Cover story

Out of drought

Across the vast expanse of Central Australia, from the treeless plain of the Barkly Tableland to the sandhills of the Simpson and the flatlands of Uluru, rainfall has, to different extents, sparked the onset of a string of good seasons ahead for pastoralists. Drought has attacked the landscape in varying degrees. While the Barkly is coming off just three ordinary seasons, the stations in the south of the Territory have experienced the worst of the nation-wide drought. “Normally in a dry few years, there’s somewhere in Australia that’s good and they’re looking to take store cattle,” explains Costello. “But in the last few years, it’s been drought Australia-wide. So for the cattle you normally sell at a reasonable rate, there’s been no real demand.”

Not so in the Barkly. After last year’s exceptionally dry season, the massive Australian Agricultural Company (AACo) moved over 50 000 head off their Barkly stations, selling some and sending thousands into agistment in the company’s properties in the Gulf Region. With a decline in grass, it was an effort aimed at avoiding over-grazing the country. “We had to ship cattle off to ensure we had enough grass for the cattle we did retain,” recalls Henry Burke, AACo’s regional manager of its Barkly Stations. “We shipped out all non-essential cattle and just kept breeding units.”

Following the drenching rains experienced this year, many thousands of those cattle numbers will be shipped back to Brunette Downs and other AACo properties. At the time of writing the Barkly received just under 500 mm for the wet season to date, well above average of 400 mm, flooding much of the region and crippling the Barkly Highway to Queensland. “While we will have a huge year this year, we will increase some of our carrying capacity to take up the extra grass we have on hand. But in saying that, we also have to be careful that we manage for next year when we might not get a good season,” says Burke.

Early rains in the western region have come as welcome relief as many stations in the area are still recovering from drought-sparked bushfires in 2002 that burnt millions of hectares. Curtin Springs station had over a million acres incinerated. “We trucked-off as many of the male cattle as we could find to lighten the load, with the hopes that if it rained the cows would start producing again and we could rebuild,” Curtin Springs owner Peter Severin told ABC Radio. “That didn’t happen until November and the cows were very very poor. But, now that we’ve had the rain, it’s amazing the condition that the cows are putting on, even though they’ve got calves at foot and they’re still calving.”

While dealing with drought is a troublesome nuisance for many Centralian pastoralists, it has become a way of life for Don and Colleen Costello, along with their business partner, Alice Springs businessman Viv Oldfield. Not only do they own New Crown (8000 sq km), but they also own Andado (10 000 sq km) and Lila Creek (3000 sq km), in close proximity to each other on the fringe of the Simpson. Owning the three properties allows them the ability to share staff, plant and equipment as well as the best feed available.

Living centrally at New Crown, between the two others, also allows them to live in one of the most beautiful homesteads in the Territory. The house was originally built at Charlotte Waters, 30km to the south, as a repeater station for the first Overland Telegraph station. Built with stone quarried nearby, it was pulled down in 1948 and rebuilt at New Crown. It was a homestead and station that came available five years into the drought. “Drought is when the opportunities arise,” says Colleen. “If it weren’t for the drought we’d probably never have gotten the opportunity to get this place, or Andado. Drought or succession seems to be the two major factors driving the fact that stations have come on the market.”

The Costellos believe that Central Australian properties are possibly more sustainable than other beef producing regions in Australia because they do not get the full impact of the drought until it is well advanced. Don says their benchmark data suggests that it takes three dry years before you actually notice it, financially. Their primary rule of thumb regarding drought is that they do whatever it takes to hold on to their core cattle numbers. Core numbers on New Crown and Andado are 3000 breeders each. Over the recent drought, that meant opening up new country by running pipelines and drilling new bores. They moved cattle onto country that previously had been ungrazed due to the lack of water.

They also did their homework, recognising that pastoral success does not simply equate to cash in hand at the end of a season. They compare their management practices with other stations in the region with a membership in what’s known as the ‘benchmark group’ – the Southern Beef Producers Group. It is a group of six dry zone, family-operated cattle producers who benchmark their performance each year comparing management practices and results, in the end providing a realistic cost of production. “The comparison helps us lift our game and do better,” explains Colleen. “You’re not competing against the group, you’re trying to get your cost of production down. You’re competing against your own business performance.”