About Us
Our History
I’m a 4th generation cattle producer and it may be said I was born with a love of cattle in my veins. Some of my fondest memories as a child revolve around cattle, from having purchased my first stud cow (Hereford) at the age of 14 to registering my own stud back in 2006 and now conducting a yearly Hereford Bull Sale. Whilst I have always loved Herefords and always will, I carefully studied the Speckle Park breed since its introduction into Australia with great interest.
After a lot of research the Battalion Speckle Park stud was registered in 2016 after the purchase of 8 frozen embryos from Six Star Speckle Park resulting in two bulls and two heifers. The two bulls went on to sell at the Scone multi-vendor sale for the top vendor average of $22,000 and setting the sale record for a bull that still stands today at $26,000. The two females were retained as foundation donors with one of them, Heartbreaker M1 now being regarded as one of the breeds top producers in the world, with progeny sales currently grossing over half a million dollars and still increasing.
Our great matriarch has given us many highlights and several Australian and World Records. She has produced the current world record priced female for $100,000 (to Ivery Downs Speckle Park), A son that held the Australian record at $45,000 (to Celamba Speckle Park), a world record for Embryos at $5050 each (to Toebelle Speckle Park) and another of her sons has the Australian record semen price at $860 per straw (sold by Ivery Downs Speckle Park).
We started breeding Speckle Park cattle to diversify our breeding program and run a second breed side by side with our Hereford stud. The natural thickness and carcase merit drew us to the breed. We've always had a strong focus on breeding cattle with extra thickness and structural correctness whilst maintaining a strong emphasis on constitution and temperament. We have found our Speckle Park cattle tick those boxes and allow us to breed industry relevant animals that can perform and match up competitively in the current market.
For the past 5 years we have been improving our genetic base and marketing our stud bulls and females at the Scone multi-vendor sale with great success. Now the time has come where we have the confidence that our cattle competitively match up with the top end of the breed and our breeding program has the consistency and stability to conduct our own sale on a yearly basis.
We run a small intensive Speckle herd of females with the ability to breed top quality calves. Through the use of embryo transfer we are able to continually match our top females to the best bulls in the world and consistently breed calves that meet our breeding objectives.
My wife Kylie and I make a good team, her background in Veterinary Nursing and Graphic Design compliment well on both the cattle and marketing sides of the business. We now have a full house of cattle enthusiasts. Travis, Grace and Hailey all love cattle as much as we do and there are many debates on which cow is better. We are passionate about producing seedstock and pride ourselves on our customer service.
Grant Kneipp