Good afternoon fellow cattle people of the world, my name is Beth Streeter, and I own and run Palmvale Red Brahmans at my property “Mt Slopeaway” Marlborough in CQ, Australia, with the help of my 23 year old daughter Remy, and that jockey sized lady over there Paula (otherwise known to us as the bull whisperer).

Before I tell you all my story, I want to say how honoured and privileged I feel to have been invited to this amazing event by Judd and Gayla Cullers, it was certainly a huge surprise and something I have never done before,, so if I’m extremely nervous please forgive me. I would also like to thank my support crew of friends from Australia who have come with me to hold my hand through this awesome experience.

Right from when I was a very small child, there have always been Brahmans in my life. My parents had a small farm in southern Qld, and my father drove trucks into the NQ on a regular basis where he saw his first Brahmans and decided that they were the breed of cattle he wanted to try. I have the documentation from the late 1960’s from where Dad and Mum bought their first Brahman cows and calves, and then in 1970 when they bought their first Brahman bull.

In the mid 70’s , my parents sold their farm and bought a larger property closer to CQ and shifted their grey Brahman herd into a district that ran mostly Hereford cattle. I remember when one of our bulls got into the neighbours paddock for the first time, we had a phone call from a very irate farmer saying we had to come and get him straight away because he was not wanting any of his cows in calf to a yak bull that would breed black meat and milk. Such were the misconceptions of Brahman cattle in the early days. Nine months later beautiful tiger striped, white -Palmvale Brahman-faced, smooth coated calves starting hitting the ground in the neighbours paddock, and as they matured they had so much more growth than the straight Hereford calves, plus the advantage of not having to be treated for ticks and flies every 3 weeks, within 5 years all the neighbours were using Brahman bulls.

Fast forward through my life of mustering cattle, and helping my mum run the farm while my dad was away a lot driving trucks, to my graduation from high school, where I got a job in a large bank in a city about 5 hours from home. During the 10 years of working in the banking sector, and climbing the ladder to the lending dept and writing loans for agricultural businesses, I always went back home to help my parents every chance that I got.

On transferring back to my hometown with the bank, and being horse mad, I met this blue eyed, blond haired man at a polocrosse carnival that I was playing at one weekend. His name was Kearin Streeter, he was a bull rider who had come for the weekend with some friends, and he had a Brahman stud called Palmvale about 60 miles away.

So Kearins late father , Percy, had diary records of when the first Brahman calves where born on their property in the early 50’s, and he had loved them so much that he formed the Fairy Springs Brahman Stud in 1967, which is still going strong today and owned by my nephew Joe Streeter. When Percy was tragically killed in the early 80’s, the stud cows were split between my husband Kearin who called his own stud Palmvale.

Kearin and I were married in 1993, and I discovered my true passion in life, breeding Brahman stud cattle. We achieved so many things with our cattle in the 23 years that we were married and I will talk more on that shortly, but sadly Kearin passed away 8 years ago after a long illness, so there were many stressful times for our small, all girl crew along the way, keeping the stud running, showing cattle, preparing cattle for sales, and nursing Kearin at home as well.

We moved to our current location 24 years ago, as we needed more land in a great location for our growing stud. Mt Slopeaway is a 3000 acre property situated 60 miles north of Rockhampton, the Beef capital of Australia, where we run around 200 stud red Brahman females and 60 Droughtmaster stud females, and also grow our own hay and silage.

We sell bulls annually at the Rockhampton Brahman Week bull sale where 900 red and grey bulls are sold over 3 days , and we are one of the largest vendors with an allocation of 20 bulls which is performance based. We also sell bulls at the Big Country sale in Charters Towers North Qld each year, a smaller sale which you are personally selected to attend. We attend one elite female sale each year with around 10 heifers, which is on next weekend, and then sell by private treaty straight from the paddock.

Our major client base in Australia are selling bulls into beef breeding enterprises, as our national beef herd is around 26 million head , with Brahman genetics being found in 50 percent of that. More than 70 percent of the bulls sold from the Tropic of Capricorn north are Brahmans , To put it into some perspective, genetics that we purchase from the USA, will ultimately end up on a live export boat to Indonesia. Of course we also sell and buy our paddock sires from other studs and them from us, but the large percentage of sales go to commercial cattle people on large parcels of land, so udders and teats, ease of calving, walking ability, feet and legs, are of the utmost importance in Australia.

Polled cattle are also becoming increasingly popular and in more demand. My personal style of cattle as you will see in the photos, is growthy animals with plenty of bone, loose skin, growth for age and plenty of natural muscling and meat.

Ultimately we are in the business of breeding beef, and our clients get paid on weight whether it be at the meat processing plant, or their weaner steers reaching a certain weight earlier. I like bulls to look like sires, and females to be feminine. Temperament is paramount and there are no compromises. Bad udders go straight to the cull paddock as well.

We have a very strong repeat buyer base for our bulls, which is a testament to our breeding program, personal service and integrity in what we do.

The emphasis on showing cattle in Australia is vastly different to the USA and other countries, and whilst our triannual Beef Australia show is on in May and there will be large numbers of cattle in attendance, our main focus as breeders in selling live cattle at sales.

We did show cattle whilst my daughter was in her teens, as we thought it was a great opportunity for her to be with like minded kids, learn judging and public speaking, and also to strengthen her muscles on the odd occasion. She also made lifelong friends as I have, and some of those parents are here on this trip with me today,

In the last 25 years we achieved a lot in our small stud of which we are very proud of such as:

First started exporting to heifers and bulls to Thailand in 2005, and have been doing so ever since

Sent the first shipment of stud heifers to Cambodia for the first Brahman stud over there in 2009

Sent live heifers and embryos to Brazil in the early 2000’s

Have secured the semen rights in MK Sophisticated Millionaire 107 from Doc McKenney, in the 90’s and then in 2004 on our first trip to Houston Livestock Show, purchased the Australian rights to Mr Winchester Magnum 999 and Mr Fontenot 311.

Importing semen to the USA and Asia in one of our polled herd sires this month.

Have sold bulls to $140000 at the RBWS and have sold bulls at that sale to studs that have gone on to breed bulls that have made $100000 and $200000 twice a couple of years later in 2022.

We did a lot of ET work in the 2000’s, working on getting our cow base really strong, and now we try and do one IVF program a year, and focus on proven cows that have had a couple of calves. We run 4 single sire breeder paddocks and run an AI program on our maiden heifers every year, using both Australian and USA Sires.

I believe that breeding stud cattle is a constant challenge, and you have to have a true passion for it to be successful, be prepared for disappointments along the way and have the ability to pick yourself up, and dust yourself off and try again. As any stud breeder will know and I’m sure will agree, some days are diamonds, some days are stone as someone famous once said.

Some of the best thought out and researched matings don’t work out as planned, something always happens to your best cow or bull calf, and the constant struggle to make your cattle better, as well as the search for genetics to do so. However the best thing in the world is to drive out into the paddock and see a new bull calf born that might just be “the one” or nail that perfect photo when you are doing your presale advertising. (Photographing cattle is the other passion of mine).

But before I close, I want to pay homeage to the women in Australia who play a huge part in the agriculture in our country, working side by side with their husbands, or by themselves, as well as teaching school to their kids in outback locations, running the office, feeding the staff , and holding it all together.

I want us all to pay our respects to just a few of the amazing women in the Brahman industry in Australia, some that aren’t with us anymore, some that were pioneers of the breed, and those that are still out there every day working hard for their passion of breeding Brahman cattle.. Ladies in agriculture of the world, I salute you.