WHEN it comes to improved pasture Cumnock grazier Rob Lee knows his stuff, having sown high performance pasture based on lucerne, clover, phalaris and winter fescues about 10 years ago.
“When you’re turning off young stock, 90 per cent of your production is what goes down their throat, so pastures drive my business,” he said.
Having good perennials is his recipe, practiced through his involvement with the Little River Landcare Group, with plenty of ground cover and the grasses taking up the nitrogen that lucerne and clovers produce.
“As soon as it rains, the pasture utilises the moisture and I don’t have bare paddocks being washed away.
“So I’ve got cranking hot pasture which is really important for my business.”
His business on “Coorah”, Cumnock, run with wife Kim and their family, is predominantly based on first-cross lamb production and crossbred beef cattle, with some trading of young cattle.
They have a base flock of 3500 Merino ewes, which are joined to White Suffolk rams, and a breeding herd of 200 cows – predominantly Shorthorns from the Lee and Co herd at Larras Lee which are joined to Charolais bulls with all progeny marketed over the hook.
Mr Lee expanded his pursuit of hybrid vigour within the crossbred herd last month by joining Angus bulls to a selection of the Charolais/Shorthorn heifers.
“The Charolais/Shorthorn calf is really an out-performer, so an Angus-cross calf from that mating should be more outstanding,” he said.
The trade steers and Charolais-cross steers and heifers were generally put onto grazing (Wedgetail) wheat as soon as it is ready in June or July.
“When they come off, generally in spring, we’ll give them a drench, vaccine and a bloat bomb and put them onto the lucerne and clover,” he said.
The Lees had been European Union accredited until last year, but let it drop and now use hormone growth promotants on cattle ready to finish.
“This is the first year I’ve turned off half of the home-bred (draft) as calves to Cargill before Christmas,” he said.
“They are only 15 months old, so I’m pretty pleased – we had a cut-off weight at 480 kilograms and there were animals pushing 600kg.”
However, Mr Lee said the family makes more money out of the sheep.
“The first-cross lamb business is the most profitable.
“We have been benchmarking with Holmes and Sackett, Wagga Wagga, for about 15 years.”
The company’s benchmarking shows the dual-purpose flock is the most profitable consistently.
The Lees have bought cast-for-age ewes of 21-micron fibre diameter from a Wellington district Merino breeder for the past several years as three-, four- and five-year-olds.
“My supplier classes his ewes on wool quality.”
He only culls at weaning time in November for mouth, udder and feet.
In past years he had retained his old ewes too long and they had been dying in the paddock.
“With their value today I’m better off cashing them in earlier,” he said.
Because of culling Mr Lee has had to buy extra ewes with lambs at foot through AuctionsPlus.
The Merino ewe was worth its weight to Mr Lee, who said it didn’t eat a lot of grass, produced a valuable fleece “and her lambs are not far behind a second-cross lamb”.
For the past two years he has been turning off August/September drop Merino-cross lambs at domestic weights of 18-22kg carcase weight anytime from January through to May/June.
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