Australian records demolished

Six females made $40,000 or more, four females made between $30,000 to $40,000 and 21 females made from $20,000 to $30,000.

The 21-month-old pregnancy tested in calf (PTIC) heifer, sired by Coonamble Hector H249 and from Millah Murrah Prue F141, had the bidding frenzy stop at a staggering $190,000.

Her maternal lines include Hector, Carbine, Woody W100 and Hingaia 469. 

First time stud sale attendees, Rodger and Jenny Pryce, Brooklana Angus, Brooklana, purchased Prue M4. 

Mr Pryce said he liked that she fits into their breeding program as she doesn’t have any genetic influence from Emperor or Reality.

“We have quite a lot of that in our stud already,” he said. “Structurally she ticks all the boxes for us.

“I have been following what Ross has been doing since I have got back into cattle in 2009. It is a passion.”

They also purchased Millah Murrah Flower M137 for $12,000 to keep her company.

Mr Pryce runs a small stud of 100 breeders and is thinking of downsizing to a smaller herd of 20 to 30 cows as they believe it is better to have high quality rather than quantity.

Second top purchase and also the first record breaker at $54,000 was Millah Murrah Prue H112, a PTIC daughter to Ythanbrae Henry VIII U8. 

She was purchased by East West Angus stud owner, Shane Adams, Upper Bingara. They were also the under-bidder to the top priced heifer. The stud purchased a draft of five averaging $30,800.

“She is a beautiful cow from all angles,” stud manager, Josh Hreszczuk, said of the high priced cow.

“She carries herself extremely well for being such a big framed female with massive volume and capacity.” 

Volume purchaser, Heart Angus, took home a draft of 11 females topping at $26,000 and averaging $12,363. They also purchased three others in conjunction with Cherylton Angus from Kojonup, Western Australia.

A long-standing buyers, Cherylton Angus also purchased a draft of seven with a top price of $16,000 and an average of $10,857.

Repeat buyers, the Duren family, Bald Hill Pastoral Company, Trunkey Creek, selected a draft of 11 females with an average of $8181 topping at $10,000, three times.

Manager, Lucas Clayton, felt the line-up was well presented.

“We are really happy with all of them, it is hard to pick one above the others,” he said.

Coolie Angus principal, Jamie Edmonds, chose 10 young females. 

“They are an unbelievable line-up of cattle, the improvement they will do to our herd will be phenomenal.” he said.

“It is a credit to the principals at Millah Murrah. The professionalism is amazing, it carries the rest of us with them.

“I’m sure it will help us in all ways, it will give us great females. They will go straight to the top.

“If you are going to do this, you have to do it properly.”

Damian Gommers, Mandayen Angus and Limousins, Keith, South Australia, purchased a draft of four for an average of $20,500, topping at $42,000.

“After discussions with Ross we chose these cows for what we needed to keep building our herd that already has a strong Millah Murrah foundation,” he said.

“We hope that these new bloodlines will help keep on improving our herd using this stud’s breeding.”

Millah Murrah stud co-principal, Ross Thompson, was overwhelmed.

“We feel the sale reflects the strong demand for our bulls over the past seven years and 50 years of dedication to maternal function.

“We thought the females on offer were simply as good as we could ever hope to produce.

“From an industry perspective, the sale underlined the seemingly endless horizon in demand for quality Angus cattle.”

The sale was conducted by Elders Bathurst with guest auctioneer, Paul Dooley, and Elders’ Andy McGeoch at the rostrum.