother Nature supplied us with a full moon and words cannot describe the sight of it rising over a clear sky and shining on the silvery water. I was mesmerised and didn’t take a photo – a photo could not have conveyed that impression. As I took Dora for a walk early this morning the dam was picture perfect – the magpies were singing to me and sparkling fish were jumping out of the dam everywhere as the last of the early morning fog lifted off the water. Ducks and other water birds were bobbing and diving, trying to get some of those silver-scaled fish I imagine. Dora must know that the water is cold as she hasn’t attempted to go in for a swim in the last couple of weeks!
This week has been busy, par for the course. With the days so short it is hard to get much done before going to work and, of course, it is dark when I get home. Everything has been a mad rush and on Tuesday I had decided to get a ride to work with Richie to save fuel. The phone rang just as we were driving off at 7 am. It was the neighbour, advising that our cows and horses were out. We headed off down the road and found them 1km from home, just about to have a meet and greet with the neighbour’s cows.
Bearing in mind that we were now running late for work and in a hurry it was an easy decision. Richie got out of the nice cosy warm ute with his bucket of cow feed and played the Pied Piper while I drove back along the road. Through the fog and long wet grass Richie trudged along followed by six cows all vying for his bucket of feed. When we got to the front gate we also spotted the ponies in the distance that had also escaped. After we shut the gate on the cows we went off to get the ponies. When they saw us they kicked up their heels and took off in to the distance. They sure could gallop for old horses!
That’s not the end of the story, though. Just when we were ready to leave work that afternoon I noticed we had missed a couple of calls from CJ. By the time I was able to get hold of her we were nearly home and it was a very distressed CJ who greeted us to tell us the cows had pushed down the fence into our garden. Attempts by CJ to shoo them out, including pulling the fence back up and hanging a sheet on it to deter them, resulted in a dirty trampled sheet and cows back in the garden, where the grass is greener of course! Next morning I banished those naughty cows to the back paddock.
With pecan harvest nearly over I decided it was time to go for a holiday to Tasmania and to see Yves, Monica and their boys, who all stayed with us nearly a year ago. I have never been to Tassie and am very excited about going, although Richie is not so keen on the cold weather. We fly out next Friday. I am also excited to meet one of the Rare Breeds Trust Directors and rare breed poultry enthusiast Jill Weaver as well as Janet Lane, our horse coordinator and Waler expert. We will also be delivering the gorgeous Kent Saddlery bag from our auction to Brenton Heazlewood, who has the largest English Leicester Stud in Australia, established in 1871, as well as the largest privately-owned pasture seed cleaning business in Tasmania.
Speaking of English Leicester sheep, I didn’t think anyone else had any besides me in Queensland but agent Ross notified me that there were five ewes and a ram at the Warwick sale on Wednesday. Because of their rarity, I could hardly let them go to the works so, thanks to some lovely people that went out of their way to bring them home for me on Wednesday evening, we now have five more English Leicesters in our small flock.
As it is cattle month I thought I would share with you a bit about one of my favourite breeds – the British White. We do have a local breeder of these wonderful cows here in the Southern Downs and the breed is also a popular choice for A.I. over dairy cows, producing a nice small calf. Lee Gore has bred British Whites on her property at Clifton for many years and has been involved with the British White Society since its inception in 1994. The breed is great for hobby farmers being smallish, docile and hardy. The breed is considered dual-purpose, although I don’t know anyone personally that milks them. They are very docile so I can see they would suit this purpose. British Whites are one of the oldest breeds of cattle native to the United Kingdom. Their survival as a pure breed of wild cattle from ancient times has made them resilient, hardy and productive. British Whites also featured strongly in a recent Wingham Beef Week Show and ‘carcass only’ competition. I believe it was the largest number of British Whites ever entered in a carcass competition.
Until next week…
