The Nature Conservancy to sell NSW Riverina cattle stations

A pair of southern Riverina cattle stations that total 34,114ha have hit the market four years after they last changed hands.

The expansive Juanbung and Boyong Stations also comprise the Great Cumbung Swamp.

Two adjoining southern NSW Riverina cattle stations, totalling 34,114ha, have been listed for sale after they last changed hands in 2019.

Located at Oxley, about 110km northwest of Hay, Juanbung and Boyong Stations are being sold by The Nature Conservancy and Tiverton Agriculture after more than four years of ownership.

It is understood the aggregation, offered as beef backgrounding farmland with a timber harvesting enterprise, is expected to receive offers worth more than $60 million as a whole.

Buying interest is expected from large cattle-farming enterprises wanting a backgrounding property with a drought hedge as well as nature-based investors similar to The Nature Conservancy.

Indigenous and government groups are also expected to be interested.

The Nature Conservancy and Tiverton Agriculture purchased the stations as a joint venture for $55 million in early 2019.

The Juanbung and Boyong Stations in the NSW southern Riverina are for sale.

At the time of the purchase, The Nature Conservancy said the deal would protect almost the entire extent of the Great Cumbung Swamp from conversion to irrigated cropping. The swamp is one of the largest wetlands in the Murray Darling Basin.

Prior to the sale, the stations were owned by Melbourne businessman Tim Roberts-Thomson, who offloaded the properties to fund his TRT Pastoral’s King Island beef business expansion.

Juanbung Station (27,499ha) and Boyong Station (6615ha) have frontages to the Murrumbidgee River (55km), Lachlan River (18km) and Lake Bunumburt, along with numerous catchment dams and seasonal swamps.

The stations are also underpinned by 16,000ha of the terminal flood-plain delta of the Lachlan River, which forms the Great Cumbung Swamp.

A Redgum firewood harvesting enterprise has been run on Juanbung and Boyong Stations.

Across the stations there is a carrying capacity of 37,000 dry sheep equivalents while The Nature Conservancy and Tiverton Agriculture have also run an enterprise harvesting Red Gum timber for firewood during their tenure.

The licence for the timber harvesting has been recently extended for 15 years while there are sufficient resources for future harvesting.

Additional income streams include mustering rangeland goats and as well as sustainable land use options for carbon and biodiversity offsets.

LAWD senior director Danny Thomas and director Elizabeth Doyle are handling the sale with expressions of interest closing July 13 at 12pm.