Hutton family partnership between Capel and Ludlow Rivers

Mark Hutton is a fourth-generation farmer who has been farming in the local area his whole life.

Starting out in the dairy industry with his father Tom and brother David, was where his passion for livestock began, and where his now working partnership with Murray Bell was formed.

Eight years ago, Mr Hutton and his family left the dairy farming life behind, leaving him with his own slice of prime cattle country that he purchased in 1983.

Mr Hutton and his wife Meredith are three-time Meat Standards Australia (MSA) winners, winning in 2017, 2019 and 2021.

The couple took home the most outstanding MSA beef producer finalist in the band one division in 2021 and MSA excellence in eating quality award, top 100 producer in 2017, and in 2019 for the excellence in eating quality performance and MSA grading compliance.

Nowadays, since spending many years in the cattle industry together, Mr Hutton and Mr Bell work alongside each other at Mr Hutton's Capel property, which is where Mr Bell keeps some cattle of his own.

Together, the duo oversee a herd of 220 breeders that is predominantly made up of first-cross Angus-Friesian and Murray Grey-Friesian females that are joined to Charolais bulls.

"My father used to have a small Charolais stud, so that's where my love for the breed stems from," Mr Hutton said.

"Our aim is to extend our breeding herd to a bit more than 250 cattle to really get our cattle numbers up."

Mr Hutton is in the process of upgrading to beef bred females, with a vision of ideally having a herd of Angus breeding cows that will continue to be joined to Charolais bulls.

"This is our aim," Mr Hutton said.

"We want something that has longevity, rather than replacing the first-cross females after a few years."

With a strong cattle background Mr Bell said he had always run straight-bred cattle and reaped the rewards of breeding this way.

"I did an experiment with some Angus heifers joined to a Charolais bull and noticed that the growth rates were very impressive," Mr Bell said.

"The aim is to breed a Eurocross hybrid type of calf, we want a good Angus cow with the Charolais component to give the offspring that bit of extra weight and power.

"Over time I have seen that Mr Bell's own cattle that are straight-bred as better doers and have less problems with calving and turnover," Mr Hutton said.

The pair agreed that their ideal cow is one that lasts and has the ability to stay sound.

"This all comes down to something with a good structure and has good feet and legs to support it, and also good milk production and growth rates," they said.

The Capel farmers purchase their Charolais sires from the Elgin Park Charolais stud, run by the Quilty family at Elgin.

Running an all natural breeding regime, the bulls are an extremely important component of the enterprise and are selected very carefully, with the help of Elgin Park stud principal Jim Quilty.

"Similar to the breeders, we want a bull that has a reasonable sized frame, good feet and legs and is able to stay sound for our breeding seasons," Mr Bell said.

"Going over the first-cross Freisians that already have big frames, the early-maturing breed that the Charolais is, helps with the Friesian component of the herd."

In recent years, the calving season would usually fall in January carrying right through to March, although this season it has been pushed back a month, with calving starting in February.

"This is so that we aren't feeding all the cattle in the heat of summer," Mr Hutton said.

"We put the bulls out on the 25th of April, for an early February start to calving.

"The bulls stay out with the cows for three months, to allow them to have a better chance to get pregnant and cycle a few times."

Mr Bell said there were always a handful of cows that won't get pregnant, whether it was due to cystic ovaries or otherwise.

"Although there is always a portion of the breeders that aren't in calf, we find it's only ever four to five per cent, it doesn't really ever go over that," Mr Bell said.

"This year, all of our replacement heifers got pregnant which was great to see," Mr Hutton said.

Due to the bulls being out in the paddock with the maidens and cows for a quarter of the year, the majority of the cattle give birth problem-free.

"Our calving rates for the past few years have been up about the 95pc mark," Mr Bell said.

In their breeding herd any young dry cattle are retained and kept for another breeding season.

If any of the females that are pregnancy scanned are empty, Mr Hutton will make a note of it each to see if any are repeatedly not getting pregnant.

"I hate to see a young cow go to waste, so we'll carry her over to our next breeding season because we are short of breeders anyway," Mr Bell said.

"With my own personal cattle I run on the property, I can't afford to do that as much.

"If a cow doesn't raise a calf this year it may be two years before you get any money out of her.

"Because that cow isn't feeding a calf she's gaining fat which means it's more likely to struggle calving when she does get pregnant, so I tend to get rid of my personal dries."

Once all of the cows have calved down, at the end of calving season Mr Bell and the Hutton family begin the calf marking process.

"In the first round of marking we will earmark, tag, put rings on the bull calves and drench them," Mr Hutton said.

"During this time we will also vaccinate with Multimin or Selenium Cobalt and always an Ultravac 5in1 vaccination which usually takes place in late April, early May," Mr Bell said.

In mid-June, the cattle are brought back into the yards for their second dose of vaccinations and drench.

"We bring them back in when the spring flush comes around, just in case they get worms in between June and September," Mr Bell said.

"In the first week of September they will also get a B12 vaccination too."

The calves are usually weaned off of their mothers when they are eight to nine months old.

Mr Hutton offered five heifer and five steer calves at yeserday's Charolais feature WALSA Boyanup Weaner Sale.

The sale is supported by the Australian Charolais Society with champion ribbons being awarded to the best pens.

Ten months of age is usually when the duo aims to get the weaners sold, and in recent years the majority of the calves have been sold to the Woolworths and Coles meat market.

"They will be sent to Woolworths and Coles if they make weight early, they usually take them at or above 400kg," Mr Bell said.

"The calves that aren't heavy enough by late November and December are then sold through the weaner sales at Boyanup saleyards," he said.

"We also retain about 10-20 heifer calves to keep as replacements for the breeding herd," Mr Hutton said.

Last year Mr Hutton sent 130 of his calves to Woolworths and they averaged more than 600 cents per kilogram, liveweight.

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"With our later start to calving next year we might end up selling less direct to Coles and Woolworths as they might not make the weight in time," Mr Bell said.

"Prices look like they will be slightly down this year and this combined with increased input costs makes things difficult."

With pasture improvement seen as an important aspect by the Capel growers, Mr Hutton hopes to take the next step at the end of the year.

"Since working closely with GeoCatch in Busselton, we have started soil testing more often and fertilising accordingly," Mr Hutton said.

"This year I plan to rip up my pasture paddock at the back of the property and seed it with perennial rye and clovers.

"This is why we need more cattle, so we can increase the pasture, otherwise we would be defeating the purpose as there wouldn't be enough cattle to eat it."

Mr Hutton grows his own silage and hay to feed cattle in the summer months, meaning he is never buying in any feed.

"We rotationally do our silage and hay, we lock up the paddocks every third year," Mr Hutton said.

"I mow a paddock one year and then let it rest for two years before locking it up again, so the paddocks I mowed in 2019 I will mow again this year."

Mr Hutton keeps a detailed record of how many rolls of silage or hay he gets from each paddock in case he needs to mow an extra paddock the following year for more feed.