Speckle Park triplets born to North Queensland mum

The triplets were born on Sunday afternoon to four-year-old Speckle Park cow, Gayle, after AI with semen from stud bull, Wally, at Blair Plains, Blue Mountain Rd, Sarina Range.

Blair Plains owner Travis Parry, who runs the breeder property with his parents, Julie and Lionel, and sister Katrina, said Gayle was the foundation female for the family's Speckle Park stud operation.

Gayle is originally from Wattle Grove Speckle Park Stud in Oberon, NSW, where the sire, WGSN142 Wally resides.

The triplets were born between 4pm and 5pm on Sunday.

Travis said this was Gayle's second calving after a male calf, Telly Tubby, last year, and having triplets, according to Google, for a cow was a one in 105,000 chance.

"Getting three live triplets is pretty rare again," he said.

"It doesn't seem to be a family trait that we know of. We know there is good longevity in the cow line through the Speckle Park history that we've tracked, so there is pretty good longevity and fertility there, but to go and have three is a bit unheard of."

Travis said the first male, Usman, weighed in at 30kgs at birth while Usher was 25kgs and Ursula was 22kgs.

"She definitely didn't look as though she was going to have triplets, she just looked like she did the first time that she was in calf," he said.

"Mum is doing pretty good, she knows she's had three calves, she knows all three are hers, she's trying to get eyes in the back of the head to see where they are at all times but, no, she's doing very, very well."

Travis said he and his mother, Julie, were helping out with feeding the calves and did take them in on Sunday night after the birth while mum calmed down.

He said they also milked her to give each calf some colostrum because they looked "a little bit wonky" and the mother was "a bit panicky" looking after three.

Travis said two calves were trying to have a suck on Monday morning while the third was sleeping.

He said they were now looking at the option of taking the heifer which was the smallest across to the neighbour's broken-in cow to guarantee the best outcome.

"We can feed her milk replacer, we can feed all three milk replacer if we really needed to so they can all stay together, but at the moment it's just all about trying to work out the best case scenario to keep the cow healthy and make sure the calves are healthy and they all get equal opportunity to grow well and kick on as they've all turned up together," he said.

Travis said the triplets were described as leopards in colouring which meant they were slightly more white than black.

He said there was a chance the female was a freemartin (infertile) especially if she shared the same embryo sac as the bull.

He said if she was productive she would have a long future ahead of her while the bulls would either grow out to work at home or be sold in their first stud sale.