It has been a busy 18 months for Todd Brown and Alicia Billinghurst.
The couple started milking 60 cows on their Stanhope property last July and they have some grand plans for the future.
Todd grew up on a dairy farm in Queensland and moved to northern Victoria in 2019.
He bought a 38ha farm in 2021, but continued to work and share farm for other people.
In October 2023, the couple decided it was time to resurrect the defunct dairy, and by June the following year, the eight-aside was up and running.
During the transition period, the couple parked the herd, and when they returned home, they were disappointed with their condition.
“We had to work hard to get the cows back, so we started out with lower production than expected and our dairy renovation went over budget, but the accountant did say we ended up breaking even, so we were happy with that for our first year,” Todd said.
They are currently milking 95 cows and hope to be up around 120 over the next year or two.
The herd is a mixed — mostly Jersey with some Holstein, Brown Swiss and some recently purchased Red Holsteins.
“We didn’t have any Red Holsteins so we started with them last year,” Alicia said.
The Holsteins are registered under the prefix Sundar, while the Jersey’s and Brown Swiss are under Grand Dream.
“We like different breeds for different reasons, and we are happy to do a bit of cross breeding as well,” Alicia said.
They recently put Allflex collars on their cows.
“I toyed with the idea of collars for years, but they were just too expensive.
“Allflex now runs a subscription, which has made it affordable for us — we were looking at a $40,000 outlay initially,” Todd said.
“We are only small, so we have to be efficient with everything we do, and the collars will play a major role in delivering efficiencies,” Alicia said.
Alongside the home farm, the couple leases an additional 42ha across the road, which will be used to grow additional fodder.
They didn’t get off to a great start with the block across the road either.
“The land hadn’t been worked for a long time, and when the contractor came in to rip it up, he couldn’t get the discs in because the ground was so hard.
“We had to wait for rain, and of course it didn’t rain until June, so we were pretty late getting something in the ground,” Todd said.
The couple are totally reliant on the temporary water market and plan to capitalise on spring and autumn growth as they move forward.
“We will graze pasture in spring and autumn and feed hay and silage over summer to lessen the temporary water market risk.
“We have a lot of brown paddocks at the moment and we are busy feeding hay and silage,” Todd said.
In years to come, the couple hopes to run a small family farm milking 200 cows.
“I would love to work toward some sort of barn system in the future,” Todd said.
Unlike Todd, Alicia didn’t grow up around cows. She comes from a horse background.
She said in some ways working with horses and cows is similar.
“I do love working with cows, even though I was thrown into the deep end,” she laughed.
Todd said his love of cows, and particularly Jerseys, began when he was eight.
“My grandad had a Holstein herd which he transitioned across from Jersey, I found some old photos of some Jerseys, and I said to him that was what I liked — three weeks later, there were some Jerseys in the herd again.”
Todd said his love of showing started in the early 2000s when he led a bull at one of the local shows.
“I got bitten by the bug,” he said.
The couple, along with children Harry and Dusty, will be attending International Dairy Week — their first time as a family with the boys in tow.
Todd said he would be traveling backwards and forwards to the farm to milk and do a few jobs, while Alicia and the boys will stay at Tatura.
The family is taking six head to the show, and Harry who has turned nine, will be able to participate in the youth events for the first time.
Dusty will have to be content with participating in the fancy dress class.
To read more about the family, please see story on page 18 of our IDW feature.