Young beef producers on the role of buffel grass

Queensland Country Life

Queensland Country Life reporter Bella Hanson hits the Young Beef Producers Forum to ask emerging cattle producers how buffel grass fits into their systems.

Transcript

00:00I'm Bella Hanson from the Queensland Country Life and this week we're bringing you along

00:03to the Young Beef Producers Forum.

00:06I'm here with Riley Godwin from Springshaw.

00:08Riley, what role does buffle play in your production system at home?

00:11It's quite a large role at home, like 90 to 95% of our pastures is buffle.

00:18But yeah, obviously dieback is a bit of an issue for us as well and most other grasses

00:23probably don't have that issue but yeah, it's sort of, you know, double-edged sword.

00:27It's good at the same time but when it's bad it's not that great but anyway.

00:31Has it reduced that percentage of 95, has that reduced back a bit?

00:35Yeah it does, nothing really comes back to it though, like it's sort of, it's not there

00:40for a few years and then it will eventually come back, I don't know, it's let nature do

00:44its course and it's been right for us.

00:46I'm here with Ben Wirth from Marra, Ben what role does buffle play in your production system

00:51at home?

00:52It plays a very big part in our production, it sort of covers a fair chunk of our area

00:57and we've had some impacts with dieback over the years which has suffered, like it hasn't

01:05been very good, like it's made us suffer a bit but that's all sort of come back now,

01:09it's just done its cycle and it's also naturally grassed up again with like green panics and

01:14stuff instead.

01:15I'm here with Holly Cook from Montau, Holly how does buffle grass fit into your production

01:20system?

01:21Yeah well we just have a, we have a small place there at home at Montau where we run

01:25Wagyu cows and we, you know they just, helps keep them going along then we wean our wieners

01:32and sort of keep them and put a few more kilos on them so the buffle really helps with their

01:38growth there.

01:39I'm here with Katie Nash, the first time farmer from Corina Barabin in New South Wales.

01:44Katie what role does buffle play in your production at home?

01:46I don't actually think we have buffle grass where we are, I'm based in New South Wales

01:51and but please by all means correct me if I'm wrong.

01:55I'm here with Tom Copley, the chair of the Young Beef Producers Forum from Crows Nest.

01:59Tom, what role does buffle play in your production system?

02:02That's pretty easy Bella, buffle doesn't really play a tremendous amount in our business

02:07because we don't have any, so we're mostly native spear grasses and a lot of improved pastures

02:12so roads grass, blue grasses, that type of stuff so definitely had the opportunity to be able to

02:18finish on buffle, I can see the advantages to it so yeah I would like to be able to access it more I think.

02:26I'm here with Ivy Kerr from Aramac. Ivy what role does buffle play in your production system at home?

02:32Buffle isn't the main grass at home, it's mainly Mitchell but when it does come up we really,

02:39really, it's highly regarded, we really like it for our production system.

02:45Do you try and fatten on it or what's your operation at home?

02:48Yeah we fatten, we try to fatten our cows on it and our steers.

02:52I'm here with Harry Stewart from St George, Harry what role does buffle play in your production system?

02:57Yeah thanks Bella, so my family's got a property in between St George and Surratt, it's all buffle grass country

03:03plays a really important part to our breeding program and our production system as it's really good

03:09pasture to fatten our cattle to get them to weight to sale but also to maintain weight on our breeder

03:16cows to get them in calf and keep that fertility in our production system.

03:21Awesome thank you. I'm here with Sean Wright from Banana. Sean how does buffle fit into your production

03:26system at home?

03:27Look, probably a controversial thing for me, we try to avoid buffle grass as much as possible

03:33in a lot of ways. Buffle grass which some people don't necessarily know actually excretes a hormone

03:38which stops other varieties of grass from going fertile and the seeds and actually be able to set

03:44seed so for our system we try to avoid planting buffle grass as much as possible because it already

03:49exists so preferably within the system. How much of a portion does it currently take up in your paddocks

03:55would you say then? It's probably taking up, we're in an extensive pasture renovation program at the

04:01moment so at the moment we're probably 50% but we're trying to work it back down from that.

04:05I'm here with Lachie Martin from Taroom. Lachie, how does buffle fit into your production system?

04:10Yeah so buffle grass across all our properties is our main grass by Longway. We have a mix of

04:18both Biloela and Gander so we find that's best to go against all the dieback as well so don't,

04:28as it hits a Gander worse so that's what we've done and it's worked pretty well for us and the

04:32cattle do great on it and we love it, yeah. Would you say that's your main species there of grass?

04:38Yeah by a long way, yep. I'm here with Chrissy McCarthy from Opal Creek. Chrissy,

04:42how does buffle fit into your production system? So on our end we use it for our background in cattle so

04:49when the cattle come in a bit too light for the feedlots we chuck them out there, try and get a

04:54bit of weight on them, yeah before you bring them back in and put them on grain. And is it a dominant

04:59species on across those properties where you're doing that? It is a little bit, we are sort of trying

05:06to improve a few of the pastures like we've just invested a heap of money this year

05:10into improving those pastures so we can have more capacity but yeah it is definitely more dominant

05:17now, yeah.

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