Happy New Year!

We hope you and your family are all well.

We are enjoying the Christmas holidays with Abbott and Arthur at home. We went to Fiji to celebrate our respective 60th and 50th birthdays with our boys before Christmas and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. What a great country and great people - we are now fully committed Fijian Drua rugby team supporters - and have the shirts to prove it!  https://drua.rugby/!

Christmas was at home with family and Guyra always has the best climate for Christmas day to enjoy all the festivities.

Now we are full on into January and making plans for another exciting year ahead.

We were able to make contact with most of the families that purchased bulls last year and it was great to receive feedback on how their new bulls were performing. It is also interesting to hear the various names these bulls receive at their new home. Examples include: “Sambo”, “Richard”, “Arthur” to name a few. Do you name your bulls? Please let us know if you do and what the name is by email kirstywhite@baldblair.com.au

Female Sale Thursday 27 April 2023

https://auctionsplus.com.au/auctions/cattle/bald-blair-angus-female-sale/109912

https://www.angusaustralia.com.au/event/bald-blair-angus-2023-female-sale

We will be preg testing next week and will have a better idea of the numbers and selection for our female sale. We will keep you posted on results.

Are you looking for new genetics in your stud or commercial cow herd?

Are you looking for a proven pedigree with generations of selection pressure?

We are providing an opportunity for stud and commercial producers to purchase Bald Blair Angus Seedstock and Commercial genetics at our Female sale on Thursday 27th April 2023. 

The sale will be held on property at Bald Blair Angus, Guyra NSW and live streamed online with AuctionsPlus.

An Open Day prior to the sale will be held to provide the opportunity to inspect females being offered for sale. 

Inspections prior to the sale are also welcome by appointment.

We will have on offer - subject to change closer to the date….

To be confirmed 30-40 Bald Blair Angus HBR and APR stud cows PTIC and covered by Bald Blair Sires.

To be confirmed 24 Bald Blair Angus commercial maiden dams PTIC joined to Bald Blair Stirling S86, NBB21S86 here is a link to his current stats.

To be confirmed 50-80 Bald Blair Angus commercial weaner heifers.

More specific details to come closer to the sale.

Please contact us on 02 6779 2141 or 0427 722 908 or email kirstywhite@baldblair.com.au if you would like us to send you a catalogue when they are printed.

Biosecurity: This was a hot topic last year and our biosecurity farm gate signs were completely faded so you could not read the important information. The Northern Tablelands Local Land Services have provided us with new more robust signs and we have replaced the old ones. This is only one small step as part of our overall biosecurity plan that we will continue to monitor and improve on.

Season: The storm season has made a welcome return and as expected have a very narrow impact. If you are under a storm, then you are lucky. Afternoon torrential downpours have been common with 20mm of good rain. So far we have recorded approximately 40mm here at Bald Blair. We have two moisture probes and are monitoring this data for Bald Blair and Gatwood a lot more closely as the country dries out. Noticeably, in our basalt country our data shows water at 50cm holding well, while the top 20 is losing moisture rapidly; in our lighter soils we are losing moisture at depth as well as the topsoil. What we’re all observing no doubt is the country drying out. Look forward to predicted rain over the next few days, and the positive impact it will have.

Markets:  We are seeing our livestock markets adjusting to new levels, both with sheep and cattle. I would expect this volatility to be around for a while. Always it reminds you to keep focused on things you can control, like costs of production.

Cattle Market: The last of our steers are going to Woolworths at the end of the month. We are getting ready to wean the next lot of commercial cattle and start working on our next crop of steers.

Lambs: We attended the first lamb sale for the season at the Guyra saleyards. The store market appears to have some good opportunities. If it stays dry there may be a few opportunities for those with feed. 

We have weaned all our lambs, thankfully. The lambs have been yard weaned for a few days, and put in new pasture. Our 100 year old sheep yards can only be repaired so much; we look forward, in association with Ramage Engineering to replacing these yards in the later part of February.

Sheep manure: Like many country kids our boys have been selling sheep manure at the mailbox on and off for many years. The Bald Blair woolshed appeared to be a bottomless pit of sheep manure…until now. The supply has now been exhausted and the bagging assistant has decided we have done enough. 

Pastures:  Abbott has been on the tractor, slashing paddocks that we will renovate with new pastures this year. It has dried out enough now to at least get onto these paddocks to slash, spray and sew with our new Williams Seeder. We missed this opportunity last year because we could not get onto the paddocks as they were a swamp. It will be good to catch up on our pasture program. 

Autumn Calving: We are very pleased to welcome the Autumn drop of calves to Bald Blair. The heifers are in good order and so far have calved on their own, with no assistance. 

Rainfall Charts: Once again we have printed rainfall charts and have them available for pick up at Guyra & Armidale rural merchants. If you would like to receive one in the post, please contact us and we will send one to you. Please email kirstywhite@baldblair.com.au with your postal details.

Welfare Benchmarking and Management for the Beef Cattle Industry Report: We participated in the joint MLA, CSIRO & NSW DPI Benchmarking Pilot to objectively track changes in welfare performance over time, identify what can be improved, receive feedback and learn our cattle welfare. We have just received a copy of the report and it makes interesting reading. We really appreciate our team participating in this project and the support we received from Dr Jessice Monk from UNE. The report benchmarked Bald Blair on the topics of feed & water, property resources, management decisions, health & husbandry practices, breeding management and yarding events. It was very interesting to see where we are placed in the industry. Animal Welfare is an expectation of our customers and marketplace and now we have a method of recording it. For more information contact jessica.monk@csiro.au or https://www.csiro.au/en/research/animals/livestock/benchmarking-beef-cattle-welfare

The Lamb Campaign: The MLA have released their latest lamb campaign and once again it is a great watch. Check it out here and share far and wide.

The MLA YouTube channel is a very good resource for information on red meat production. Check it out here. https://youtu.be/bq3UpFAwPbA

New pasture assessment tool available: Australian red meat producers now have access to weekly information on their farm-level pasture status with the release of a new tool called the Australian Feedbase Monitor (AFM).  https://www.mla.com.au/news-and-events/industry-news/world-first-tool-for-better-grazing-management-launched-for-red-meat-producers/

Go to your MyMLA page https://www.mla.com.au/mymla/ at the top of the page you will see the Cibolabs grazing management information. Click on the link “access the tool”. We loaded the Bald Blair map easily and the information was available - amazing!

Podcast - The Data Breeder: Our podcast is still available to download. We plan to make some more recordings in 2023. If you have any suggestions, please let us know. https://www.baldblairangus.com.au/podcast-the-data-breeder

Commercial Semen Available: We have also collected semen from a number of our leading bulls for our own commercial heifer AI program and to provide to clients. Please check out our Semen Sales page on our website https://www.baldblairangus.com.au/semen-sales and if you are interested in ordering semen please fill in the form and give us a call so we can assist you with your breeding program.

Bald Blair Merch: Bald Blair Angus Trucking caps, hand towels & enamel mugs- check out our website store if you would like to order one.  https://www.baldblairangus.com.au/store

Kelly’s Cottage: We have cut back trees around Kelly’s Cottage that were starting to fall into the garden and possibly on the cottage. We now have a much safer environment to host guests. Kelly’s Cottage will be open again for accommodation soon - so please check out our listing on Airbnb for availability or contact us directly. We are in the process of upgrading our website to manage our own bookings and we will let you know when that is available.