NIOA Santa Gertrudis General Manager Shannon Gardner rated the 2025 draft as “the best line of bulls we’ve had by far.”
Forty-two sons of $250,000 Yarrawonga Spartacus S316 (P) and $160,000 Riverina Roland Sanchez R88 (PP) headed up the 68 catalogued Classified S bulls.
Buyers from throughout Queensland, Northern Territory voted with their feet – and cheque books, outlaying a total of $529,000 for the 2023 Spartacus and Roland Sanchez spring drop calves for an average of $12,595.
“We’re very pleased with the results,” Mr Gardner said. “We made a significant investment in genetics and undertook extensive selective breeding to produce a product we hoped would be well received by the industry. Buyers appear to have responded well to the direction we have taken.”
In total, 77 bulls were offered and 74 sold for an average of $11,283. Seven poll heifers sold for an average of $4428 while all three 10-straw semen packages from Spartacus, Roland Sanchez and Yulgilbar Queens Council sold for a total of $8,500 with an average of $283 per straw.
Sale manager Rob Sinnamon, presiding over his 36th on-property auction, was pleased with the overall result including his stud’s Lot 4 homozygous bull Riverina Ulysses U68 which topped the sale at $40,000, knocked down to first time buyers Daniel Stoten and Paul Purdue, “Karinya Downs”, from Doon Doon in New South Wales.
“It’s been a great result,” he said. “It was always a long game – breeding stud cattle is – it takes three years from conception to sale when you purchase a bull and go through the process of breeding whether it is through IVF, natural breeding or AI.”
The 34 NIOA Classified bulls averaged $13,264 for a 100 per cent clearance under the stick. The second-best price of $32,000 was paid by Ian Heckendorf for Lot 13 NIOA Van V48 (IVF) (P) that will be put to work as an impact sire at Auburn Farming, at Trangie NSW.
Bill and Dallas Scott from MacDonald Downs outlaid $142,000 for 12 cattle as they look to refresh the bull battery at their 270,000ha property at Hart Range near Alice Springs.
This article appeared in Allora Advertiser, 10 September 2025.
