While many 15-year-olds are still sleeping, Matilda Herron is already hard at work, tending to her herd of stud cattle on her family’s small property in Southern Queensland.
It’s an intergenerational operation, but not one she inherited.
Instead, her small mob of 25 animals is the legacy of her neighbour, Chris Gleeson, who died suddenly in 2022.
The 43-year-old Mr Gleeson helped foster Matilda’s passion for cattle breeding, culminating in her buying his herd after his death.
Now, as the first new calves roam the paddocks, Matilda is taking the chance to build on that legacy and help other young women do the same.
Triumph out of tragedy
Growing up on a farm near Groomsville, north of Toowoomba, Matilda has always loved animals.
She started exhibiting and judging cattle at agricultural shows with her school, saving up her pay from her part-time job to one day buy her own cattle.
But when that chance came, it was through an unexpected tragedy.
“We lost our neighbour, and that was pretty heartbreaking,” she said.
Before his death, Mr Gleeson’s Santa Gertrudis stud, Groomsville Park, had been steadily growing, buying and selling the cattle known for their dark cherry-red coats, heat resistance and adaptability.
First developed in Texas, USA, the breed was brought to Australia in 1952, where a stud was established at Warwick in southern Queensland.
As Mr Gleeson’s family grieved, the Herrons helped out on the farm, with Matilda’s parents Toni and Matthew pitching in too.
It soon became clear the herd would be sold, presenting Matilda with an opportunity to turn her dream into a reality.
“It’s a big decision really, to output your whole life savings and just say, ‘well, let’s do it,'” she said.
“I think it’s worth it at the end of the day, if you’re passionate about it.”
She said the day she took delivery of the cattle was bittersweet for both families.
“To see their son, their brother’s, hard work being taken off [the farm] was pretty emotional, but also emotional for me knowing that now I’m getting that start,” she said.
She said she owed the Gleeson family a debt of gratitude.
“They are the people that have helped me more than anyone else,” she said.
Risk it for the biscuit
Getting started in the stud stock business is not without its risks, and costs.
But it can also be lucrative — in 2022, a Santa Gertrudis bull broke the breed record when it sold for $250,000.
While Matilda’s parents both have jobs away from the small production block that supports their daughter’s breeding operation, they help out wherever possible.
“She’s very keen, she has all the drive and all the initiative, and we support that where we can,” Toni Herron said.
“Sometimes you’ve got to risk it to get the biscuit.”
Established breeders Alice Greenup and her husband Rick are no strangers to that risk.
When they took over Eidsvold Station, south-west of Bundaberg, in 2006, they also took on the legacy of Australia’s oldest Santa Gertrudis stud, and the herd now boasts more than 6,000 head of cattle.
Just like Matilda, the Greenups worked extra jobs while establishing the stud.
“It’s really with the passage of time that that investment prevails, but it also only prevails if you stick to what you’re trying to breed,” Ms Greenup said.
“That can be really challenging … particularly when you’re starting out — wanting to keep everything because you work so hard, but then also culling things that really need to be culled.”
Life renewed, legacy preserved
With many tough decisions ahead, like what to call her stud, Matilda turned to a women-in-agriculture Facebook group for support.
“I had a couple of hundred comments flow through of not only name suggestions, which overwhelmed me, but just kind and supportive words of even people that are pretty high up in this stud game,” Matilda said.
“I was absolutely blown away and shocked that agriculture is such a supportive community.”
She settled on the name TildaH Santa Gertrudis, combining her name and that of her farm, Herron Downs.
“It’s my parents that have supported me along the way, my roots are here, and it just reminds me of where I started and my connection to the land,” she said.
Matilda intends to return that support, as the first progeny from Mr Gleeson’s herd arrived – the first male calf, named Chris’s Legacy.
“Mr C, as we call him, he’ll be a big part actually — he’ll go over the commercial herd and has been a big focus of the whole thing,” she said.
It’s the first of many of what she described as “small milestones in a very big dream”.
