Roma Qld July 16 2015

Roma Qld. July 16, 2015

Up early and down to the cattle saleyards to see the country folk at work. Thursday is 'Prime' day, what that means is that these cattle are all heading to the meat works. It was a slow day, only 1600 head going through, but boy do they make some action. It's just so fast and so slick. The cattle are penned into smaller lots - maybe 20 at most in each pen. The Auctioner and circus walk along the high walkway between the pens, the buyers are at cow level on the other side of the pen. You have to listen really close to understand what's going on, but basically, they rattle of the lot number, the type of cattle and the price - in cents per kilo. The buyer is buying the pen lot at a given price per kilo, a weight that is measured later.

The sellers. Cattle stockyards. Roma Qld

The first bloke is the auctioneer, the next two are the recorders, the bloke with the pole is the 'paint', who makes each beast with the brand of the buyer - a brand dipped in yellow paint. The last fellow is the 'Reader', who has a RFI tag reader on a long stick. He's only needed if there's and 'out', that is when a buyer wants the pen but not one or more particular beasts, which are then outed, read and put into a sub-lot, which that same buyer normally buys but at a lower price.

The cattle. Cattle stockyards. Roma Qld

 This place can handle something like 10000 head a day. Each one of these cattle was bringing about 200 cents a head or about $1000 each today.

The buyers. Cattle stockyards. Roma Qld

The buyers, maybe 6 to 10, represent 'big business' and many are from the US, where they apparently have a spike in demand for meat at the moment. These blokes have to pay at the end of the day, maybe millions of dollars.

Now, you just can't bring your cows here to sell. No no no. You have to engage a Stock Agent, or more likely, they have already engaged you as they cruise the country touting for business. The agents organise the stock to be transported to Roma, from as far away as Alice Springs, and provide their own auctioneer and crew. The agents also have to pay the growers for all stock within 7 days, so there is a bunch of money changing hands as a result of the sales. The agents get a slice, stockyards get a slice, the truckers get a slice and the farmer, well he'll be lucky if there's anything much left!

Her's another agents crew. Cattle stockyards. Roma Qld

As soon as each pen is sold, the cattle are moved out. The whole place is a maze of gates and shuts, all operated by the ringers to steer (sorry) the cattle back out past the scanners, where each ID tag is read again, then into a special weighing pen where the lot is weighed and then out to the holding yards where they are loaded onto the trucks.

Cutting 'em out of the pen. Stockyards. Roma Qld

This is what they love, when a stroppy cow wants to get stubborn and not move out. YeeHa!. Stockyards. Roma Qld

It's fantastic to watch these blokes on the horses, they just sit there as if glued on, the horse responding in a second to every move of the cattle and the pressure from the rider's knees.

There are displays for all the world to see how much each lot went for. This one shows Lot 141, price paid 187 cents per kilo, average weight 500 kilo and average price per beast $936.

Phew!

After so much excitement we went on a bit of an attraction crawl. First, the big bottle tree:

Then the stained glass in St Paul's. Now I have stepped into a few churches around the place, and the thing that strikes you the moment you walk through the door is : OMG it's ugly! It looks like it's been built with concrete blocks, and guess what? It has, except they made the blocks themselves, and very proud of them too, they are. You can see the lime leaching out all over the walls, and its just so cold and sterile. They had a big working bee and cement rendered the columns and arches in matching smooth cement...

The only saving grace are the many satined glass windows, 15 of which are from the original church that they bulldozed in 1913 to build this thing, but reused the glass. And the hideous swing screen doors. The place looks like it needs acid washing to get rid of the stains, and then rendering with stone coloured render....

St Pauls. Roma Qld

St Pauls. Roma Qld

The new stained glass is very colourful..

St Pauls. Roma Qld

St Pauls. Roma Qld

 Next was the courthouse where the infamous Harry Redford - king of the cattle duffers, was tried after being caught red-handed after stealing a 1000 head of cattle from Bowen Downs Station near Longreach in 1870. The good people who made up the jury were so impressed by his cattle drive from Bowen Downs to Maree in SA (only 10 years after Burke and Wills died on the same track) and possibly by his daring, that they declared him 'Not Guilty'! The building is on the spot where the original courthouse was, as this one was built in 1901, the same year Harry pegged-out.

Courthouse, Roma Qld

 Further out of town, about 10km, is the fabled Mt Abundance Station, from whence Ludwig Leichhardt went wandering off on his quest to reach the Swan River in WA in 1848, never to be seen again. The property is open to the public, but only on Sundays, as they have to work full time jobs to make enough cash to stay alive.

Mt Abundance Station. Roma Qld

On the way back into town, you have to stop and take a snap of the Southern Cross Windmill. built in 1950 and bille as the 'biggest one in commercial use'. I'm not even sure that this is it, as it doesn't look any bigger than heaps of others we've seen, nor do i have any idea what the commercial use is, apart from advertising the solar & pump place and recycling the water from that tank, over and over

Souther Cross windmill. Roma Qld

So much excitement! Next on the list was the Hero's Trail. A great idea where they planted 138 bottle trees along a few streets, one for each fallen soldier in WWI, and marked each one with a cairn and a plaque. Not easy to even go close to getting a decent picture, but here goes

Bottle trees on Hero's Walk. Roma Qld

Talking of bottle trees, they of course have 'the biggest' one back down near the van park

Brian and the Big Bottle tree. Roma Qld

The other 'must-see' in town is a 3D mural inside the council chambers, which is actually pretty impressive, especially if you sit and listen to the commentary explaining what each part represents. Shame the light part wasn't working and also a shame that the Council Chambers Foyer is as cold as charity (what else would you expect?)

3d Mural. Roma Qld

3d Mural. Roma Qld

3d Mural. Roma Qld

that's it then, a tourists day out in Roma, Queensland.