Darcey Heffernan is the 21-year old farm manager with a passion for animals and agriculture

21-year old Darcey is taking over the family farm and bringing new ideas with a vision to grow the efficiency and profitability of the business.

Darcey Heffernan at her family’s beef farm at Beveridge, which she now runs. Picture: Andy Rogers

AT 21 years of age, Darcey Heffernan is taking over her family’s cattle business.

At the start of this year the business and all the stock were transferred into Darcey’s name from her father, Greg, who was looking to retire.

She now runs 160 Poll Hereford cows with a terminal Black Simmental bull along with a small flock of Poll Dorset sheep on the family property at Beveridge.

“I left my job at Rodwells in December last year and started working on the farm straight away,” Darcey said.

“The transition has been pretty cruisy, but Dad has been there to help me if I need — he wanted to retire,” she said. “It’s exactly what I thought it would be and I love it.”

With the family-run farm, now in its third generation, Darcey seems like the natural choice for the farm succession, but she was not always set on running the family business.

“They bought the farm in 1973. My Dad and his dad ran it before me,” she said.

“Growing up, I always wanted to work with animals or agriculture, but I never thought I’d be capable of managing the farm,”

But Darcey has new ideas to grow the business.

She is holding on to yearling steers normally sold on the store market to grow them out to about 500kg at 15 or 16 months old.

“We’re selling our bottom (performing steers) portion and keeping our top (performing steers) to finish them off and sell later in the year on the fat market,” Darcey said.

“This is the first time doing it. We usually sell all our calves, but I think it will be profitable hopefully, depending on the rain and the season we have.”

Having previously worked at Rodwells, and now studying for her diploma of agriculture at Melbourne Polytechnic, Darcey is more than qualified for her role as farm manager.

“I learnt a lot (at Rodwells) and owe a lot of my knowledge and confidence to them,” she said. “It’s also given me a lot of contacts.

“I do consider myself young, but only young for this area (the agricultural industry). I haven’t really heard of many people my age managing in agriculture”.