Newsletter for the week ending 21 May 2004

Gympie QLD Clean Sweep
"Gympie has never seen the like of it, a complete breed whitewash for all seven supreme interbreed awards and all from one exhibitor.
Nothing could go wrong for Clifton QLD breeder John McCarthy who with his wife Rosemaree runs the multi award winning Rosehill Stud", Queensland Country Life 20 May 2004.
The interbreed winning Rosehill cattle were:
Junior Champion Bull Rosehill X338
Senior Champion Bull Rosehill X289
Junior Champion Female Rosehill Honour Y
Supreme Champion Female Rosehill Tartan 6
Supreme Champion Animal Rosehill X289
Supreme Champion Other Sex Rosehill Tartan 6
Champion Interbreed Group Rosehill Limousins
Other Limousin breeders to feature in a strong showing of Limousin cattle at Gympie Show were:
Paul Foreman, Bundaberg Qld; Reserve Senior Female; Oakwood Felicity
Jean Plaisted and Viv Burnett, Redland Bay Qld; Reserve Champion Junior Bull; Burnstead Yea
Trevor & Sheresse Tramacchi, Gympie Qld; Reserve Senior Champion Bull; Tramahler Xterior
Warragul (Vic) Sale Toppers 7 May
Steer vealer 365kg @ 212 c/kg = $773
Acc V Minichello, Drouin (Vic)

Komburra (Vic) Sale Topper 9 May
Steer Vealer 325kg @ 190.6 c/kg = $619
Acc N Holloway, Wattle Bank (Vic)

Nowra (NSW) Sale Topper Early May
8.5 month steer vealer 385kg @ 220 c/kg = $847
Acc Don Hodgson, Jaspers Bush (NSW)

$1000 Cows & Heifers
Tony Whistler from Wangaratta Vic called to report the sale of some "old" cows and heifers over the hooks to Cargills Wagga.
7 cows 396kg carcase @ $2.50 = $1003
4 heifers 373kg carcase @ $2.75 = $1025
All in all a very good return from some "old girls" that have done their job and some "young girls" who refused to do the required job.

Calves From New Bulls
Tim Keys reports that the first calves from new AI sires Opera, Ryedale Orion and Ronick Iceman arrived in mid April.
"The first Iceman and Orion were born in the Keystone herd while Bruce and Ann Gill of Bruangil Park Limousins at Kernot (Vic) beat me to the post with the first Opera calf in Australia" Tim reports.


New Semen Arrives
Ian & Joan Symons of the Lanaud Limousin Stud in Victoria together with Geoff and Diane Lyster of Lysgorren Limousin Stud in WA have imported semen from a new French sire Nelson. The Symons and Lysters have he semen rights for this bull in Australia, New Zealand and New Caledonia. Semen is available from Keystone Genetics.
Keystone Genetics have also brought in semen from another up and coming French bull Junior in the same shipment.
I understand that Agrigene are bringing in semen from French bull Milou in the near future.

New Chairman in the UK
The British Limousin Cattle Society have elected a new Chairman in the lead up to the ILC Conference. He is Aled Edwards who along with his parents David and Joan run the noted Difri stud herd of 90 breeding cows at Llandovery in Wales. Aled's father David was also Limousin Society Chairman from 1995 to 1997.

Number of Australians going to the ILC Growing
On the current count there will be 49 Australians attending the International Limousin Conference in the UK from 1 to 11 August.
Thirty four of these will participate in a four day pretour to France where they will inspect daughters of up and coming French sires at the Moussours female test station and progeny of sires including Nelson, Junior, Malibu and Nenuphar on farm in the Limousin Region.

Website Hits
It is hard to measure the impact of our website on sale demand other than by page hits. The National Show and Sale catalogue had 12,302 page hits from 545 visitors prior to the sale and has had 1,368 page hits from 95 visitors since the sale to check on prices paid.
The number of page hits prior to the sale is more than double the number of hits for last years' National.
The Tramahler Invitation Female Sale had 3324 page hits from 161 visitors prior to the sale on 8 May and has had 301 page hits from 36 visitors since the sale.

Wanted - Limousin Steers for Rockdale Feedlot
I have had an enquiry for a pen (150-180) Limousin X steers by the large Rockdale feedlot at Yanco NSW.
They fed a pen of Limo X Angus steers late last year and were so impressed they want more.
They need to be 400-500kg liveweight and can be out of British breed or Santa Gertrudis cows.
Please check with your bull buying clients and let me know if they have any suitable steers.

Yes they did sell bulls not bells at the sale at Wodonga prior to the National. They would need to have been very special bells to average $2703!

Yours in Limousin

Alex McDonald