Community & Business
21 March, 2021
Baronessa breeds best in the world
AFTER a decade of breeding stud Brangus bulls, 2020 was a year of firsts and successes for the Stazzeri family's Baronessa Farm outside Atherton.
BY SALLY TURLEY
AFTER a decade of breeding stud Brangus bulls, 2020 was a year of firsts and successes for the Stazzeri family's Baronessa Farm outside Atherton.
They won international acclaim for one of their Brangus sires and achieved very pleasing results at their first Rockhampton bull sale.
Shane Strazzeri decided to enter 22 month old Brangus bull Baronessa Mr Blockbuster, into the Brangus Breeders' 7th Champion of the World Competition.
Their bull was chosen as the Australian winner by the competition’s four official judges from Argentina, Paraguay, Australia and the United States in October 2020.
Blockbuster, whose bloodlines hail from the famed Brinks Brangus stud of Westall Ranches, New Mexico, went on to score a perfect 10/10 Genomic (tenderness) rating before taking out the Pan Pacific competition and being named world champion on December 20, 2020.
He was sold after undergoing semen collection, as one of a draft of three bulls from Baronessa Farming in Rockhampton at the 44th annual National Brangus ABCA Sponsored sale.
He achieved Baronessa's top price of $20,000 and the stud averaged $15,500 across the three bulls offered.
If the Strazzeri family, who sell 20 Brangus bulls a year and around 100 bulls all up including Charolais and Charbray bulls, had one message for the northern beef industry, it would be that bull buyers do not need to travel down south for good quality bulls.
“We are importing straws of the best AI (artificial insemination) bulls in the world to produce the polled genetics, ease of calving and short coated progeny that everyone has been looking for,” Mr Strazzeri said.
Heading this year's Rockhampton team of seven bulls, is 23 month old Ultra Black embryo calf, Baronessa Mr Holloway. Holloway's father is the US Schaff Angus Valley bull, SAV International who sold for $400,000.
Schaff Angus Valley Stud created a new world record for Brangus bulls when they sold SAV American for $1,510,000 in 2019.
A second team of 9 Brangus bulls are being prepared for the North Queensland Field Day sale in Mareeba at the end of May.
Baronessa bulls have sold to vendors across the north, from Georgetown to Croydon to Charters Towers, Innisfail and Ingham over recent years.
Mr Strazzeri said the Tablelands Better Beef Open Day was a great showcase for local product and was looking forward to sharing the results of their new Simmental over Brangus and Senepol over Charoliais composites with beef producers in the future.
