Nicholls disperse entire Holstein milking herd

With a family history of milk production, Mr Nicholls parents and grandparents were also dairy farmers.

Involved with dairying his whole life, Mr Nicholls grew up on their current farm from the age of 10 where he rode his pony to primary school and would then bring the cows in for milking on his way home. He would then have a bit of afternoon tea, and go and help finish at the dairy.

He worked away from home for 10 years on Santa Gertrudis properties, including Gyranda, King Ranch and Hardigreen Park, until he came home in 1991 and purchased a farm next door to his parents which was then combined to form a family partnership

After 13 years of the partnership, in 2004, Mr and Mrs Nicholls purchased the family farm from Murray's parents and also an additional property to make the operation their own.

"We bought the last farm to make us self sufficient because generally we would grow our own crops and not have to purchase any fodder off-farm, apart from grain," Mrs Nicholls said.

"We grew our own silage, we would grow corn, and in the summer we would grow soybeans and barley and triticale in the winter and turn that into silage."

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The family milked between 200 and 250 cows each day for an annual milk production just shy of two million litres.

Mrs Nicholls said her and her husband gave a lot of thought to the decision to stop milking cows.

The main reasons for the change were the continuous raising costs of production, the climatic conditions that were so variable, staffing, the constant commitment to being on farm, and their daughters did not work in the dairy business due to their own careers.

"For us to slow down a little and not be as committed to the dairy, we would have had to employ another full-time staff member or multiple staff, and it's not easy to do that or to find people to fill the jobs," Mrs Nicholls said.

"For the last five years, it has been very difficult with drought, and we probably had one year of recovery and then we went into floods."

While the whole milking herd was sold, Mrs Nicholls said the younger heifers and poddy calves were still on the property, but would be traded after joining.

Having a large passion for agriculture, Mrs Nicholls said she and her husband Murray loved the beef industry and had dabbled in beef over the years with Tookawhile show steers and Temana Charolais stud. The main farming focus going forward for the Nicholls would be commercial beef production.

Uncertain of which stream of beef cattle to go down, Mrs Nicholls said the on-farm facilities left over from the dairy option gave plenty of options and flexibility.

"We can trade cattle or feedlot cattle, and we will definitely have some cow/calf units - there are lots of different options," Mrs Nicholls said.

"We will still keep cropping, making silage, and sowing crops, and if we don't need them, we can let them go to grain and there are still some dairy farms in the area that will require those crops."

Mrs Nicholls said she was thankful to the Ray White Casino team for organising the sale of the milking herd which were purchased by three Norco dairy operations meaning the cows would stay productive in the industry.

These females were sold prior to auction which Mrs Nicholls said was much healthier for the cows as their milking routine didn't change and they did not have to be moved to an auction house.

Norco's director Paul Weir, Tuncester near Lismore, said the cows were purchased mainly for restocking from losses in the floods and higher culling rates after an increase in mastitis from the wet weather.

"We know they have been artificially inseminating cows for 30 years and they are just well-bred local cows," Mr Weir said.

"Sometimes you can run into problems by bringing in cows from other areas as they can have different diseases... and these cows are acclimatised to our region."