With the demands of the Beef Industry in mind, we’ll endeavour to breed the best Limousin cattle we can for commercial cattlemen. We look for traits that increase profitability, from the bulls and the females, of muscle, milk, maternal, docility, calving ease and adequate fat cover.
We know Limousin bulls have a great and deserving reputation as terminal sires. Talk to any butcher! Now, cattlemen have realised the importance of Limousin and Limousin infused females in their breeding herd. Exciting new Gene for yield and tenderness discovered with high frequency in Limousins read more...
Champion Limousin T-Bone on the left - why butchers love Limousin
Limousin cattle are prolific and long-lived. Our oldest breeders are only 17 years old. We've read of others into their 20s. The meat is tender and fine grained. Limousin on feed show high daily weight gain with high carcase yield. The combination of good cutability and medium size has given the Limousin its reputation for feed efficiency. Feed lot operations like them because they tend not to put on excess fat. Limousin are well suited to all purpose crossbreeding. Low birth weights contribute to a substantially lower incidence of calving problems relative to other breeds, while there is also a consistent pattern of increased weaning and yearling weight in crossbred calves.
Before the drought we ran approximately 60 commercial shorthorns and put a Limousin bull over them with great results, selling the calves to the Killara feed lot. The feed lot could not get enough of them!
With every drop of calves, we aim to improve, and try and keep up with market trends, whether it is our stud or commercials and by using several breeds in ourcrossbreeding program.
4 month old Limousin x Brangus calves on NATIVE grass
An experiment with marking calves has paid big dividends with extra weight gain. We watched the results of calves marked soon after birth, 3-5 mths, 7-8 mths then at 10-12 mths. The results were very convincing. Calves marked at birth/3-5 mths were static. Calves marked at 7-9 mths for the vealer/domestic/ supermarket trade had the opportunity of testosterone by adding extra muscle therefore extra $$$. The calves marked around 10-12 mths powered ahead with steers at 13-16 mths old averaging $1,100 ph (paddock condition). There is no "neck curl" at this late marking stage and we allow at least 4-6 weeks after marking before selling. We use a bloodless marking method = no stress = no weight loss.
Everyone wants a return on their heifers ASAP. We'd rather a live heifer that has had the time to grow properly and a healthy calf. A good return, not a NIL return. By leaving our joining times by an extra few months (18-20 mths), we’ll reap the benefits of a well grown heifer which will calve normally then go on to produce calves well into her 'teen' years. This is also our view for the stud side. We don't believe in having young heifers in calf or with calf just for the sake of the show ring.
