In dairy farming for more than three decades, Bryan and Jo Dickson are celebrating a rare double win.
Southwest Victorian farmer Bryan Dickson has accomplished an all-Australian feat by topping both the Holstein and Jersey genetics league tables.
Working alongside wife Jo, the Terang region farmers are renown in the genetics sphere following frequent appearances in the Australian Breeding Values index over the past decade.
Bryan said the double win on the ABV tables was a rare event in the industry.
“The only other farmer to have more than one first placing would be (former northern Victorian turned Gippsland farmer) Daryl Hoey more than 10 years ago, so it doesn’t happen very often,” he said.
“That was back when it was called the Australian Dairy Herd Improvement Scheme.”
The double victory by the Dicksons is the first under the Dairy Herd Improvement Scheme’s successor body DataGene, formed in 2016.
The April 2025 ABV release shows Emu Banks Holsteins with a winning Balanced Performance Index average of 376, notching up another win for the Dicksons on their Holstein ledger.
But it was in the Jersey field where they had a breakthrough for 2025, topping the breed table for the first time with their Spring Banks Jerseys herd with an average BPI of 279.
The Emu Banks herd consists of about 50 Jerseys and 30-40 Brown Swiss but the majority are Holstein, with about 900 cattle.
Emu Banks first topped the Holstein list in 2015 and returned to the top at the start of the decade, maintaining a strong ABV list presence ever since.
Bryan said daughter Anna was the driving force behind the Spring Banks success, given her interest in the Jersey breed.
“Anna wanted us to get back into Jerseys about five or so years ago. It was a smart move that seems to have worked out,” he said.
Bryan Dickson on farm at Garvoc with his cows. Bryan is the double winner of the best Holstein and Jersey stud herds in Australia.
Spring Banks have been a regular in second spot on the Jersey ABVs list, often coming runner-up to Con and Michelle Glennen’s White Star Jerseys, based at Noorat, near Terang and only a short drive from the Dickson farm.
White Star Jerseys recently featured in a showcase of southwest Victorian farms as part of the
World Jersey Conference tour.
Lyn Parish’s Dornoch Jerseys near Winchelsea; Paul and Lynette Lenehan’s Murray Brook Jerseys near Koroit and Sarah Chant’s Warrion Jerseys near Colac also featured in the April breed tour.
“Con has a great herd – we’re very lucky in our part of the world to have some of the best Jerseys – best of a lot of dairy really,” Bryan says.
In Holsteins, Bryan and Jo bred the second and third ranked BPI heifers. Emu Banks
Rizboy Tiffany 15111, with a BPI of 573, was second and was recently sold for $17,000 to Agri-Gene and will contribute to their bull breeding program.
In third position is Emu Banks Rizboy Louanna 14977 with a BPI of 568. Three of the top five genomic heifers are owned by the Dicksons.
Emu Banks was the highest herd for the Sustainability Index at 652 and number one for the Health Weighted Index at 361.
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