Angus the choice for Willing family, Carnigup Hill, east of Esperance

Mr Willing farms alongside his wife Elisha 130 kilometres east of Esperance on their property, Carnigup, named after the Carnigup Hill, behind the property.

The 1050 hectare seed-stock enterprise was purchased from Mr Willing's parents Noel and Joanne in 2016 whom they lease another 850ha from.

The husband and wife duo run 1100 purebred Angus cattle, comprising 500 breeders, their progeny, replacement heifers and 20 bulls.

Having grown up farming Angus cattle since Mr Willing was a child, it seems only fitting that he continued the legacy.

"The Angus breed as a whole has come so far as a beef cattle breed in terms of breeding improvement over the past 20 to 30 years," Mr Willing said.

"It seems to be a great fit for our operation and an ideal cattle type for the area, they perform well here and it seems to be what the market prefers at the moment too."

After admitting they had changed the way they run the breed over the years, it tied in with the economical role Mr Willing is playing on their property.

"Of course the breed is constantly evolving in terms of Estimated Breeding Values (EBVs) and we are always trying to improve cattle," he said.

"We want to give them more efficiency and improve our stocking rates through breeding too."

Stocking rates are an extremely important aspect of the Esperance operation, something that is taken very seriously.

After lots of research, Mr Willing finally decided to take the economical factors of stocking rates to the next level, with Virtual Fencing, created by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).

The idea behind the Virtual Fencing is for livestock to be moved or confined without using fences - they are simply controlled by a collar worn by cattle using wireless technologies and sensors.

Mr Willing said he was beyond excited to give the collars a go and if they work, he will be putting them on every animal on the farm.

"I have ordered 200 collars from Vence, a virtual fencing, livestock management system for cattle, and will start them on my steers, as they are the easiest to manage and move," Mr Willing said.

"It will allow me to rotationally graze cattle from my phone or computer in an easy, accurate and efficient way, it's phenomenal really.

"I will also be able to have bigger paddocks."

Mr Willing wants to rotational graze more often to signficantly increase his stocking rate and improve the methane emissions.

"I plan to rotationally graze the whole property," he said.

"The cost of putting in and replacing fencing and water points just doesn't seem economical to me, but this does.

"Rotational grazing is meant to be more efficient for cattle because they won't be walking kilometres everyday to get feed.

"They will be placed where there is feed so that way it will be efficient because they will be confined."

Mr Willing said the pasture growth should improve as well, having cattle graze and trample on it once a month rather than on a daily basis.

The aim going forward for the Esperance farmer is to customise his grazing plan and start his steers on five hectares and rotate them every day and a half.

With an endless possibility of rotational grazing options, it means that the Willings will be able to keep cattle off of areas that are fragile, which is important on the sandplain soil.

"When we graze our cattle on our cereal crop we often get a weak point that we wait on to gain more growth before being grazed on," Mr Willing said.

"Now that we can virtually fence that area off, we can graze the cereals earlier which is a bonus."

At the moment, prior to the virtual fencing concept, the stock are rotated across half of the farm, in a year-in, year-out crop rotation, meaning there is a year of crop followed by a year of pasture.

"The other half of the farm is left permanently in pasture and perennials as it's either too wet or sandy to crop so we use it only for grazing purposes," Mr Willing said.

"Due to the sandplain we are on down here, we really need cattle that have good feet and legs that stay sound."

Good cattle structure is key at Carnigup, ideally the Willings are after a breeder that has a medium-sized frame that calves easily and has good growth rates.

According to Mr Willing an animal that can "get up and go" as quickly as possible is a good one.

"I also like to have a bit of fat on the breeders, I believe that helps with the fertility and longevity of the cattle too," he said.

An incorporation of natural breeding and artificial insemination (AI) are used for breeding on the property, with only the heifers receiving a combination of AI and a bull.

"We use a fixed time AI protocol on the maidens that lasts two weeks," he said.

"This means the heifers' cycle will be synced and we can do all of the AI in one day and this results in a tight calving window."

All of the heifers are AI'd in late June and the bulls are put in one week after, with both the heifers and the older cows, giving the bull a chance to cover any of the heifers that didn't conceive through the AI program.

"Our conception rates with the heifers are usually 60 per cent to AI and 20pc to the bull," Mr Willing said.

"The remaining 20pc that are empty will be sold as grass-finished heifers to Woolworths."

The calving season commences in early April for the heifers and from May through to the end of June for the cows.

Every breeder on the property is pregnancy scanned, which the Willings see a big benefit from.

"If we don't pregnancy test we have to carry all of those empty cows right through to mid winter when we calf mark," he said.

"That's a tight feed point of the year so we don't want to be feeding anything that's not carrying a calf.

"The heifers are pregnancy tested five weeks after the bull comes out to get rid of them as soon as possible and sell into the spring grass finished market," Mr Willing said.

The cows are pregnancy scanned towards the end of November.

"We will then get rid of any dries straight away and sell them," he said.

The dry breeders are sent to either Western Meat Processors or Harvey Beef, the the only places the Willing family sends their cows and bulls to.

"Last season we achieved a 94pc pregnancy testing rate," he said.

"Our post-calving percentages reached 90pc for heifers and 99pc for our cows."

The majority of the offspring are kept at the end of the calving season, with heifers being retained as replacements for the breeding herd and the male progeny kept to sell as grass-finished steers at 17-months-old.

Growing up on a Angus stud himself, Mr Willing is no stranger to the breed and works closely with his parents when selecting bulls for his own herd.

"My parents run a small stud now purely just to supply me," he said.

"We all work together to keep the stud going in the direction it needs to depending on how my cattle are evolving.

"Ideally we want a consistent type of bull and take figures into consideration too."

Looking at Estimated Breeding Values (EBVs) constantly, Mr Willing said he aimed to get growth rate figures as high as possible, in balance with all other EBVs.

"In terms of EBVs we don't want anything that is under 50pc in value," he said.

"The only thing we will make an exception for is mature cow weight, that's something we do want lower than 50pc.

"We are trying to get away from larger, inefficient cows."

The Willings select their AI straws alongside Swans Veterinary Services at Esperance, with their vet Enoch Bergman.

"We don't prefer any straws in particular or base it on any one bloodline," Mr Willing said.

"It will be any bull that is suitable and can get me to my target I am aiming for that particular year."

Mr Willing said if they liked the progeny from that bull, they will tend to use its straws for two years in a row and they preferred to use the same bull over the whole breeding herd each season.

When it comes to health treatments for their cattle, selenium and copper have a vital part to play.

"We have a trace element deficiency problem on the sandplain so we are always working to improve that with selenium and copper," he said.

"The weaners, yearlings and first calvers will get a drench, as well as the first calvers after they calve.

"Everything gets lice control after calf marking and a long acting selenium and B12 at calf marking and typically a multimin pre calving."

The Willings are thrilled with the current cattle market and the prices they have received this year.

"This year we broke our price rise record which was up 15pc on last year's prices," Mr Willing said.

"Although we have had a price rise, this year there has been a significant increase in input costs."

The cropping aspect of the farm takes up 400ha of the property with a quarter dedicated to canola, a quarter to wheat, a quarter to barley and the remainder dedicated to hay production that is kept for their own feed.

The cattle and cropping aspects work hand-in-hand and are used to the Willing family's advantage.

"We graze all of our cereal crops which is an enormous help at the end of June," Mr Willing said.

This gives the pasture a chance to replenish and grow before they return to graze on it, with the cereal crop acting as a feed source in the meantime.

"The stubbles from the cereal crop also have a high feed value for the weaners through the summer and having a diverse income in the business is important too," Mr Willing said.

"Our canola is a good income crop and weed cleaner on the property.

"We also like to maintain our pasture improvement on the property."

Mr Willing uses a mix of ryegrass, clovers, serradella, vetch mixes and grazing brassicas as a feed source too.

The Esperance farmer is also a committee member for the ASHEEP Esperance grower group.

ASHEEP is a group of pasture and livestock farmers who promote the role of sheep and cattle in all farming systems and offer solutions.

At the moment, the group is working on a lot of projects in relation to the cattle world.

"One of them is becoming carbon neutral," Mr Willing said.

"With all the CN30 (being carbon neutral by 2030) talk from Meat & Livestock Australia we decided to launch a project on how to measure what farmers' current statuses are.

"We also have a Bovine Viral Diarrhoea Virus (BVDV) project in heifers."

This is a disease that cows can get and a virus that can affect their fertility.

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"It can be a silent killer and you don't realise you have the disease but it can result in a 5-10pc calf loss each year," he said.

Mr Willing said it was also dangerous to those without the disease as an exposure to non-immune cattle could result in catastrophic conception and calving rates.

"We are also working on an earlier weaning project to see if weaning calves in the spring versus early summer leads to a more efficient cow and calf once separated," he said.