Ross and Dimity Thompson, Millah Murrah Angus.
Innovative beef producers, Millah Murrah Angus, were highlighted at the 2019 NAB Agribusiness Calendar launch in Toowoomba last night, for having achieved extraordinary growth and results in their agribusinesses.
Meticulous genetic research and an encyclopaedic knowledge of his herd have seen second-generation cattle farmer Ross Thompson transform his family farm on the NSW Central Tablelands into one of Australia’s premier Angus studs.
Millah Murrah produces 400 registered calves and 300 embryos each year and its genetics are used globally, from New Zealand to Europe and South America.
The stud has set a slew of records in the past decade, including raising the Angus breed average bull sale price five times. It has also raised the average cow sale price for any beef breed twice, as well as selling the highest priced Angus bull and the highest priced female of any breed in October 2017.
With ‘front-pen-quality bulls in the back pen’ as his mantra, Thompson focuses on ‘visioning and blending’ individual animals – setting eyes on animals personally before he mates them to create the ideal phenotype, or overall physical appearance.
It’s an objective that sees him regularly travelling throughout Australia, New Zealand and the US, where he can see potential new sires for his breeding program in situ, and ultimately create the ideal Angus phenotype – ‘an animal with more length, depth and width than most’.