Palmer Valley Station
Calling the red centre home, the Fogerty family of Palmer Valley Station reside 150 kilometres south of Alice Springs, Northern Territory, via the Stuart Highway.
Palmer Valley Station sits on just under one million acres of semi-desert country, comfortably running 3,000 breeders in full capacity, season permitting.
The Fogerty’s aggregation of properties run over varied environments around Australia, with their family running four properties: Palmer Valley Station in the Northern Territory, Tressavale and Rowleys Creek near Walcha, New South Wales and Spring Creek near Tamworth, New South Wales.
Family patriarch Ted Fogerty has been involved in the cattle industry for his whole life, growing up on a family property northeast of Alice Springs, where he was involved in his family’s cattle company. Leaving school at age 13, Ted began working in the industry full time from then on.
Following the dispersion of his family’s business to begin their own operations, Ted and his wife Sheri moved to Palmer Valley Station 30 years ago. Since that time, the Fogerty’s have built their operation around the use of Angus genetics.
The business is truly a family one; Ted and Sheri who after running Palmer Valley for three decades have taken a step back in recent years and handed over the reins to daughter Jade and her partner Rory Simpson. Daughter Kristy and her husband Gerard Oversby run their properties in the New England region of New South Wales, which serve as their steer fattening locations. Their two other children, Elle and Ben, work in careers outside of the business.
In its beginnings, the Fogerty’s operation was originally a Brahman based herd. Approximately 20 years ago, the family made the decision to go into the Angus breed, finding the breed would be better suited in their operations for their temperament and market suitability and demand. Furthermore, the family entered the organic market with the Angus breed.
“We went to the blacks with the organic market,” said Ted. “We thought that was the best way to go and were one of the first to do that. We believed in them and followed them, and it worked out pretty well.”
When integrating Angus into their herd some twenty years ago, the Fogerty’s made sure to introduce the breed over a period of time.
“We started with bulls first and just crossed them with the Brahman cows,” said Ted. “Anything black, we kept. We just kept culling the Brahmans out as they got older. They turned out to a pretty nice herd after a fair few years.”
He continued, “Then the drought hit us, and then we had to get rid of most of it and we had to start again. But that’s what your dealt with.”
When it comes to selection for their Angus herd, Ted explained, “On our Estimated Breeding Values (EBVs), there’s probably about four things that we really target.
“Our main thing is birth weight in this area. You’re not there watching them every day, you actually might only see them every couple of months, and you don’t want them to lose their calf or jam up.”
The average yearly rainfall for the location is approximately six inches, and depending on the season can often result in less than average rainfalls in the area.
Of their current season, Ted said, “Our season this year, I wouldn’t say it’s great, but we will survive. I hope we get a bit more rain through the next coming months.”
When it comes to joining their herd, due to the variability of the rainfall in the region and the fact it falls throughout the year rather than in a primary season, the Fogerty’s join year-round, conducting two musters by horses annually.
“We haven’t really got a pattern of joining. We can get our rainfall any month and if we were to try and do a set joining when it’s so dry and you put them out and have them there for eight weeks, sometimes it doesn’t even work. So, we just leave them in there and do two musters a year.”
Using a ratio of three bulls to every 100 cows, calf rates sit at about 75% to 85% over the two brandings yearly.
Cows are pregnancy tested and are typically culled from the mob when empty. Further to that, females are culled on phenotype. However, Ted highlights that caution must be applied when culling animals when weaning twice a year.
When introducing bulls into their operation the Fogerty’s take care to select bulls that they believe will integrate well into their environments.
“Usually, I try and talk to the producers and get their views on bulls. The people that sell them, you try and talk to them and see what they reckon is good quality,” said Ted.
“They talk us through it a bit and what they like and then what you like. We go through all the EBVs with what we know.”
The aim is to have the bulls on property anywhere between 12-15 months of age, arriving in approximately March/April to acclimatise before the warmer months.
“They come from down south with its cold weather. Then they come up to the heat, so you’re better off bringing them up March or April.
“They get used to temperature during the winter, then they come into the summer, and they don’t even know it.”
When describing his preferences for the bulls they use in their operation, Ted said, “I like the shinier coat, because it’s better for the heat. If they’re a pretty woolly-looking animal I tend to avoid them because they carry that a bit longer and we find they knock up quicker when you are travelling or walking anywhere with them,” said Ted.
Bulls are semen tested to ensure fertility.
Currently, the Fogerty’s purchase Angus bulls for a seedstock operation that they run themselves and use bulls they have bred themselves within their wider commercial operation.
After purchasing their Angus bulls, typically from the more southern states, the Fogerty’s keep the bulls close in order for the family to ensure they are adapting well. An important consideration as well for the Fogerty’s is the different management practices utilised in the North that animals are not familiar with in southern operations, such as trapping systems.
“We keep them around here for at least eight weeks and then we set area up so they can actually walk through our trapping systems,” said Ted.
“They walk in and out of the trapping systems around here and we make it so that we put more arms in so by the time they go out, if they do wander, they’re used to the traps. They’re not hanging around the waters, perishing.
“They’re all used to that before you let them go. But even when you do let them go, you open your spears up so they can actually walk in fairly easily without the spears touching them, which they get used to pretty quick and then they’re just like the rest of the herd.”
With their herd, the Fogerty’s have the ability to chase the dominant market at any given time.
“We target wherever the market is at the time. The last couple of years, you’ve been getting weaners and turning them off between $1,500 and $2,000 and that’s where the market was at so why would you hold them for any longer?
“Now that the market has come back, we have just been growing them out a bit bigger. They’re still making good money when they’re growing up a bit, but the smaller cattle aren’t making as much, so wherever the market is on the day, we target that.
“We try and work to the feedlot types. But if the market means weaners are making good money, well, you quit them and then you can spell your country and save it for something else later in the year.”
When asked about the challenges that the family face in their business, Ted highlighted the threat of wild dogs as an issue for them.
“We get a lot of feral dogs, and a lot of people don’t like trying control it,” said Ted.
“‘They don’t reckon that’s the first priority and I think that’s one of the first priorities for us.
“If there’s a lot of dogs and you lose up to five calves a week, that’s a lot of calves over 12 months. We try and control that as much as you can. There are also the feral camels, which are another problem.”
While running in an area of the country more highly dominated by bos indicus breeds, Ted believes that their country lends itself well to running Angus cattle.
“There are Angus around us,” he said. “It’s soft country, so Angus will handle it pretty good. It’s not like further north where you get into the Brahman or bos indicus breeds.
“Buffel grass is probably the main thing in the central Australia for most places and I think it’s good because it’s made a lot of country. For us, it’s definitely made a lot of this desert country.”
In fact, in retrospect Ted believes that he had his time again, he would get into the Angus game earlier then the family did.
“I would have gotten into Angus sooner, but it’s just what was here when we bought it,” he said. “The market didn’t allow you to change at the time.”
Previous to the development of Ted and his own family’s business, there was a bos taurus influence with his family’s existing cattle business.
“We had Hereford cattle previously, and we were bringing them across however our family were all in the same company then.”
“I probably would have got the Hereford and then put Angus over them for the black baldies,” he said.
“We couldn’t get rid of the Brahmans for a fair while, so we just went for the Brahmans and bought Brahman bulls.
That’s where we were for probably the first seven or eight years before we started to go into the Angus side of it.”
When reflecting on their use of Angus at Palmer Valley and why it works for them, Ted said, “It’s a market. You can sell them anywhere in Australia, and they’re good cattle to deal with.
“All the genetics we’ve got, we’ve had good cattle. They’re quiet and easy to deal with. You drive around, they don’t run away.
“We’ve never had any problem with them. We deal with Angus both here and in the New England. The Angus can handle the cold and handle the heat which is perfect.”
When looking at the future of their business, Ted is positive about where the family stands currently, with the next generation of their family stepping up in the business.
“I have got out of the business a bit and am letting my kids have a go as the next generation coming into it, and hopefully, they can make a go of it,” he said.
“My daughter and her partner run Palmer Valley Station now. They’ve been here for nearly two years, and they’re doing a good job. They’re a bit more into the genetics side than I am.”
He continued, “One of my other daughters, Kristy, is in the New England, she’s getting right into it running those properties. My other daughter Elle is a schoolteacher, and my son Ben is a heavy diesel mechanic.”
Reflecting on the journey of the business to where it is today, Ted believes that the biggest achievement is the growth of business.
“I started from Palmer Valley, and I’ve got four places now,” he said. “If I fell off the perch, all my kids would have a place each. That’s what my parents did for us, and now I’ve done it for my kids, and I hope they can do it for theirs.”
“Our biggest opportunity is having our places which is a pretty hard thing to get now, as it’s hard to try and get into these places. If you’re a family-owned business they cost a lot of money now, so it’s a big opportunity for us.”
– Cheyne Twist, Senior Marketing and Communications Officer
