{"id":608131,"date":"2026-04-15T09:14:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T09:14:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/608131\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T09:14:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T09:14:15","slug":"farmers-selling-cattle-in-record-numbers-as-feed-becomes-scarce-and-el-nino-forecast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/608131\/","title":{"rendered":"Farmers selling cattle in record numbers as feed becomes scarce and El Ni\u00f1o forecast"},"content":{"rendered":"

Staring down the barrel of no feed, high diesel costs and now an El Ni\u00f1o<\/a> forecast, farmers are offloading livestock in droves.<\/p>\n

Across New South Wales, more than half a million cattle have already been sold through saleyards this year, up from around 377,000 head this time last year.<\/p>\n

At Scone, in the NSW Upper Hunter, agents have just held their largest cattle sale in 20 years.<\/p>\n

“We went close in 2016-17, with the last drought,” stock agent Stuart Sheldrake said.<\/p>\n

Tuesday’s sale was second only to a yarding two decades ago, almost to the day, where 3,647 head were sold.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Livestock agent Stuart Sheldrake is expecting more big yardings in the lead up to winter. (ABC Rural: Amelia Bernasconi)<\/p>\n

Scone has already seen more than half of last financial year’s total volume of cattle go through the yards in just 11 weeks this year.<\/p>\n

Mr Sheldrake said it was a telling snapshot of how dry the Hunter Valley had become.<\/p>\n

“We came off an unbelievable first half of 2025 and then the tap turned off at the end of August,” Mr Sheldrake said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“It’s been short and sharp.”<\/p>\n

Scone broke it’s 24 hour rainfall record earlier this year<\/a>, but the mass volume of rain came in just a two-hour window, too quickly to really soak in.<\/p>\n

Hot dry conditions since have absorbed any moisture.<\/p>\n

The current conditions are increasingly being compared to that of the 2016-2019, which was dubbed the worst drought in living memory<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Many in the industry have been quick to enact drought management plans this time around<\/a>, making tough calls to sell stock to protect their core breeding herd.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Agents say cattle are largely in good condition despite the challenging season. (ABC Rural: Amelia Bernasconi)<\/p>\n

Mr Sheldrake said the impacts of the Middle East conflict were also playing a huge part in drought decisions.<\/p>\n

“With fuel prices at the moment, freight, and lack of stock feed about, it’s an easy decision this time in for them to sell and obviously put a bit in the back pocket as well.”<\/p>\n

The saving grace at the moment has been a much stronger cattle market.<\/p>\n

“We’ve never experienced a dry time like this and experienced a market as well as it is,” Mr Sheldrake said.<\/p>\n

And with winter just around the corner, Mr Sheldrake said the livestock sell off would likely continue.<\/p>\n

Singleton held its biggest sale in eight years on Wednesday, and early yarding numbers suggested the Dubbo cattle sale could break its all-time record tomorrow.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Amanda Thorpe has sent over 600 cattle away for agistment, with six month old weaners seeing grass for their first time (Supplied)<\/p>\n

El Ni\u00f1o forecast, but farmers already feeling big dry<\/p>\n

The forecast El Ni\u00f1o could become one of the strongest on record<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“There’s nothing on the horizon… it’s going to be a tough winter,” Mr Sheldrake said.<\/p>\n

Western NSW grazier Amanda Thorpe said there was a lot being thrown at the farming sector, as she too navigates the drought.<\/p>\n

“It seems like the world’s on fire. There are so many other factors that normally wouldn’t come into this decision, such as fuel security and cost,” she said.\"A<\/p>\n

Western NSW grazier Amanda Thorpe says sending cattle away for agistment has been a huge relief after months of feeding in bone-dry conditions (Supplied)<\/p>\n

Ms Thorpe has already sold some young stock but is holding on to the breeding cows she has invested heavily in, sending them off on agistment.<\/p>\n

“We have sent four road trains to Wanaaring [north-west of Bourke, NSW] and three to Longreach [in central Queensland],” she said.<\/p>\n

“We have been feeding since October and are a bit emotionally spent \u2014 still burnt from the last drought.<\/p>\n

“Sending the girls has taken the pressure right off! It’s created some breathing room for us and the remaining stock here.”<\/p>\n

She likened buying stock after the last drought to “the Hunger Games” but after a big investment then, she is determined to see them through.<\/p>\n

“We bought heaps of heifers at the time and went for the long game; those girls have served us well and I don’t want them to go.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

In Central West NSW, the heat, lack of rain, dry winds and water evaporation have caused drought conditions to hit some producers “fast and hard”. (Supplied)<\/p>\n

Ms Thorpe said there were “hard lessons” learnt during the last drought.<\/p>\n

“[It’s] still burned in everyone’s memories, so we’re really drought-weary. We can’t believe we’re here again.<\/p>\n

“I think people are taking it a little harder because it has come so fast and hard. We did have a good patch there but we’re right back there again.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Staring down the barrel of no feed, high diesel costs and now an El Ni\u00f1o forecast, farmers are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":608132,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[295770,64,63,99,67803,4358,59808,20666,295772,295769,295771],"class_list":["post-608131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-amanda-thorpe","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-cattle-farming","tag-drought","tag-el-nino","tag-farmers","tag-rural-aid","tag-scone-saleyards","tag-stuart-sheldrake"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/608131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=608131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/608131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/608132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=608131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=608131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=608131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}