A top-quality line up of 103 bulls from across the country will contest the $15,000 prize pool when judging gets underway for the Sire Shootout next Tuesday.
This year's competition was well up on the 80 bulls in the inaugural event with 46 head entered in the Bos indicus/Tropically adapted class, 26 in the British class and 31 in the European class.
Bulls have entered from Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania.
The online judging will kick off from 7pm on July 6 when David Greenup of Rosevale Santa Gertrudis, Jandowae, Queensland, judges the Bos indicus/Tropically adapted bulls.
Mr Greenup operates Rosevale Santa Gertrudis stud along with his wife Sonya, their three sons Sam, Toby and Sev and David's parents, Grahame and Peggy.
In 2021 the 65th annual Rosevale sale will be held in September - the longest running on-property bull sale in Australia with more than 400 bulls set to be sold throughout the year.
Mr Greenup is a past president of the Santa Gertrudis Breeders Australia Association and has judged competitions throughout Australia, including the Urquhart Trophy at the Sydney Royal and most recently the Gelbvieh breed at Beef Australia.
On Wednesday night from 7pm the British and European bulls will be assessed.
Anne Starr, Foxforth Hereford stud, Guyra, will judge the British animals having had extensive judging experience including the Urquhart Trophy in Sydney.
Ms Starr is co-principal of the Foxforth Hereford stud, and along with her father, Fred, run a commercial herd of Hereford and black baldy cattle.
She served on the board of Herefords Australia from 2014 to 2018 and has a bachelor of agribusiness (rural science) from the University of New England.
On the same night, Roger Evans of Nagol Park Shorthorn stud at Tamworth will judge the European entries.
Fresh from judging the interbreed exhibitors group at Beef Australia in May, Mr Evans is co-principal of Nagol Park which has bred and exhibited several grand champions at the Sydney Royal Easter Show, numerous division winners at the Dubbo National Shorthorn Show and Sale and grand champion bull at the Dubbo Shorthorn Show and Sale in 2008 and 2021.
Mr Evans is also the director of Bovine Scanning Services and is an accredited ultrasound scanner for all carcase traits and a beef class structural assessor. He scans more than 19,000 head of cattle each year and structurally assesses over 2000 head annually.
The judging will wrap up on Thursday July 8 with the interbreed class where the top five bulls from each breed will have the chance at being crowned supreme and runner up bull.
Undertaking that task is Guy Lord, Branga Plains, Walcha.
Mr Lord and his wife Suzanne manage the family commercial cattle operation which consists of 2500 breeding cows made up of predominantly Hereford and also utilising Angus, Charolais and Shorthorn in a crossbreeding program.
Mr Lord has judged cattle at all major Royal Shows in Australia including Sydney Royal on 13 occasions, assessing nine various breeds as well as the Hordern Trophy and the Urquhart Trophy twice and led steers. He has also officiated at the Royal Queensland Show three times and the Melbourne Royal three times.
He judged the New Zealand Royal twice at Christchurch and the New Zealand National at Palmerston North, both the Angus and Simmental Nationals at Wodonga as well as the National Steer Show at Dubbo along with numerous country shows in NSW and Queensland.
Mr Lord served on the board of the Australian Hereford Society and the advisory committee of Meat Standards Australia.
He said he was looking forward to judging the Sire Shootout as the seedstock industry has such a large bearing on manipulating the commercial industry as the genetics are filtered through commercial herds.
Tune in to the Sire Shootout online and on Facebook from 7pm July 6-8.
Lucy Kinbacher
Raised on a cattle property at Biggenden, Lucy Kinbacher has spent 10 years working across metropolitan, regional and rural publications in both Queensland and NSW. Lucy has been the editor of the Queensland Country Life and North Queensland Register since 2021.
Raised on a cattle property at Biggenden, Lucy Kinbacher has spent 10 years working across metropolitan, regional and rural publications in both Queensland and NSW. Lucy has been the editor of the Queensland Country Life and North Queensland Register since 2021.
