Bald Blair is an Angus bull stud and commercial farm including wool and sheep meat production.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
or signup to continue reading
Farming in difficult conditions is a generational farming experience.
Bald Blair Lagoon has 'dried up' three times in 100 years and the family is convinced the lagoon will be dry for the fourth time in a couple of weeks.
"Farming has all the challenges of the present circumstances, drought, snow and feeding stock and I love it all," Bald Blair Pastoral Co owner manager Sam White said.
Mr White is the third generation of Whites to run Bald Blair following on from Colonel HF White, his dad, Richard White and uncle, Graham White.
His grandfather originally learnt how to improve pasture post-WWI in England and Scotland.
"The property has improved from what my grandfather and father learnt," Mr White said.
He is now continuing to learn through experiencing their fourth year of "in and out" drought conditions.
"Watching things change or watching out for things changing is what farming is all about," Sam said.
READ ALSO:
The property has had to de-stock 40 per cent of their total stock. Bald Blair has also sold its eight-year-old and six-year-old cows.
The commercial beef has gone to a feedlot and the cows left will be kept for breeding meaning that in the next eight weeks calves will start to drop.
Selling stock means next year's income has gone and the farm needs to now plan how to accommodate that lost income.
At Bald Blair, they produced 12 acres of sorghum which resulted in 300 bales of hay and Mr White reckons "they should have planted more."
Bald Blair is maintaining 1300 merinos and 700 crossbreeds for wool and meat production. The prices that are holding as a result of supply for lamb is helping the farm's income.
"At the moment we have just started to feed and maintain the growth in our cows who are about to calf and keep our young bulls, ruminating," Mr White said.