Synopsis
Broad Strategies
The Darling Catchment Map is one of my favourite “message tools”. To this day there is a
view that the control of our western rivers is in human hands. In reality nature rules and
man ‘fiddles at the edges’. The map shows the relatively small area “trapped” by large
Government owned dams and the huge area where the watercourses run free. Note all
“roads” lead to Bourke. I used to refer to this misguided control attitude as the “we must
decide “syndrome. I have since learned the economic expression “the illusion of control”,
which is exactly what this is.
Dudley Dunn gave me some very good advice when he suggested I should attend to the
cotton selling myself and not delegate it to others. As the business evolved Clyde Sydney
Head Office attended to all cotton selling and remained involved with Station (Livestock
and Grain) marketing, consistent with Station Managers retaining “ownership”. This was in
the context of ensuring, as with Branch Managers at Dalgety, the Clyde Station Managers
did not become merely “post offices” and retained considerable authority and central
involvement in matters affecting their respective stations. I followed Edward Scott’s lead
in minimising the paper war and kept in touch by phone and frequent visits-so called
“management by walking around”.
A further strategic issue that again reflected Scott’s strategic mind and his way with words
was a conversation we had about profit measurement. I had long had concerns about the
“big beef” northern Australia approach of running groups of properties as if they were a
single business and one profit centre with numerous cattle movements between stations.
This was probably appropriate in the days when the major investment was in cattle and in
many transactions the land was “given in”. In Clyde’s case, the major investment was in the
land and the concentration needed to be on getting a return on the land asset.
Consequently, it seemed to me that we should run each Station as a separate profit centre.
This also had the added advantage of being more motivational for individual Station
Managers.
When it came to livestock movements we determined to only do internal movements when
it enhanced the earning performance of both the supplying and the receiving station. The
chances of this applying, given Australia’s notoriously variable seasonal conditions, would
be rare. Edward summed all this up with the simple statement, expressed in the negative,
’”inter-station movements are not prohibited”. In practice, we did more than I envisaged.
These were done at market value, and we had to be careful to cancel out the internal
profits on consolidation.
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Chapter 22
Portfolio Description
Portfolio Description
A feature of the Clyde portfolio was its geographic spread from Central Queensland
(Longreach) down to Trangie in central-western NSW on a North/South axis and from
Bourke to Walcha on an East/West axis. It included 27,000 acres (11,000 hectares) of
laid out furrow irrigation (cotton and rotations) on the Barwon/Darling upstream and
downstream of Bourke and 74,000 acres (30,000 hectares) of land designated for dryland
farming (wheat and rotations) principally on the Trangie/Coonamble/Warren holdings.
Of the thirteen Stations (at peak) there were only three that we didn’t scale up, by the
purchase of adjoining holdings.
Another characteristic was the number of properties with river frontage and flood-out country.
The merino breeding operation included a stud flock of some 4,000 ewes. The stud was
founded in 1891 and thus is one of the longest continuous stud flocks in the country. Over
the years top sires have been purchased from Havilah, Boonoke, Haddon Rig and Uardry.
Under Clyde ownership initially, sires were sourced from Uardry and later rams from
Clyde’s internal Haddon Rig based stud at Merrimba (Warren, NSW) were introduced.
The cattle breeding herd consisted of Santa Gertrudis cows with an infusion of Belmont
Red and Red Angus blood. When seasonal conditions allow, steers are retained and sold at
20/24 months.

Portland Downs
“Portland Downs, 227,000 acres (92,000 hectares), is one of western Queensland’s largest
and best-known sheep stations. The property is said to be the largest unrestricted freehold
property in Queensland, where most of the grazing holdings are leasehold. A very unusual
feature was that the title also granted the holder mining rights.

It is situated on the northern side of the Barcoo River some 22 kilometres upstream of
the village of Isisford and 103 kilometres southwest of Longreach. It consists mainly of
beautifully shaded, rolling pebbly downs with patches of boree and gidyea scrub grassed
with Mitchell, Flinders and annuals. At one time the area was a shallow inland sea. It has
little flood-out country.

First explored by Thomas Mitchell in 1846 the land was “settled” in 1865. The early settlers
in the area were predominantly from Melbourne. After passing through the hands of at
least two owners, in 1888 Portland Downs, then 353,000 acres, was sold to a Melbourne
consortium that had formed the Portland Downs Pastoral Company Limited. It remained
under the same ownership until the early 1980’s when a young Victorian entrepreneur,
John Jaffe made a successful takeover bid for the company. Jaffe’s pastoral pursuits were
unsuccessful and after the property failed to sell at auction in 1992, it was sold by Dalgety
as mortgagees in possession to Clyde Agriculture Limited in December 1992.

The company consigned half of its first wool clip to Melbourne for sale and the other half to
London. It seems it was shipped from Rockhampton. The history of the property has been
well documented in the book “Barcoo Saga - The story of Portland Downs, a Queensland
Sheep Station” by G.W. Lilley.

At the time of purchase by Clyde, the station had an area of 192,000 acres. The eastern side
neighbouring property Birkdale of 25,863 acres, was purchased in 2002 and the Portland
Lane was leased from the local shire some years earlier. The total grazing area in 2004 was
just under 227,000 acres. The complement of livestock comprised 20,000 breeding ewes,
15,000 wethers and 1,400 breeding cows.
Typical Mitchell grass dominant, rolling pebbly downs country - Portland Downs
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A great piece of aesthetic architecture-the Merino Ram Shed - Portland Downs Portland Downs breeding cows. After Clyde sold, the property was converted to all cattle.

Merino ewes at Portland Downs The Barcoo River on Portland Downs

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Thylungra
“Thylungra 695,000 acres (282,000 hectares) is on Kyabra Creek between Quilpie and
Windorah. A unique channel country holding with hard hilly country to the north and
northeast which drains down numerous watercourses onto Thylungra, where even a single
storm can cause water spread with resulting fast-growing nutritious feed. About a third of
the total property is subject to this type of beneficial flooding. It has a wonderful history of
high lambing percentages.

Located in the Quilpie district of south-western Queensland, Thylungra was Clyde’s largest
individual property and fully stocked ran 60,000 sheep and up to 4,000 cattle. It is famous
as a top-quality large-scale sheep property. The sheep breeding flock consisted of 18,000
merino breeding ewes and their progeny and 16,000 wethers. The core cattle comprised
1,800 Santa Gertrudis breeding cows and followers. The wethers were mostly run on the
northern 246,000 acre block, appropriately called “Stoneleigh”.

The station was made famous by the pioneering Durack family and was among the first
stations settled (1868) in the region. It features extensively in Mary Durack’s Australian
pastoral classic “Kings in Grass Castles”, and its discovery and settlement are well
chronicled in the chapter “A Land Loved by Birds”. It was the starting point for the mobs
of cattle driven by Patsy Durack’s sons and cousins to stock their extensive holdings in
the East Kimberley region of Western Australia, in the 1880s. One of Clyde’s proudest Thylungra Homestead. A renovated huge family home.
possessions was Patsy Durack’s cattle brand-“7PD”, a combination of his initials and his
favourite number. To this day his horse harness equipment, including pack-saddles, are
still in the station sheds.

In later years under the ownership of Australian Estates, a UK owned Australian sugar
milling and pastoral company, it was often referred to “as the largest sheep station in the
world”. An old newspaper cutting speaks of a sheep classer classing a line of 27,000 one
age maiden ewes! This would suggest a breeding flock of at least 100,000 ewes. It was
much larger in those days.

Thylungra Homestead complex. Soft Gidyea country on Thylungra, subject to beneficial flooding and ideal for breeding.
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Getting dry, but ewes doing a great job on Thylungra Kyabra Creek tributary flowing (and spreading) across Thylungra.

Plenty of wool. Prolific growth after flooding on Thylungra