Iain Bruce, Stanley, Tasmania

Knowing their feed budget, maintaining strong relationships and developing quality cattle are some of the keys to success for the Bruce family.

A reliable climate, feed budgets, on-farm benchmarking, fertile soils and selling into a high value market all combine for a productive beef enterprise for the Bruce family.

The Bruce family run their self-replacing grass-fed Angus herd under the Western Plains Beef banner on a 625ha property, north of Stanley on Tasmania’s northwest coast – on a peninsula jutting out into Bass Strait.

Currently running 360 Angus and South Devon-cross breeding cows, they also buy in about 200 weaners each year, as well as grow lucerne for grazing with the excess made into silage and hay.

The Bruce family have been farming the property for almost 50 years, with three generations of the family involved in a five-way partnership, which includes Iain Bruce and his wife Jane, Iain’s parents John and Angela Bruce and his grandmother Marie Bruce.

Iain and John run the enterprise day-to-day, while Angela is responsible for admin and they undertake quarterly meetings as a group to discuss the business and make decisions.

Angela, Iain, Jane and John Bruce run Western Plains Beef in Tasmania.

STRONG TIES HOLD SUCCESS

Iain acknowledges one of the keys to their business success has been longstanding, strong relationships with producers they purchase weaners from each year to finish and to their processor, Greenham.

“We purchase our young cattle each year from the same producers, and we basically tell them to set the prices, because we know the quality of the cattle and those relationships are important,” he said.

All the Western Plains Beef cattle are marketed to Greenham in Tasmania, to supply mostly their Cape Grim brand.

The Bruce family finish about 400 cattle each year, 200 of their own progeny and 200 of those bought in, and 100 cows.

“We have a really good relationship with Greenhams, they are local and the abattoir is about 20 minutes away.”

He said they continued to supply Greenham as his father John developed a good relationship with Peter Greenham and they liked the way Greenham doesn’t just sell meat as a commodity, it is instead a high-value product with a story behind it.

“It’s meant Greenham have turned a commodity product into a high end beef product.”

“It’s great to have that focus, we are happy Greenham started that trend to increase the marketing around products and differentiate them. We can sell the story behind our beef.”

The Bruce’s host Greenhams’ customers on farm tours, particularly those from the US, including chefs and red meat marketers so they can see what goes in to producing their beef.

Western Plains Beef cattle on the Bruce family's property in Tasmania.

FIXED-TIME AI A WINNER

Joining is for six weeks, calving occurs in August and weaning in February, with steers and heifers weighed and split into mobs, with the aim to offload to Greenham in September at about 25 months old.

Iain said they liked to supply stock in September and early October because it was when the price was usually the highest due to a market shortage coming out of winter.

In recent years they have introduced fixed-time artificial insemination for their heifers at the recommendation of Iain’s sister Emma and brother-in-law, Matt Izzo, who are both vets.

Heifers calve at two-years-old and Iain said the fixed-time AI means all the heifers get in calf in the early window and once they calve it gives them an extra three weeks to recover to then get back in calf for their second calf.

“Getting a cow to return to oestrus after her first calf is the hardest, but if we can get them to calve in the first cycle window again then they are more than likely going to be first cycle calvers their whole life.”

Cows are pregnancy tested and any not in calf are finished and sold to Greenham.

Bulls are all Angus and are selected for moderate traits, reasonably good calving ease, good intramuscular fat, eye muscle area and docility.

“We basically want an animal that grows well, calves well and has good carcass characteristics.”

Iain said their aim was to be Meat Standards Australia compliant with all of their stock, even cull cows. Their compliance percentage was 97 per cent.

Greenham offers a premium price for MSA score of +62, which Iain said was a good incentive.

Cattle grazing on lucerne at Iain Bruce's property in Tasmania.

STAYING FOCUSED

Iain said they run a “relatively intense” operation, but they had been doing it a long time and had a mature business so knew their stocking rates and what they could handle.

They average a stocking rate of 21 dry sheep equivalents a hectare.

About 10 per cent of the farm is under irrigation and lucerne pastures were first established almost 30 years ago to fill the summer feed gap.

Iain said their pasture was ryegrass dominant, with cocksfoot and clovers also in the mix.

An annual fertiliser program of phosphorous and lime is applied, while nitrogen was applied strategically in autumn, which builds the feed wedge in winter to be able to finish cattle.

A rotational grazing system is used, with cattle moved every two to three days and mobs having about 30 paddocks each.

The rate at which cattle are moved is determined by the leaf emergence rate.

Iain said the rotation can be as slow as 60 days at its slowest in winter and 25 days at its fastest in spring.

Cattle are supplemented with silage and hay as required, usually throughout winter and the end of summer.

Iain said all of the decisions are based around filling their September processing window.

“We know as a mature business the number of cattle we can handle for turn-off in September, and it is all about grazing management and timing of the feed wedge, which is pretty consistent. Not a lot can change it,” Iain said.

They have an average annual rainfall of 810mm and Iain said they got within 20 per cent of that most years.

“Our climate is extremely reliable. Everything happens generally at the same time every year.”

And while the climate is reliable, the Bruce’s don’t leave anything to chance.

With a background in agronomy, Iain has introduced feed budgets, which he works on each month to make sure they are “spot on”.

He said his feed spreadsheets included a monthly growth rate of every paddock on the farm.

On-farm benchmarking was also undertaken regularly.

The Bruce family are heavily involved in a local discussion group, which is where the benchmarking initially started.

Iain said staying focused on goals and constantly fine tuning the business is important.