Gilberton Station has witnessed seven generations in its 154 year history, with each generation displaying a strong passion for cattle and the country they are raised on.
Rob and Lyn French are the owner of Gilberton Station, located 450 kilometres north west of Townsville on the head of the Gilbert River.
The 88,000 acre commercial beef operation runs 3500 Brahman breeders on the headwaters of the Gilbert River surrounded by hills and ranges of red granite, slate, pink granite and black spear grass.
Gilberton Station was established in 1869 when Rob's family moved to the goldfield town of Gilberton as teamsters bringing in goods.
"They soon saw an opportunity and started a butchers shop and took up Gilberton Station," Ms French said.
"He bought his cattle from Chudleigh Park station, 60 miles south west of Gilberton, they had really good black polls and they used to buy and slaughter them for the town."
Gilberton's herd started with Shorthorn cattle and Brahmans were introduced in 1976. Ms French said they just kept "breeding it out of them" until they had a strong Brahman based herd.
"We just kept introducing Brahman bulls and eventually it was bred out of them and way back then, their only water was the Gilbert River so they used to bale for water," she said.
"They would have cattle further out while the creeks had water in them and as the dryer season came, they would come closer and closer back towards the homestead.
"Cattle died like flies and the ticks didn't agree with them and they didn't feed lick."
Despite the challenges, Ms French said they were experimental always doing things before their time.
"In the early 60s they did some experimental work with supplement salt and molasses and they were always innovative in the industry," she said
"No one had really thought about supplementing at that time so they were doing things before their time."
Today, Gilberton Station conducts annual supplementing and focuses on conservative grazing and working with the country.
"We supplement feed all year round, the cattle tell us when we need to change their lick and we bring in dry and wet season lick," Ms French said.
"We don't run at full capacity. Rob is a very conservative grazier he never believed in running at full capacity, because if we don't look after the country it won't look after us.
"He believes in less makes more, and we've always got a couple of paddocks spelling at all times, because we don't know when we will get rain next.
"We don't do rotational grazing, we just do our own program of spelling country and always having back up feed.
"And if real bad times come we get rid of them, all as we would prefer to sell them rather than smell them."
Ms French said they were ruthless when it came to building their herd, with controlled mating and turning off any rough stock.
"We are very strict with culling. We only buy PP bulls and anything that turns its head sideways in the yard is gone. We are a family business, we cannot afford for anyone to get hurt, but also we have a good name for quiet cattle and we do a lot of work with our cattle and it does shine through.
"We have a controlled mating program that works for us, the bulls go out just before Christmas and we pull them out around April.
"It has taken a few years for the cows to get in sync, but once it happens it is great because calves hit the ground about September and we are turning off our weaners when they're all a nice line."
Gilberton conducts two rounds of mustering a year, selling onto a buyer on the Tablelands and meatworks.
"We brand in January/ February and depending on the season will wean from June onwards. We didn't wean until August this year because the cows were doing well," Ms French said.
"We turn off our young steers to a family on the Atherton Tablelands and we turn off the weaners as weaners to allow us to run a few more breeders.
"Once cows turn 10 years old they go into the meatworks paddock along with anything with bottled teats or scaly neck - we are always keeping it fresh."
The future of Gilberton is looking bright as Rob and Lyn start to step back and their son Ashley takes hold of the reins.
"We are starting to step back and our son is ready to take it over, we have been doing this though succession for the last few years," Ms French said.
"Our grandkids are the seventh generation and hopefully one of them will eventually want to take it on one day too."
Samantha Campbell
Samantha Campbell (nee Walton) has worked for regional and rural publications across New South Wales, Queensland and the Northern Territory. She is currently writing for the North Queensland Register based in North West Queensland. Email: samantha.campbell@austcommunitymedia.com.au
Samantha Campbell (nee Walton) has worked for regional and rural publications across New South Wales, Queensland and the Northern Territory. She is currently writing for the North Queensland Register based in North West Queensland. Email: samantha.campbell@austcommunitymedia.com.au
