Opportunity knocks at Quilpie

Most of the recent news has been bad: two years of drought, high debt levels, reports of forced sales, live cattle export problems and resultant heavy yardings of unwanted cattle.

It was in similar earlier times of widespread pessimism and despair that Sidney Kidman and others like him, who were able to take a long-term view, made property investments that later repaid them handsomely.

And Elders’ veteran Brisbane-based property guru Dick Allpass hopes there may be some punters of that ilk still around next month, when two notable SW Queensland stations go under the auctioneer’s hammer.

He says despite all the negativity, sales are still being made, as canny investors seize the opportunity of a buyers’ market to secure a pastoral asset which in happier times might have been beyond their reach.

Prices across the board for Queensland pastoral land have tumbled by an estimated 25 per cent since the 2009 market peak, and as experience has shown, such trends can quickly be reversed once circumstances change.

Testing the market at an important Elders auction to be held on September 5 in Toowoomba will be the two Quilpie district offerings, Raymore Station and “Giberoo”.

Both are experiencing a lean season, in common with much of the State, but both also offer the potential for rich production in better times, thanks to their exposure to large-scale beneficial flooding.

Raymore Station, the larger of the two, is a Channel Country leasehold property of about 121,000 hectares (300,000ac), situated 161 kilometres north-west of Quilpie on Kyabra Creek, where it joins “Thylungra”, of Durack pioneering family fame.

Now owned by Al and Judy Warby, who are scaling down to concentrate on their other holdings further east, “Raymore” was earlier held by Joe Tully, whose forebears followed the Duracks to the Kyabra in the 1870s.

The property has a long history of successful sheep and cattle production, with Merino sheep yielding heavy cuts of 21-micron wool and cattle recording 90 per cent weaning rates and finishing readily in season.

Roughly one-third of the total area receives beneficial flooding from Kyabra Creek (an offshoot of the Cooper). The balance of the country is a mix of open gidyea plains and undulating stony mulga.

About 8000ha has been pulled and sown to bambatsi and buffel, complementing the natural cover of Mitchell and Flinders grasses, gidyea, bluebush, lignum, wild sorghum and seasonal herbages.

This supports a “safe” stocking regime of up to 3000 cows, or 25,000 sheep and 1000 cattle, with additional finishing in favourable seasons.

Structures include a low-set timber homestead of five bedrooms and staff quarters, a six-stand electric shearing shed, steel sheep and cattle yards, machinery shed, workshop and aircraft hangar.

Bidding for Raymore Station is expected to top $4.5 million, and the purchaser will have the opportunity to negotiate the purchase of about 3000 head of cattle now on hand.

About 75 kilometres to the south of Quilpie (“Raymore” being 161km to the north-west) is the other property offering, “Giberoo”, a Bulloo River channel property of 18,987ha (46,916ac) held in four freehold titles.

Owned for many years by the Watts family, it is held now by Geoff and Mary Scott, who bought it in 2002 and are selling now to concentrate on their other interests in the Roma district.

Rated as capable of carrying under normal conditions 8000 sheep and 500 cattle, or 800 cows, “Giberoo” is also a seasonal finisher’s paradise, with about 75 per cent of its area comprising Bulloo flood channels.

The country ranges from shaded plains and watercourses of red, grey and black soils to slopes of red stony and grey loam soils, all carrying a rich mix of native grasses, edible bush and seasonal herbages.

Improvements include an attractive five-bedroom homestead in garden setting, steel cattle yards of 800-head capacity, a six-stand shearing shed with steel yards, quarters and shedding.

Bidding for “Giberoo” is expected in a range above $1.5m – a price level that reflects its modest 300mm average rainfall, but belies its proven capacity to generate wealth from its reliable flood events.

Contact Dick Allpass, (07) 3840 5533.