Best ever season helping Sorensens rebuild at Teviot after monsoon losses

The couple lost 50 per cent of their stock in the devastating weather of February 2019 but have been building back both their Merino flock and Santa Gertrudis herd, to make the most of some of the best grass-growing conditions they've ever experienced.

They are running between 7000 and 8000 sheep on 36,420ha at Teviot, 35km west of Winton, along with 600 breeding cows, and just shore 4300 wethers at Conamore, 10km north of Corfield, which also runs around 500 heifers.

"The thing with the flood, there was no follow-up, so it was an average season," Mr Sorensen said. "We didn't have the money to buy back in so we've just been breeding back up."

Teviot was purchased by Alex's grandparents Jim and Margaret Mitchell, passing down to their son Graham, before Ken and Alex took over in 2010, and they've kept up the woolgrowing side of the business.

"It gives us diversity," Mr Sorensen said. "It's one article we can grow that's not perishable. You can put it in the shed and sell it when it's good."

Of Danish descent, he saw his first rural property in Australia when he was a teenager and has been out west ever since, attending the Longreach Pastoral College in the late 1980s.

He got weekend work at Eskdale in the Winton district, then did contract mustering and a bit of shearing before the collapse of the reserve price scheme dried up a lot of work in the wool industry.

He and Alex managed Corfield Downs for Arthur Earle for three years, plus Muttaburra district property Beryl for around eight years before moving to Teviot.

All their country is Mitchell grass downs, which they run at one sheep to 4.5 acres.

"We don't try to go too fine," Mr Sorensen said.

"Ideally we try and grow 19 or 20 micron wool.

"We like the kilograms and we don't think the country's set up to go finer.

"In a dry year the wool opens up and gets dusty, and you need frame to walk in this country."

Older wethers aren't often seen in western Queensland paddocks these days but the Sorensens like to keep theirs until they're five years old, ideally selling 1000 every year, depending on seasons.

This year's turnoff dressed out at 35-40kg and cut 7.8kg of wool.

"We had an early break in the season so they were on good feed," Mr Sorensen said. "They were big boys."

The property received a proper break at the end of April when it recorded 150mm of rain, followed by 50mm in early May and 29mm at the end of June.

"It's absolutely one of our best years," Mr Sorensen said, "not in the amount but in the way it fell.

"The grass is as high as the sheep and it's hard to see them - they're the same colour as the grass now that it's seeding."

To date they haven't been hit with wild dogs, which they attribute to country not too far away with a lot more cover.

If they do see dog activity, they've been able to get on top of it quickly.

With five stands busy in the Teviot shearing shed this week, the bright white wool that Egelabra is renowned for is hitting the wool tables at a great rate of knots.

Mr Sorensen said that as well as their bright wool qualities, they'd chosen Egelabra bloodlines because it was the only stud they'd gone to where the rams were uniform.

They buy between 30 and 40 rams a year, and have been regularly recording 70pc lambings, dropping in February.

Mr Sorensen says he's happy to see people around Longreach and further south converting to meat sheep, meaning the wool industry is unlikely to be swamped again anytime soon.

"Wool is a volatile market - you're at the mercy of exporters," he said.

"But whatever industry you're in, your passion is what will work for you.

"A passionate woolgrower will make a ton more money out of wool than a cattleman, because they do it well.

"It's the same with any industry."

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The Sorensens do like their cattle as well though, starting Landsborough Santas in 2011 with foundation cattle from Sandy McGavin at Tara, west of Barcaldine.

Mr Sorensen said he worked on the theory that it was better to buy two or three excellent bulls a year to breed from, which meant they had 40 or 50 excess herd bulls most years for repeat clients.

Like many in the Winton region, prickly acacia is a constant threat that the Sorensens are working to keep under control.

They can't afford to spray the whole property and so they've invested in camels to help keep it in check.

They came about when they were doing a low stress stock handling school and met Paul Martin from Summer Land camel dairy in the Fassifern Valley.

He was in need of agistment and sent some camels north.

The Sorensens saw that they were serving a useful purpose on their country so now they have around 250 head, and send about 30 head a year down to Summer Land.

Asked whether they would follow the trend into goats, they said that while they'd had experience of them at Corfield Downs, where Arthur Earle had around 6000 behind wire many years ago, they didn't have the room at Teviot.

"We've got enough going on," Mr Sorensen said. "We'd have to sacrifice something else - it would be a strain on our carrying capacity."