A heartfelt thanks: American contractors grateful for Grenfell farming community

Hailing from Michigan, USA, Roy and Madison Watkins embarked on their trip to Australia in 2017 and loved every minute.

So much so, that when the opportunity arose to manage a 1619-hectare grain/graze operation near Grenfell, they grabbed it with both hands and made the permanent move to Australia at 21.

"We came over right in the mix of the drought, it was just my wife Maddy and I on the farm, we didn't have our young fella at the time," Mr Watkins said.

"I've always had a fair bit to do with cattle back in the states but coming over here the dryland cropping was a bit of a change.

"The variable rainfall definitely had it's challenges, there were some learning curves in terms of the Australian environment and climate but we had some really great people backing us.

"We did that for three years with a bit of contracting on the side and noticed a need for a local contractor, especially in hoof pairing, so we left and went full time contracting."

Roy and Madison founded R&M Watkins Sheep Contracting Services in 2021 and haven't looked back.

With over 80 clients and processing in excess of 300,000 sheep per year, Mr Watkins said the business blew up a lot bigger and quicker than he thought it would.

"A majority of our clients are local but we do have a couple of jobs up in Condobolin and Coonamble," he said.

"We originally started offering quite a few different services, but quickly realised that people needed assistance with feet in their flock, whether that was genetic, nutrition or infection related.

"A big focus of our work has been hoof pairing as not a lot of contractors specialise in that.

"We've had people ring us from WA wanting us to go over as there is definitely a deficit of contractors doing that sort of thing and taking a passion to it.

"Once you get a good reputation in Australia, farmers really hunt you down so it has been a great place to grow a businesses."

The couple have trimmed more than 1.5 million hooves and said they were proud to be a key player in the development of the preventative and corrective trimming industry.

"There is a lot of confusion around hoof health in sheep, it is more understood in cattle but the things we know in cattle can be easily translated to sheep," Mr Watkins said.

"No one was really translating that to the clients, and that is why I'm really interested in the industry.

"Australia has some of the best farmers in the world, but some of them don't look at their sheep's feet often enough.

"There are so many benefits you can see from it, I have some clients who have reported a 10 to 15 per cent increase in production just from trimming for years consecutively.

"It is getting more important because our sheep breeds are getting bigger and heavier and production wise the more stress you put on the animal, the more foot issues you're going to have.

"The more we push these flocks like farmers are now, the more important it is to pay attention to foot health."

When Mr Watkins speaks his innate passion for hoof health and improving the production of Australian farmers radiates.

He said their decision to move back to the US to be closer to family was an incredibly tough one.

"Our business is only growing, we could easily stay in Australia but childcare isn't easy in regional Australia," he said.

"We're moving back for a couple of years in June but we're pretty fond of Australia so we might come back when Malcolm gets a bit older.

"We have a commitment to what we do because we've built a relationship with each of our clients and seen operations progress.

"We've managed to line up another contractor who is going to take on the trailer, the equipment and our clients."

The couple also started Dynamic Livestock Services, a livestock contracting business that delivers hands-on workshops for US producers as well as hoof trimming, ultrasound pregnancy scanning, faecal egg counting and resistance testing.

"We want to bridge the gap between Australia and the states with some of our learnings during our time here," he said.

"We want to drive that production approach and bring those skills over from Australia to the states."

When reflecting on their time in Australia, Mr Watkins said the support from the Grenfell farming community has been amazing.

"The community strength and support has been unreal, Grenfell took us in like family and it was a great place to raise Malcolm," he said.

"With both Maddy and I working in the business, farmers have all offered to watch him and there have been a couple of times where we've been cut short and they have actually babysat him.

"They even invited us over for Christmas because we haven't got any family here.

"We went in as contractors, but we left as part of the family and that is really unique."