THIS week’s property review includes this wrap-up of recently completed sales and two separate articles on significant recent property listings across the country.

• T.A. Field Estates expands into Victoria with Banongill South
• NSW’s Rocky Creek Aggregation makes $18m
• Wanna Station sells to neighbouring cattle producer

Cattle on the 4551ha Banongill South, 20 minutes south of Skipton

T.A. Field Estates expands into Victoria with Banongill South

Well-known agribusiness family T.A. Field Estates has expanded into Victoria, purchasing Banongill South in the state’s south-west.

The 4551ha specialised, intensive sheep and cattle enterprise, pictured above, lies in the Vite Vite North/Carranballac region, 20 minutes south of Skipton.

Ballarat-based farmers Chris and Tanya Mulcahy listed the property in June, but no price guide was offered by Elders agent Rob Rickard.

The property once formed part of the 8200ha Banongill Station, a flagship Western District cropping and livestock holding sold in 2020 by agricultural fund manager Laguna Bay in 2020 for $80 million.

Until the Banongill South acquisition, T.A. Field Estates’ rural property portfolio was concentrated in New South Wales.

Its holdings include the 1770ha Aberfeldy at Holbrook, 3000ha Benangaroo Station at Jugiong, 10,000ha Congi at Walcha, 6200ha Mobinbry at North Star and 50,000ha Wyvern at Carrathool.

The business operates across 71,000ha, plus 1300ha of long-term lease country, producing Merino sheep, beef cattle, prime lambs and dryland crops. It also holds substantial water rights, which are traded annually.

In May, T.A. Field Estates sold the 1891ha Doughboy Mountain grazing property in northern New South Wales for close to $30 million to the South African Langenhoven and Ramazotti families, trading as Rallen Australia.

The premium, high-rainfall holding, described as one of the district’s finest properties, sits on top of the Doughboy Mountain Range, 56km east of Guyra and 68km north-east of Armidale.

At Banongill South, the winter cropping program has been scaled back over the past five years and now occupies 15 percent of the total land area.

The balance has been converted to a predominantly pasture-based system focused on livestock breeding and backgrounding.

This year, the property was running 1300 sheep and 1430 cattle, compared with 2200 sheep and 1545 cattle last year.

During their eight-year ownership, the Mulcahys invested heavily in pasture improvement, fencing upgrades, expanded water infrastructure, subdivision into smaller paddocks and high-quality farm facilities.

Mr Rickard said the improvements have significantly enhanced productivity, operational efficiency and carrying capacity.

Water is supplied by the historically reliable Banongill Spring, supplemented by numerous bores and dams.

Infrastructure includes a renovated four-bedroom home, a three-bedroom staff home, a six-stand shearing shed, undercover sheep yards, steel cattle yards, numerous sheds and 15 grain silos with a total capacity of 1239 tonnes.

Yet to sell…

Meanwhile, the Mulcahys’ other property, the 792ha Brenleys, remains on the market.

Located north of Willaura, 20 minutes from Ararat, Brenleys served as the principal grain production base for the broader livestock business at Banongill South.

Brenleys runs a full winter cropping program on free-draining loam soils across three clear, open paddocks. Sheep graze the stubbles during summer after harvest.

Dams and bores supply the property’s water.

NSW’s Rocky Creek Aggregation makes $18m

Brisbane-based investment firm InfraAg Management has paid $18 million for Gunn Agri’s Rocky Creek Aggregation in northern New South Wales.

The 4246ha mixed farming and grazing property in the New England region is 21km north-east of Ashford and 61km north-west of Glen Innes and offers potential value-add opportunities.

Rocky Creek was the first acquisition for Gunn Agri Partner’s Transforming Farming Platform, established in 2021 and backed by the Van Lanschot Kempen SDG Farmland Fund.

During its five-year ownership, the Australian-based agriculture and natural capital asset manager carried out a significant capital expenditure program.

Works include expanding the cropping area and improving carrying capacity through exclusion fencing, water infrastructure and the regeneration of degraded soils and pastures.

The undulating, open timbered grazing land features a mix of self-mulching red and black basalt, granite and New England trap soils.

Under Gunn Agri’s stewardship, Rocky Creek operated as a breeding and backgrounding platform for high-quality beef cattle.

Its estimated carrying capacity is 17,527 Dry Sheep Equivalents or 2337 Adult Equivalents.

Water supplies include a bore, two wells, 49 dams and numerous creek and river systems.

Infrastructure includes a three-bedroom home, a three-bedroom cottage, two-bedroom workers’ quarters, two steel cattle yards, a shearing shed and sheep yards. There are also numerous sheds and silos providing 160 tonnes of grain storage.

JLL Agribusiness agents Chris Holgar, Clayton Smith and Bart Norris handled the sale.

Rocky Creek’s estimated carrying capacity is 17,527 Dry Sheep Equivalents or 2337 Adult Equivalents.

Wanna Station sells to neighbouring cattle producer

Dean Ryan of Minnie Creek Station has purchased the neighbouring Wanna Station in Western Australia’s Gascoyne region for around $5 million, with more than 4000 head of cattle included in the sale.

The 360,337ha breeding and finishing property, originally known as Elliot Creek, is near Mount Augustus, 230km north-east of Gascoyne Junction and 400km from Carnarvon.

It was offered for sale by Bill Briggs after 20 years of ownership.

Elders agent Greg Smith handled the two-stage expressions of interest process but was unable to confirm the sale price. He said the region had not received decent rain in three years.

Mr Ryan and his wife Katie own Central Stockcare, a livestock handling and husbandry business.

Their property portfolio includes 42ha Echuca near Bullsbrook, 3035ha Send ‘em Down and 1410ha Hallswood Park near Badgingarra in the state’s mid-west, and the 324ha Springfield feedlot near Beermullah.

Elliot Creek was renamed Wanna Station in the mid-1950s.

During the 1990s, the then owners sold Wanna’s northern portion, at the southernmost end of the Hammersley Ranges, to the Department of Conservation and Land Management. They subsequently bought neighbouring Gifford Creek.

The combined holdings are now known as Wanna Station.

Typical of the Gascoyne, Wanna has 50 percent high to moderate value pastoral land and is rated to run 3600 cattle units.

In November last year, the station was carrying 3500 head, plus breeders and followers. broad and narrow leaf mulga are the dominant and most abundant browse.

Land types range from high-value river systems and flood-out country to acacia, bluebush and saltbush plains extending into rugged ranges.

The Lyons River floods across an estimated 50,000ha of the property. Abundant buffel and native grasses support the growing out and finishing of sale cattle in most years.

In a region with 250mm rainfall, Wanna Station is serviced by 57 equipped bores, 32 of them with trap yards.

Infrastructure includes a five-bedroom home, five-bedroom staff quarters, numerous sheds and two cattle yards.