Golden Grove Stud getting back on track
Hunter Valley farm Golden Grove Stud is in the process of embarking on a plan to become a full-scale commercial entity after being hard-hit by drought in recent years.
The 259-acre property, near Denman, is owned by Melbourne businessman Sean Buckley and large-scale Northern Territory pastoralist Viv Oldfield with the latter taking charge of Golden Grove Stud in recent times.
Golden Grove Stud manager Grant Mackay said the change in direction had started last year with the relocation of the Buckley and Oldfield-owned Shamus Award (Snitzel) relocating from Widden Stud to Rosemont Stud in Victoria.
“The drought really hurt us, particularly on this farm, but we’ve put things in place to hopefully future-proof the farm more than anything,” Mackay said yesterday.
“There’s always been a good water supply under the (Wybong) Creek that fronts the farm. Basically, all we did was cleaned up and repaired the irrigation equipment that was already there, which we’re allowed to do.
“We haven’t gone and added anything but we’ve undertaken a heap of maintenance on what was there. There’s more water under the creek than what there is in it.”
Buckley’s horses are now located at Barree Stud in Victoria while Oldfield currently has about 13 mares on Golden Grove, which has bounced back with good rainfall this year.
“They took Shamus Award down to Victoria and it was more of a convenience thing with Sean having Barree, his own personal farm that he’s got down there,” said Mackay who has been with Golden Grove since August 2017.
“Viv’s got a few mares that he sends to Shamus Award as well and then he’s got a few others that he sends elsewhere.
“We’ve got 12 or 13 of Viv’s and he’s still got a couple of more who we left in Victoria to go to stallions like Written Tycoon, so they were down there for last season while we got this place back up and running and ready to go. They will come home for this season.”
Golden Grove took two yearlings owned by Oldfield to the Magic Millions Adelaide Yearling Sale in March and averaged $87,500 while Mackay said the intention was to take on more outside clients for the foaling down of mares, servicing the Hunter Valley stallion farms as well as the spelling of racehorses.
“We will be doing the whole lot. We are within 40 minutes of Widden and 45 minutes of Scone and a tick over an hour to Aquis, but the rest of them are centrally located,” said Mackay, the son of “battling Queensland trainer” Reg and brother to Grafton trainer Brenden.
“There’s 259 acres at Golden Grove and we have another farm that we are just starting to get up and going – the old Riverslea Farm on Rosemount Road, but it’s not operational yet.”