Raza Bovina Nelore: Una raza para carne campeona en rusticidad.

I'm Amy Dickens, co-principal of Jadd Speckle Park. We're located at Yeovil, which is midway between Dubbo and Orange in central west New South Wales. We bought our first Speckle Park bull in the same year we bought our first property, so 2012, and it was Justin's dad who introduced us, Tony. Apart from the fact that the particular coat colour, they always seem to do very well and I've noticed them here. The cattle that have come from Canada in the extreme cold do so well in the heat. There's got to be something good about that. Speckle Park are an early maturing, low maintenance animal by default. They hit the specks quick as opposed to some of your later maturing breeds out there and with a lovely even fat cover and ultimately then it's what's what ends up on the plate and that just impressed us time and time again. So we had no plans of starting a stud when we first got into Speckle Park and you know we say in a way the cattle dragged us kicking and screaming into starting a stud because they just kept impressing us. They've certainly got high quality carcass merit. We know that it's all we eat is Speckle Park meat and I've eaten beef all my life and I'm convinced there's something very different about it. I tend to think that it's got more to do with muscle than it does fat. I think there's certainly a softness of carcass in these cattle and we'll endeavour to identify that through science as to what that actually is but they're just such good doing cattle and that's what I really like about managing them and you know sending them out into the industry is just how good a converters they seem to be. They seem to be able to live on the smell of an oily rag and that has a real place here in Australia. I mean it forgets to rain here from time to time and these cattle they stand up when times are tough and they have for us year in year out. Main things would be Justin and Amy's unwavering belief in both the JAD program and Speckle Park breed in general and they're testing their cattle in a true commercial environment. Our commercial clients have sought us out for the fact that we you know we come from a commercial background and that's what we do. We produce stud cattle and we also run commercial beef cattle so we feel I think that we connect with commercial producers because we talk the same language I guess and we're trying to produce the same product at the end of the day. And I think you know our clients genuinely see that we're trying to better the breed. I think a big part of JAD's success is there being their partnership with Mungahina Stud in New Zealand. I think it's just put that extra bone and softness into their cattle. They've used some leading size from over there started off with Legacy and Kidman's Cove animals with that extra bone and bit of structure. I think the amount of data we collect does give people confidence to buy online and the quality of the videos you know we make sure grass is so you get a really good look at the animals with the videos. The reason we've gone down this path with the speckles is the eating quality. So we first ate a piece of meat before we'd even seen a beast so we've just got to convince the rest of the world how good it is. And you just touched on it there Nikki, you've started up a restaurant down there in Mafra. Tell us a bit about that and what you're doing down there. Yeah so that's a paddock to plate restaurant so all the produce that goes into that restaurant's locally sourced and we do a regenerative farming practice there so all the calves are born at home they're not traded they stay with us right through grass fed finished and the product comes out the restaurant door. What's the response from you you know from you I guess the people that come and eat at the restaurant? Like it makes us so proud when people message the page or they'll go to the effort to ring up to say that that's the best beef they've ever eaten. And they're amazing for the breed you know we just ring up off the cuff and you know they're happy to share information. Justin's taken a visit to come down home and see have a look at the stock that we've already brought and what they do for the breed is really up and beyond. I've got a lot of respect for the New Zealand Cattlemen I think they do a really good job and have really done some great things for Speckle Park over the ditch so to have them come here and view our program and spend some time here over the last few days it's been great to have them. Yeah the reason we came over was it's quite a lot of our genetics here they've brought a lot of our genetics into the country so we want to support them we want to see how they're going. The facilities are top-notch and these facilities here is probably as good as you're going to see anywhere in the world really not just New Zealand and Australia. Justin and Amy have built themselves a wonderful reputation within the industry within the Speckle Park industry in particular and they've taken this breed to the world they really have and you come to a JAD Speckle Park sale and you know the facilities are fantastic the cattle are fantastic the hospitality is fantastic. Well over here we've got dinosaur chops they're the biggest chops that I've ever seen anyway and now we're being looked after like another level hey bro. Yeah go people right and that's what it's about having relationships. Although we're a first generation couple in in the farm we've bought and own mum and dad are hugely supportive in our business and with our family and we you know we cherish that very much so we really enjoy our time together you know and there's a strong connection there with the cattle and it's great.