For any cattle producer, understanding how stock are performing is crucial. But what if you could move beyond just visual assessments and gut feelings?
Barry O’Sullivan who runs Glenalpine Station located south-west of Bowen QLD, was able to turn observation into tangible financial benefit.
Before Optiweigh, Barry, like many in the industry, relied on traditional methods to gauge cattle progress.
“Once we saw the Optiweigh unit, we knew that if we can get that difference between what the cattle are doing, or a bit of a guide, it’s going to help our business,” he recalls.
That “guide” proved to be a game-changer.
Rapid Insights and Quicker Turnaround
“Within the first fortnight of having the Optiweigh with our trade steers, I found that I was leaving them in too long,” he said.
The data revealed “the cattle were starting to plateau with their weight gains. After about a month, I was able to have the cattle gain weight until sale.”
The result? A significantly accelerated sales cycle and boosted carrying capacity.
“That brought the sales probably two months forward. It allowed us to have more cattle here,” and the financial implications were substantial: “on this sort of operation, you talk of probably hundreds of thousands of dollars a year.”
“It probably took about two months for us to pay for the Optiweigh.”
Read the full transcript:
“Once we saw the Optiweigh unit, we knew that if we could get that difference between what the cattle are doing, or a bit of a guide, it’s going to help our business.
Within the first fortnight of having the Optiweigh with our trade steers, I found that I was leaving them in too long because the cattle were starting to plateau with their weight gains. So after about a month, I was able to have the cattle gain weight until sale, so that brought the sales probably two months forward. It allowed us to have more cattle here, and on this sort of operation, you talk of probably hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. So we worked out it probably took about two months for us to pay for the Optiweigh.
I’ve got something that’s going to be working with me; it’s going to be telling me whether I’m going forward or I’m going backwards, instead of guessing, looking at the manure or the grass and thinking, “Oh well, I think the cattle are gaining weight,” when in actual fact, they’re plateauing or they’re going backwards for a week.
We’ve had the same unit for three or four years now, and there’s been absolutely nothing go wrong with it. It’s turned us from a business that was trying to do a really good job into an actual professional business that can actually meet targets. If a business values its grass and it’s trying to get the most out of its grass for production purposes, the Optiweigh unit would be an absolute necessity.”