First time for Beef judge
ONE of only two female stud cattle judges at Beef Australia at Rockhampton, Kirrily Johnson-Iseppi is keen to cast her close eye across some of the country’s best cattle.
Mrs Jonhson-Iseppi will be making the 500km trek from the cattle stud in Dalby which she runs with her husband Gavin.
“I haven’t been a judge before but we have exhibited in the past,” Mrs Johnson-Iseppi said.
“We’ve been taking our own cattle up there since 2000. My family entered cattle in the original one in ’88 but we had too much rain to get out. So we ended up missing it.
“I haven’t been up there personally since 2009. But my husband Gavin took cattle up for exhibit in 2012.”
Mrs Johnson-Iseppi is judging the gelbvieh breed.
“They are a European breed originally from Germany,” she said.
“I think they said they have about 40 entries at Beef this year. They haven’t got the same popularity as other European breeds like the simmentals and the charolais.
“They’re very popular in North America. They’re not a highly numerous breed in Australia but I have seen some quality cattle around.
“They’re not shown much in Australia because there’s not much competition so I think they’re really focusing on putting some numbers together for Beef this year as a bit of a promotion for the breed.
“My family was originally involved in the gelbvieh breed in Australia, but now we’re red angus and simmentals.”
Mrs Johnson-Iseppi said she was looking forward to seeing how Beef had changed since she was there nine years ago.
“It surprises me that there are only two female judges. But the way the whole nomination process goes it’s sort of just the luck of the draw. I’m happy to just give my opinion,” she said.
“It’s not really a maledominated industry any more. It’s fairly even these days as far as judges are concerned. They get a lot of women to judge.
“And they have a lot to do with the showing and breeding of cattle as well.”
Mrs Johnson-Iseppi and her husband run GK Livestock.
“It’s majority stud red angus cattle, we’ve also added some stud simmentals into the mix as well.
“We generally sell our bulls on-farm. We show our cattle in Sydney and Brisbane and generally we’ll go to Beef but we’re taking a break from showing this year.
“At Sydney last year we won the Urquhart Trophy for Supreme Exhibit with GK Red Ruba G40. We’ve been involved in interbreed championships at Sydney since 2012.”
GK Livestock focuses on breeding for Queensland conditions.
“We’re concentrating on breeding bulls for the Queensland market and selling yearlings that are suitable for the Queensland conditions,” Mrs Johnson-Iseppi said.
“We have quite a select herd. We have about 50 stud females altogether.
“We have limited land space so we focus on producing high quality cattle and marketing them specifically throughout Queensland.”