From Passion to Progress in Sheep Farming with Andrew Glover
Andrew Glover, known to most as Gloves, has spent his career navigating the ins and outs of the sheep industry, managing operations that run 600,000 sheep a year. Started his career straight out of school wool classing and is now station manager at one of Australia’s largest and most innovative sheep studs, Pooginook. Andrew’s passion for the job has only grown, as has his understanding of what makes farming work. He knows that success comes down to investing in the right places—genetics, inf...
Show Notes
Andrew Glover, known to most as Gloves, has spent his career navigating the ins and outs of the sheep industry, managing operations that run 600,000 sheep a year. Started his career straight out of school wool classing and is now station manager at one of Australia’s largest and most innovative sheep studs, Pooginook. Andrew’s passion for the job has only grown, as has his understanding of what makes farming work. He knows that success comes down to investing in the right places—genetics, infrastructure, and people.
Andrew has some great advice for those wanting to begin a career in ag. He says that leadership isn’t about titles; it’s about action. He values hands-on experience, seeing it as the foundation of a solid farming operation.
Andrew has a true passion for sheep farming and his story is proof that a clear vision and a relentless focus on improvement can keep you, and the industry, moving forward.
Head Shepherd is brought to you by neXtgen Agri International Limited. We help livestock farmers get the most out of the genetics they farm with. Get in touch with us if you would like to hear more about how we can help you do what you do best: info@nextgenagri.com.
Thanks to our sponsors at MSD Animal Health and Allflex, and Heiniger Australia and New Zealand. Please consider them when making product choices, as they are instrumental in enabling us to bring you this podcast each week.
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Show Transcript
WEBVTT
00:00:00.179 --> 00:00:01.040 Welcome back to Head Shepherd.
00:00:01.040 --> 00:00:02.721 We're doing another one live, which is great.
00:00:02.721 --> 00:00:09.625 We like doing the odd one out and about, so we're out here in the river today catching up with Andrew Glover, otherwise known as Gloves Gloves.
00:00:09.625 --> 00:00:11.686 Thanks for having us today.
00:00:11.686 --> 00:00:13.067 When did you?
00:00:13.067 --> 00:00:21.812 Yeah, we'll start with a few questions, and always we start with a bit of a background when did you know you sort of wanted to clear an ag, and has there ever been anything else you think you might have wanted to do or think?
00:00:22.292 --> 00:00:22.893 you might have wanted to do.
00:00:22.893 --> 00:00:27.396 Yeah, it's a good question and something that we probably spend a bit of time pondering about over the years.
00:00:27.396 --> 00:00:30.277 But yeah, I was always an outside kid growing up.
00:00:30.277 --> 00:00:37.929 Mum and Dad were both school teachers and Dad was bitten by an agricultural bug.
00:00:37.929 --> 00:00:40.740 He's a Sydney boy, but he was bitten by an agricultural bug and he bought a little property 300 acres.
00:00:40.740 --> 00:00:45.752 So I grew up there and, yeah, agriculture was on and especially sheep was always something I was interested in.
00:00:45.752 --> 00:00:55.048 But I did toy with the idea of being a bricklayer or a butcher or something like that, along with every other kid's dream of being, you know, an athlete of some description.
00:00:55.048 --> 00:00:58.020 But yeah, no, sheep are sort of where I've been in agriculture.
00:00:58.020 --> 00:01:01.430 I think it's a space that's got so many doors that you can open.
00:01:01.430 --> 00:01:04.414 It's just a matter of finding the one that fits what you want to do?
00:01:04.433 --> 00:01:07.716 Yeah, yeah, 100%, and you could have played footy, because you actually won't do that, have you?
00:01:07.920 --> 00:01:09.144 No, no it's all lies.
00:01:09.144 --> 00:01:10.448 It's all lies, mate.
00:01:10.448 --> 00:01:12.387 I've broken down old has-been.
00:01:12.387 --> 00:01:12.948 Yeah righto.
00:01:14.100 --> 00:01:14.501 Yeah, I guess.
00:01:14.501 --> 00:01:16.368 Yeah, talk us through your career today.
00:01:16.368 --> 00:01:17.740 So lots of stepping stones.
00:01:17.740 --> 00:01:22.105 You did the contracting from day one to where we are today.
00:01:22.525 --> 00:01:44.007 Yeah, no, it's been a path full of twists and turns, but pretty much early days at high school I had found a passion for agriculture the subject agriculture but I had a really good careers advisor who was a mad, keen sheep breeder and I used to skip a few classes that I didn't like eg English and spend a bit of time in his office talking sheep.
00:01:44.007 --> 00:01:51.141 So that got me interested and I was, you know, always keen to get out and do some other external study and whatnot.
00:01:51.141 --> 00:02:21.921 So I actually completed my wool classing certificate while I was at school in year 11 and 12, two nights a week and from there went straight from finishing school in Cootamundra to UNE to study a Bachelor of Livestock Science, sheep and wool production, and that was a four-year course that I completed both internally and externally, like full-time and part-time, and during that stage, during that time, I worked part-time or I worked full-time, sorry on a cropping place and I did a bit of interstate truck driving as well.
00:02:21.921 --> 00:02:38.319 Towards the back end of the study In 2009, I'd sort of completed, got the certificate in the mail and realised that I had $50,000 hex debt and I had to work out how I was going to leverage that investment to make a life for myself.
00:02:41.907 --> 00:02:55.829 So I jumped into the contracting space with a crutching trailer and the plan was always to build a relationship with the client, to then step out into a consultancy role, try and get some runs on the board, I suppose, and then go into the consultancy role.
00:02:56.542 --> 00:03:11.233 But that sort of never really fully eventuated because the contracting just got bigger and bigger to the point where in the last couple of years, towards the back end of that 10-year period of our lives, we were sort of handling 600,000 sheep a year across 115 clients.
00:03:12.443 --> 00:03:13.384 So that was really big.
00:03:13.384 --> 00:03:18.004 So from there we'd, you know, be honest probably burn ourselves out or burnt myself out a little bit.
00:03:18.004 --> 00:03:37.381 So I was looking to change the pace and jumped out of the contracting space into into some into a farm manager's role and was lucky enough to go and be operations manager up at a well-known study in the central west where you do a lot of work for, where we met each other up at mumble bone, and from there I had a really good five years there.
00:03:37.381 --> 00:03:49.230 But then it was just time to chase that next or scratch that next ditch, I suppose, and we're lucky enough to fall into this role here where we are now at Pudgenook and, yeah, still really excited about where the sheep industry can go.
00:03:49.230 --> 00:03:59.391 Despite the challenges we're all facing with diminishing returns and increasing cost structures, still think there's a positive, bright future for the right type of sheep in Australia.
00:03:59.391 --> 00:03:59.935 That's for certain.
00:03:59.955 --> 00:04:00.960 Yeah, 100%.
00:04:00.960 --> 00:04:25.360 Won't disagree with that at all no-transcript.
00:04:25.379 --> 00:04:29.596 The unsuccessful places, I would say would be fair, and I was.
00:04:29.656 --> 00:04:45.228 I was really lucky I probably didn't realise it until towards the back end of that 10 years of contracting that I was lucky enough to be invited into people's workplaces and businesses and could cast like a third degree eye, like an external eye, over what was going on.
00:04:45.603 --> 00:04:54.468 And I started asking lots of questions towards the back end of that to try and build my knowledge set and gain some trust, I suppose, in case I did want to step out into that consultancy space.
00:04:54.468 --> 00:05:08.608 And the three things that stood out for me, for guys that really were the top end producers of those 115 clients we had on our books, was probably investment in infrastructure, investment in genetics and investment in their people.
00:05:08.608 --> 00:05:17.444 You know, with the infrastructure becomes the ability to, you know, run at that, run it right, right at that pointy end, and obviously to get to the pointy end you've got to have good genetics.
00:05:17.444 --> 00:05:20.154 And then people you we're all stuffed without people.
00:05:20.154 --> 00:05:24.346 So you know that was probably the three things that really stood out.
00:05:24.346 --> 00:05:33.653 And, yeah, any of those guys that I used to work for, listening, I'd extend a great thanks and gratitude for allowing us to be part of your businesses for so long.
00:05:33.653 --> 00:05:37.130 It was a good part of our lives and something that I'll never forget.
00:05:37.459 --> 00:05:39.629 Yeah, I think they're three keys to any business.
00:05:39.629 --> 00:05:46.511 And well, obviously you can't control the genetics if you're in a people business, but having that people right is critical.
00:05:46.959 --> 00:05:48.987 Yeah, just another thing I'll probably put in there.
00:05:48.987 --> 00:05:57.870 Third, two was the one thing that just stood out for me was the guys who knew their businesses or who were successful and knew their businesses inside out.
00:05:57.870 --> 00:06:01.651 They did one or two things and did them really really well.
00:06:01.651 --> 00:06:17.509 They weren't what I call a whirlwind farmer, they didn't chase the next fad, so to speak, and the best way to explain it is probably when you get a phone call to say we've got X amount of sheep to do whatever to, and you turn up and there's 500 less or 500 more.
00:06:17.509 --> 00:06:21.050 That was generally an indication that the guys didn't have a full handle on their business.
00:06:21.050 --> 00:06:32.454 So that was probably one thing I missed off that previous question, that those successful guys knew their business and they knew it inside out, but they kept it simple, you know, weren't juggling too many balls, so to speak.
00:06:32.473 --> 00:06:38.115 Yeah, no, your numbers is something we we refer to a bit and yeah, obviously, and you do, yeah, lots of.
00:06:38.115 --> 00:06:39.300 I guess you're in contracts.
00:06:39.300 --> 00:06:41.024 Any contractor has that experience that way.
00:06:41.024 --> 00:06:54.255 You've come out and catch a few hundred or whatever, and then there's a thousand yards or whatever, and yeah, yeah, yeah it was nearly a weekly occurrence back in the day I mean, it's pretty clear from from that job being contracted for that many sheep.
00:06:54.877 --> 00:06:57.550 It takes a massive engine and I think if we asked I haven't done this.
00:06:57.550 --> 00:07:02.223 But if we did ask lots of people how to describe you, I think work ethic and drive would come up near the top of the list.
00:07:02.223 --> 00:07:07.331 Where does that sort of that real drive and work ethic come from to keep the fires burning?
00:07:08.514 --> 00:07:17.959 Yeah, it's a good question and I think, to be brutally honest, the drive to be successful has been instilled in me from a young age.
00:07:17.959 --> 00:07:23.112 Dad was a Sydney born and bred boy that ended up in the bush, followed mum, got married.
00:07:23.112 --> 00:07:25.225 Anyway, long story short short.
00:07:25.225 --> 00:07:35.850 He was gifted, or he bought six corridor ewes and an old ram and ran them on the back of the ju young schoolyard, ended up selling those for 60, the lambs for 60 or something.
00:07:35.850 --> 00:07:36.831 He thought, how good's farming?
00:07:36.831 --> 00:07:37.901 I'm going to get into farming.
00:07:37.901 --> 00:07:43.668 So went and bought 300 tough acres at coolac in the hills and build a nice house.
00:07:44.608 --> 00:07:52.987 But his work ethic was something that sort of had rubbed off on me but all of my brothers and sisters, one of four.
00:07:52.987 --> 00:08:08.062 And to see Dad literally work his hands to the bone every weekend, every spare hour he had to make that little block of dirt financially viable for us was something that I you know I'll probably never.
00:08:08.062 --> 00:08:14.504 You sort of don't realise it as a kid that you're getting exposed to that, but it sort of it rubs off for sure.
00:08:14.504 --> 00:08:18.560 And the best way to sum up the work ethic and where it comes from.
00:08:18.560 --> 00:08:39.152 Not too many people have been up to mum and dad's house where they live up on top of quite a big hill, and dad and us kids, as we got older, were a bit more help, but hand cemented a one and a half kilometre driveway by hand because that was the cheapest way to do it.
00:08:39.220 --> 00:08:42.389 He didn't value his time, rightly or wrongly.
00:08:42.389 --> 00:08:49.988 But you know, so long days and hard work was something we were used to as kids and it sort of just rubbed off as a lot later in life.
00:08:49.988 --> 00:08:54.370 But I have worked out that you know the old analogy you only get what you get by.
00:08:54.370 --> 00:08:57.101 The sweat of your brow is true to a degree, but we've got to.
00:08:57.101 --> 00:09:01.783 Everyone's got to work a little bit smarter and I'm sort of potentially learning that at nearly 40.
00:09:01.783 --> 00:09:03.429 So, yeah, yeah, I'm not sure I could I go back my work.
00:09:03.451 --> 00:09:07.404 Yeah, yeah, I'm not sure I could like I would back my work ethic, but I'm not sure I could stay down the barrel.
00:09:07.465 --> 00:09:13.734 A k and a half of concreting, yeah, yeah, yeah no, it was, uh, it was 13, or yeah, it was round figures 13.
00:09:13.734 --> 00:09:16.702 Summer holidays yeah yeah, dad used to buy a pallet of concrete.
00:09:16.702 --> 00:09:19.009 Um, when the concrete was done, we'd go on holidays.
00:09:19.009 --> 00:09:23.086 It was all hand mixed shovel, the sand shovel, the gravel shovel.
00:09:23.086 --> 00:09:25.331 Yeah, yeah, the yeah cart the water, you name it.
00:09:25.779 --> 00:09:26.745 That is a good way to teach work.
00:09:26.745 --> 00:09:34.530 Graves, you're now managing a significant station, pudgenook.
00:09:34.530 --> 00:09:36.417 It's a big deal.
00:09:36.417 --> 00:09:44.110 What advice would you give to young passionate people out there that that would be aspiring to sort of take this role on in the future?
00:09:45.360 --> 00:09:55.130 Yeah, I think it's potentially a dream job for a lot of guys out there that are aspiring to manage a station, especially one with the aura that Pudginook has in the Riverina.
00:09:55.130 --> 00:10:01.168 You know, long-term Merino studs still producing top-end rams, still supplying a lot of rams to the industry.
00:10:01.168 --> 00:10:10.933 So there's that ability or that potential to influence the industry from a seed stock point of view and that's obviously a big attraction for me to have taken on this role.
00:10:10.933 --> 00:10:15.001 But I think the advice that I'd give would be that you just got to take your time to do the apprenticeship.
00:10:15.001 --> 00:10:16.365 It's a slow road.
00:10:16.365 --> 00:10:18.030 Gain the experience and be patient.
00:10:18.211 --> 00:10:27.642 You've got to be really willing to do those jobs or to start at the bottom to do those jobs that don't really fit what you think you're up to.
00:10:27.642 --> 00:10:38.500 You might have a $40,000 or $50,000 hex debt, but you've still got to be willing to drag out that shitty sheep and crutch it, fix that fence, do all those things that we've all had to do.
00:10:38.500 --> 00:10:39.764 We've all started at the bottom.
00:10:39.764 --> 00:10:51.924 Just be willing to stay curious, be willing to ask the questions, be willing to throw yourself out in front of the people that make the decision about who's going to be the overseer, who's going to be the assistant manager who's going to potentially be the manager?
00:10:51.924 --> 00:10:57.883 Be positive and confident, work hard, but one key piece of advice would be throw the clock away.
00:10:57.883 --> 00:11:01.989 Clock watches in agriculture don't fit, so don't count hours.
00:11:01.989 --> 00:11:06.916 It's a 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week job and that's the stuff that doesn't go unnoticed.
00:11:06.916 --> 00:11:09.368 So work hard, stay committed and your time will come.
00:11:09.368 --> 00:11:12.749 Just yeah and stay curious would probably be the main thing.
00:11:12.969 --> 00:11:13.711 Yeah, great thoughts.
00:11:13.711 --> 00:11:17.610 And yeah, I think I 100% agree on that clock-watching aspect.
00:11:17.610 --> 00:11:19.143 It's sort of I don't know.
00:11:19.143 --> 00:11:24.753 We came up through an era where there just wasn't an option to be watching what the clock is, and I think we need to.
00:11:24.753 --> 00:11:36.143 Yeah, I mean, obviously every employee has rights, but there's still if you want to climb, you have to work, and that's the same as in McKinsey and PwC, like it's.
00:11:36.143 --> 00:11:38.591 All the big firms are the same and agriculture is no different.
00:11:38.591 --> 00:11:42.051 If you want to achieve something, you actually have to bend your back and make it happen.
00:11:42.299 --> 00:11:45.801 Yeah, you've got to be a bit of a self-starter back and make it happen.
00:11:45.801 --> 00:11:53.274 Yeah, you've got to be a bit of a self-starter, you've got to be willing to put the time in, and the harder you work, the more you enjoy the time that you get not to work.
00:11:53.274 --> 00:12:10.184 And I think it's a key thing that, yes, we've all got entitlements, but sometimes the job at hand overrides that entitlement and you've just got to get the job done for the benefit of the business or the company or whoever you're working for, and it doesn't go unnoticed.
00:12:10.184 --> 00:12:10.947 People take note.
00:12:10.947 --> 00:12:16.711 So, yeah, I think when we grew up, we didn't have a clock on every device we owned.
00:12:17.000 --> 00:12:18.203 So unless you had one on your wrist.
00:12:18.203 --> 00:12:24.022 You were guided by the sun, and when the sun came up, you went to work, and when it went down, you went home, and when it went down, you went home.
00:12:24.022 --> 00:12:27.349 So you know, that's whether that's the old school approach, I don't know.
00:12:27.349 --> 00:12:34.193 But yeah, I think that's pretty key that clock watches and agriculture are two very different worlds yeah, no 100.
00:12:34.475 --> 00:12:43.884 I think your leadership point's a really good one and I actually one of my users that's probably been out by the time of well, this is released but I think it doesn't matter where you run a business.
00:12:43.884 --> 00:12:45.147 You need to find a way to lead.
00:12:45.147 --> 00:12:49.883 Like, even if you're the, you're the juniorist, junior shepherd or whatever on the on a property, you still need to.
00:12:49.883 --> 00:12:55.168 If you've got something you see wrong, you still need to find a way to, and that's just through communication, as you already covered.
00:12:55.187 --> 00:13:10.370 Like, leadership can come from all parts of wherever you are in a business, you still you still have an opportunity to show some leadership yeah, I agree, and leadership has so many different meanings and when people think a leader they quite often think a captain yeah, captain of the ship, sort of thing.
00:13:10.370 --> 00:13:13.565 But that's definitely not the case and it's not the case in a multi.
00:13:13.565 --> 00:13:20.648 You know employee business like, um, yeah, it's, you've got to, everyone's got to learn.
00:13:20.648 --> 00:13:22.672 I think it's a, it's a real development piece that's.
00:13:22.672 --> 00:13:27.451 That's sort of coming into a lot of agriculture, probably because it was missing for a lot of years.
00:13:27.451 --> 00:13:29.405 It was more of a follow me type.
00:13:29.405 --> 00:13:35.365 But if we want to keep staff and we want to attract the right staff, we've got to create buy-in.
00:13:35.365 --> 00:13:44.309 And the best way to create buy-in is give people an opportunity to lead and take on some of those meaningful tasks as their own, change it to make it suit them and do it better than what we can do it.
00:13:49.159 --> 00:13:52.274 I think that's I've always when, whenever I've employed people, I've always tried to find someone that does the job better than I can do it and then let them go and do it.
00:13:52.274 --> 00:13:53.715 That makes life a little easier if you can find those people.
00:13:53.715 --> 00:13:55.076 So here at bush it's.
00:13:55.076 --> 00:13:55.876 It's one of.
00:13:55.876 --> 00:13:58.440 It's home to one of australia's largest marina stud.
00:13:58.440 --> 00:14:00.563 The sheep industry is ever changing.
00:14:00.563 --> 00:14:05.052 It's ever evolving um and to an extent, the marina studs should lead this evolution.
00:14:05.052 --> 00:14:08.399 What do you see as the features of pushing at Pomerino in 2035?
00:14:08.399 --> 00:14:16.366 So if we could jump in our time machine and fast forward sort of 11 years or 10 and a bit years as we are today, what are we looking at?
00:14:16.366 --> 00:14:18.860 If we wandered out into the yards today, can we?
00:14:18.899 --> 00:14:22.703 jump in that time machine and see what the market's going to do in 10 or 11 years time.
00:14:22.783 --> 00:14:24.706 We wouldn't have to be here doing a podcast if we knew that.
00:14:24.706 --> 00:14:25.246 Answer mate.
00:14:25.267 --> 00:14:26.048 Yeah, no, that's right.
00:14:26.048 --> 00:14:29.051 Look, I 100% agree with what you're saying.
00:14:29.051 --> 00:14:33.556 I think education is key behind a lot of that.
00:14:33.556 --> 00:14:42.192 The industry needs educators like yourself and it needs studs to help facilitate that education.
00:14:44.039 --> 00:14:47.500 Pudginook, you know I'm lucky to have inherited a great business.
00:14:47.500 --> 00:14:50.408 Pudgenook's been under the Parraway Bennett for 16 years.
00:14:50.408 --> 00:14:54.485 It's stood the test of time for all the right reasons.
00:14:54.485 --> 00:15:20.787 So we're not tipping it upside down and all we're trying to do now is just take off some of those sharp edges round the animal out a bit more, become a little bit more resilient and ultimately more profitable, and whether that's in lamb or wool, or kilos of lamb produced or kilos of wool produced, I think it's probably a combination of both, Not convinced that one or the other is gonna reign supreme in 10 years.
00:15:20.787 --> 00:15:40.048 So, no, I think it'll be subtle changes and, yeah, we just hopefully no, not hopefully it will be Pudginook will stand the test of time and someone else will be able to stand here behind this wall table in 20 years or 10 years or however long I last at the helm and be able to talk about it as well.
00:15:40.168 --> 00:15:47.269 Yeah, exactly and I think, yeah, I guess, if we could get in that crystal ball, I think they're relatively predictable.
00:15:47.269 --> 00:15:55.340 We've already seen, like we were just chatting before, like the RWS premiums are there and so we're seeing the market rewarding the non-meal status of Pudginook.
00:15:55.340 --> 00:16:12.989 We'll see well, the land markets bounce back pretty well and we're going to see that meat market, like all the trends are pretty good for the meat side, so that dual-purpose animal as it already is, I can imagine that will just keep building out and some of the welfare traits will keep kicking in there as well.
00:16:12.989 --> 00:16:13.951 Yeah, 100%.
00:16:14.602 --> 00:16:15.044 You're right.
00:16:15.044 --> 00:16:21.089 I think consumers will shape where we need to go, because if we don't listen, we don't have a market.
00:16:21.089 --> 00:16:25.931 The RWS side of stuff quite intriguing at the moment.
00:16:25.931 --> 00:16:27.847 Like you said, we just sold some wool yesterday.
00:16:27.847 --> 00:16:35.482 That's shown that the premiums are back and back in a big way for some short 68 mil RWS accredited wool.
00:16:35.482 --> 00:16:43.386 So that's exciting and I think, yeah, the meat market people have got to eat can't see that changing.
00:16:43.386 --> 00:17:06.875 It's more just a matter of trying to make ourselves resilient and be able to flex when the season, the climate variability we now all face be it like yesterday, like 30 mil downpour, our rain seems to be falling in shorter, sharper bursts and our dry patches are getting longer and more frequent.
00:17:06.875 --> 00:17:21.648 Without going down that rabbit hole, I think it's about building businesses and animal enterprises that can flex, that can ramp up and go hard when the seasons are good and then tighten back down when the seasons aren't there, knowing you can get back in quickly when it turns.
00:17:21.648 --> 00:17:22.651 Yeah, 100%.
00:17:23.142 --> 00:17:28.666 Doing this interview and being where we are, we wouldn't be appropriate without mentioning your wife, Peter.
00:17:28.666 --> 00:17:31.603 Like lots of people in agriculture, it's a team effort.
00:17:31.603 --> 00:17:35.026 How important to you has been sharing the career journey with Peter.
00:17:36.095 --> 00:17:39.385 Yeah, mate, peter's an amazing woman.
00:17:39.385 --> 00:17:46.326 She's definitely helped take some of my rough edges off.
00:17:46.326 --> 00:17:52.743 Pretty big chisel some days yeah, some days a chisel isn't big enough.
00:17:52.743 --> 00:17:58.748 No, look, she's been a successful entrepreneur in her own right as well.
00:17:58.748 --> 00:18:05.184 I think that's what made us such a good team, or makes us such a good team is her ability to sit back and look at the big picture.
00:18:06.615 --> 00:18:19.205 So obviously, raised four beautiful boys while I was contracting and allowed me to run that business and probably run a little bit harder than we should have from a family point of view, but kept us all together.
00:18:19.205 --> 00:18:27.280 And then, yeah, she's been successful, started and ran a very successful laundromat business which she sold when we left Wellington.
00:18:27.280 --> 00:18:31.084 She's had food trucks and coffee carts and all sorts of stuff.
00:18:31.084 --> 00:18:34.045 So, yeah, no, peter, like you say, it is a team effort.
00:18:34.045 --> 00:18:40.082 There's no way I don't think I could have done half of what I've achieved without someone like her beside me.
00:18:40.082 --> 00:18:49.344 So, yeah, no, she's a very important person and I know she'll cook us a good feed tonight, ferg, so we'll be spoiled, as usual.
00:18:49.494 --> 00:18:51.096 But yeah, no, I love her dearly and yeah, couldn't have done it without her.
00:18:51.096 --> 00:18:52.878 Yeah, no, I love her dearly and yeah, couldn't have done it without her.
00:18:52.878 --> 00:18:52.980 Yeah.
00:18:53.000 --> 00:18:53.800 I understand Clive.
00:18:53.800 --> 00:19:00.650 It's a question we ask everybody, which is the hardest question we ask often, and that is what is the last thing you change your mind about.
00:19:05.954 --> 00:19:10.487 Yeah, it's a great question and one I sort of was trying to come up with something funny to reply to, because I did see this question come up.
00:19:10.487 --> 00:19:16.586 But anyone that knows me knows I change my mind nearly as often as I've changed my socks, um, which is daily.
00:19:16.586 --> 00:19:25.404 So just just to clarify, yeah, yeah, but I'm it's a very open question and I was just trying to think of, you know, obviously, something funny.
00:19:25.404 --> 00:19:29.769 But there's one thing that I keep coming back to and that's probably the riverina itself.
00:19:29.769 --> 00:19:38.905 Um, you know, I grew up at cootamundra in that you know, some of that best wheat growing country in australia around cootamundra, wallenbeen, through that, through that area.
00:19:38.905 --> 00:19:44.347 There, you know the riverina was sort of had this perception of being borderline desert.
00:19:44.347 --> 00:19:47.419 You know you're one step off the great sandy desert in south australia.
00:19:47.419 --> 00:19:49.807 You know like it was, but it's a big.
00:19:50.150 --> 00:20:06.182 It's been a big eye opener moving down here and seeing how strong this country is, how, how well the stock do, the lack of pressure that we spoke about today in the car from worms and diseases and things like that, but the ability for the country to respond.
00:20:06.182 --> 00:20:09.163 We've had 40 mils of rain in the last two days.
00:20:09.163 --> 00:20:14.105 We'll see a green pick come now, that'll carry our sheep through joining.
00:20:14.105 --> 00:20:17.855 Green pick come now, that'll carry our sheep through joining.
00:20:17.855 --> 00:20:33.394 And when I turned up here in 2023, sorry we took on some adjustment cattle that came down very drought, ridden out of the north out of that big drought that was on its way, and within sort of two or three months they turned around to become quite good looking mob of cattle.
00:20:33.394 --> 00:20:44.782 So, yeah, I think the thing I've changed my most on is the ability of this country to be able to grow stock and be productive, and it's probably about trying to find a now.
00:20:44.782 --> 00:20:50.768 It's trying to find the genotype that will allow us to do that and make some good returns in the modern era.
00:20:53.134 --> 00:21:10.798 And maybe a supplementary question is how, yeah, I mean, in this strong country, people sort of see sheep out here and see, like you're here, like you can literally hear the fleece at the table out here, because they grow great, great fleece weights and and are healthy and they have heaps of lambs, because it is really really strong country.
00:21:10.798 --> 00:21:18.902 But I guess, yeah, we have to be careful about expecting these sort of genetics to then transform into other environments that aren't so easy.
00:21:18.902 --> 00:21:29.079 And that's the, that's the art, I suppose, of trying to seed stock producers, trying to breed sheep that will not only do well here but also do well as you shift them into into different environments that have different challenges, I suppose.
00:21:29.079 --> 00:21:39.358 And that's kind of that's, that's the beauty of, I guess, the breeding base to test things here that aren't maybe a challenge here, but we can force them to have a challenge here in worms or whatever, but it's not really heavy worm country.
00:21:39.861 --> 00:21:40.343 Yeah, and that's.
00:21:40.343 --> 00:21:41.700 I think you're right there.
00:21:41.700 --> 00:21:54.844 We're lucky enough to have a big client base, that a lot of those guys are east of the Newell Highway, so back into sort of a moderate to high rainfall dual purpose country like cropping and grazing country.
00:21:54.844 --> 00:22:00.185 So we we need to be able to breed sheep that can go into those areas, um, down into victoria as well.
00:22:00.185 --> 00:22:18.035 So you know, key things that we're we're focusing on and we'll continue to focus on are obviously feet and worms and dag and things like that, because whilst it may not be top of the tree for our local environment, it's still there are still correlations or fundamentals at play that mean they perform well in our environment.
00:22:18.035 --> 00:22:23.707 In particular years and last year with our wet summer that turned up.
00:22:23.707 --> 00:22:29.066 This year, with the potential of another wet summer, those key traits will be paramount.
00:22:29.066 --> 00:22:36.923 So, yeah, that is the beauty of the art of seed stock breeding, something that I'm only new to, but I'm sure in time we'll get there yeah, 100.
00:22:37.464 --> 00:22:38.006 Awesome mate.
00:22:38.006 --> 00:22:40.718 Thanks for you, thanks for your time and yeah, great, great to have a chat.
00:22:40.718 --> 00:22:44.430 We'll, we'll, uh, we'll be plenty of plenty more chats.
00:22:44.530 --> 00:22:50.276 I'll be there after this yeah, and I look forward to it, fergan, looking forward to having you on board and we'll go from there.
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