The southern cattle industry has breathed a small but collective sigh of relief, with promising opening rain recorded across large parts of the south-east of the continent after months of very dry conditions.

As is customary with a later autumn break in the south, the wetter weather has given the livestock sector an immediate boost of confidence. Key cattle areas in both Victoria and South Australia have enjoyed good steady falls from a succession of weather systems, with follow-up rain forecast for the coming week.

Further falls will be vital for a real seasonal turnaround to materialise given the cold conditions already being experienced across much of Victoria and the South East of SA. With winter rapidly approaching, the prospects for good pasture growth are already limited and producers will continue to be wary of carrying surplus cattle through to spring.

The culmination of dry spring, summer and autumn conditions forced producers to offload stock in recent weeks, with tens of thousands of lightweight and secondary animals undermining market values. The dry-season flood of cattle which forced the market into ‘free fall’ in northern Australia had spread to the south, although there is now hope for the market to stabilise in the coming weeks and settle in to a quiet and more orderly selling pattern over winter.

Following the dry, kill rosters and feedlots are reportedly close to fully booked across the south, meaning processors and feeder buyers and likely to remain relatively quiet at the saleyards in the weeks to come.

Bordertown, SA, Poll Hereford and White Suffolk breeder Lachlan Day said while the impact of the dry was likely to linger, recent rain had provided a much-anticipated break in the season.

“We had 12 millimetres four weeks ago which was our biggest recording since August,” Mr Day said.

Further falls last week of about 30mm on his Upper South East property had raised hopes further of a seasonal turnaround.

“This autumn break which has eventuated might have been a bit earlier ideally. Calving has just started but lambing won’t start for another month so hopefully by then we’ll have a bit of feed for the ewes to lamb down on,” he said.

Mr Day recently returned from a successful outing at the Hereford National Show and Sale at Wodonga, Victoria. The event featured stud cattle from all states, although the overall mood of those in attendance was somewhat subdued due to the industry’s current difficulties.

“Exhibitors weren’t overly confident about the sale, but we ended up having an 80 per cent clearance, which was a good result for that sort of multi-vendor sale, especially given the poor season and ordinary beef prices we’re experiencing,” Mr Day said.

The Days Whiteface stud sold four bulls at an average of $12,250, including the reserve grand champion bull which made the sale’s third highest price of $20,000. The top-price bull made $30,000 and was offered by Pam Shelley, Kaludah, Cooma in NSW, with an overall sale average of $5446.

“There’s always a dedicated group of buyers from Gippsland and the Victorian high country. They’ve probably had slightly more favourable seasons than many other areas and were strong supporters of the sale again this year,” Mr Day said.

While rain in the past fortnight had provided some spark for the industry, Mr Day suggested that there would need to be more widespread relief from the dry before the cattle market had a chance to stabilise.

“The numbers of cattle that have been sold lately have flooded the market. It’s been the most significant sell-off that we’ve seen in a long time,” Mr Day said.

“It’s been difficult to get a snap-shot of where the market is at lately and that will likely continue until there is a really decent rain across a widespread area.”

Mr Day said the drought and tough market conditions in northern Australia were also impacting the industry in the south.

“We think the north is a long way from here, but I’ve seen a lot of Brahman cattle coming past my front gate on the way to Teys at Naracoorte. I’m sure there’s been plenty going to other southern abattoirs too and, in the end, those northern cattle are competing with southern cattle for kill space,” he said.