Droving is often a lonely job with long stints on the road driving cattle through ever-changing landscapes.
Subscribe now for unlimited access to all our agricultural news
across the nation
or signup to continue reading
But for Brian Glendinning it's anything but lonely. He has been droving for 13 years and the last three have been spend with his family by his side.
"It certainly takes longer to get everything ready but it's been a bit of an adventure with the kids," Mr Glendinning said.
"Travelling with kids takes your mind off the drought. They get up to mischief and let the dogs off when they are not supposed to, so makes it interesting."
It's a 4.30am start for the Glendinnings, who run Glenbri Rural Contracting. They are now 70 kilometres north of Winton in Queensland.
They've had breakfast, the cattle have been let out and they are about to shift camp with Cooper, 3 and 12-month-old Wyatt.
They call Taralga in NSW south home but Mr Glendinning has only been there for four weeks ('at the most') in the last three years.
The only reason why he was home was because the cyclone that ravaged north Queensland made it too wet to drive cattle on the travelling stock reserves.
"So I had to sit at home," he joked.
In the latest droving job, Mr Glendinning, his partner Jodie and their children have been on the road for six weeks.
"The kids go everywhere with us and Cooper tries to muster where it's possible," he said.
"They haven't seen much rain in their short life and when they see it they run and play in it."
They started in Longreach Queensland with the cattle from the Northern Territory and have been zig zagging their way north of Winton. They plan to head to Richmond to "keep following the feed".
Related reading:
And with no signs of dry conditions abating anytime soon, the Glendennings expect to be on the road until after Christmas.
"We might go home at the end of the year but there is no feed in the Top End," he said.
"The feed in this neck of the woods has come back after the floods so there is a good body of feed."
But he said it was a different story in NSW where it has been devastatingly dry.
"A lot of the stock routes are not open and those that have mobs on it in NSW have been on the road of a long time as there is no feed about," Mr Glendinning said.
"It's getting pretty dry, a lot of places are running out of water, anywhere from the Victorian border right up to Queensland border.
"Finding feed is getting harder all the time. We will just keep going around the clock chasing the feed for as long as we can, it will eventually rain."
If you have a story email samantha.townsend@fairfaxmedia.com.au
Journalist based on the Mid North Coast for The Land.
Journalist based on the Mid North Coast for The Land.
