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Series Code: TIJ
Program Code: TIJ001123A
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00:37 The outback is the colloquial name for the vast desert region 00:42 that comprises most of Australia's interior. 00:44 It describes the emptiness, remoteness and the huge 00:49 distances of inland Australia. In fact, nothing says Australia 00:55 quite like her outback. And you can find a little of the outback 00:59 in every state of mainland Australia. The open spaces that 01:10 seem to stretch on forever tell the story of the exploration and 01:15 development of our red-brown land and reflect Australia's 01:19 pioneering spirit and unique identity. And nowhere is this 01:23 more evident than in the livestock industry, especially 01:28 on the vast cattle stations that cover much of the outback. 01:33 Australian cattle stations are often mentioned in the same 01:36 breath as the Australian outback Here cattle kings built their 01:42 empires encompassing some of the toughest and driest country 01:46 Australia has to offer. Today we're going to consider the 01:51 ultimate cattle empire and discover how it affects each of 01:56 us. 01:57 ♪ ♪ 02:17 Yes, nothing says Australia quite like our outback. From 02:23 ghost towns around the billabong to plains that stretch 02:27 to eternity, and from rugged red mountain ranges and spectacular 02:32 gorges, to the longest stretch of straight railway track in the 02:36 world and the largest mines in the world. The Australian 02:40 outback symbolizes the essence of Australia. Here in the wide 02:46 open spaces adventure and opportunity await at every turn. 02:52 And it was this sense of adventure and opportunity that 03:00 attracted men of vision who opened up the outback and 03:04 established cattle stations larger than some European 03:07 countries. Cattle station is an Australian term for a large farm 03:13 or ranch whose main activity is the rearing of cattle. Cattle 03:18 stations are a big and important part of the Australian outback 03:22 and are by far the biggest in the world. The Australian 03:30 outback is so dry and the vegetation so sparse that a 03:36 large amount of land is needed to support enough cattle to make 03:40 a living. The style of farming out here is very different from 03:46 any other parts of the world. Cattle are raised in a very 03:50 natural way. The animals are basically wild. They are usually 03:55 born and grow up without any human contact. They feed on 03:59 natural grass and rarely require any chemical treatment. Perhaps 04:07 the best known cattle king is Sydney Kidman who established 04:11 an empire in the 1890s that developed into Australia's 04:16 largest land holding and encompasses 19 properties across 04:21 four states and territories. These Kidman cattle stations 04:25 cover over 100,000 km/sq of land in total. That's more than 04:32 one percent of Australia's land mass and larger than Ireland. 04:36 One of its properties is Anna Creek, the world's biggest 04:41 cattle station which stretches across 24,000 km/sq. Now to 04:48 to put this into perspective, Anna Creek cattle station is 04:52 larger than Israel and over seven times larger than the 04:57 biggest ranch in the United States of America. So how does 05:07 an Australian cattle operate? Well, to find out we're going to 05:12 head to the Kimberly region in remote northwestern Australia to 05:17 visit the Roebuck Plains cattle station which is located near to 05:21 where the Sydney Kidman empire stretch rides through to this 05:27 region. Here in the Kimberly's dreams have always been big 05:35 while success in the Kimberly's has often been challenging, 05:39 that hasn't discouraged the indigenous stockman and 05:43 traditional land owners who now hold the Roebuck Plains station 05:47 lease. Despite challenges they operate a successful cattle 05:51 station with a herd of over 30,000 animals in western 05:56 Australia. The Roebuck Plains Station is an iconic pastoral 06:04 station bordering the Indian Ocean on West Australia's 06:08 Kimberly coast. The property has recently been handed back to the 06:14 traditional owners of the country the Yawuru people and is 06:17 now a leading cattle producing enterprise and a successful 06:21 training ground for young indigenous cattle workers who 06:26 dream to work in the pastoral industry. Aboriginal stockmen 06:33 and rural workers have played a vital part in developing the 06:37 cattle industry in the Kimberly. And Roebuck Plains Station is 06:41 playing a leading role in ensuring that this tradition 06:46 continues by training young indigenous people in the skills 06:50 of cattle work. 06:51 ♪ banjo music ♪ 07:15 Located just 14 km from the historic town of Broome, Roebuck 07:20 Plains Station covers nearly 300,000 hectares and runs more 07:26 than 30,000 head of cattle that are cared for by a work force 07:30 of mostly aboriginal stockmen with keen young trainees at 07:35 their side who are helping to build Roebuck Plains into one of 07:39 Australia's most significant cattle enterprises. The center 07:47 of the universe on any cattle station is the homestead where 07:51 the manager or owner lives. Roebuck Plains homestead is a 07:56 hive of activity. It's surrounded by sheds, machinery, 08:00 mechanic workshops, accommodations for workers, 08:04 a truck depot, cattle yards, vegetable gardens and on and on 08:09 it goes. One of the most important aspects of life on a 08:18 cattle station is that everybody who works here is part of a 08:22 close knit team. Everybody here relies heavily on each other and 08:27 everybody works hard from sunrise to sunset. Team work is 08:32 an integral part of working life at Roebuck Plains Station. 08:37 Teamwork is very important. Everyone has to do their role. 08:40 Otherwise everything could just go everywhere. Cattle would be 08:44 lost out in the scrub, or I don't know, someone could get 08:47 hurt on horseback. Very important thing to do is team 08:50 work. 08:57 Here in northwest Australia there are only basically two 09:01 seasons, the wet season and the dry season. The dry season is 09:06 the time for mustering, an incredibly work intensive period 09:10 of very long days. All year the cattle have been grazing freely 09:15 all over the property that have to be brought in to be taken to 09:20 market. Gathering the cattle together and herding them from 09:25 the vast outback paddocks to the cattle yard is called 09:28 mustering. Because of the rugged nature of the Australian 09:41 outback a lot of mustering is still done on horseback. On the 09:44 morning of the muster the stockmen prepare the horses 09:48 earlier. They are put through their paces in the yard before 09:51 being saddled up and loaded onto trucks and transported to the 09:56 paddock that is to be cleared of cattle. So, yes, horses are 10:03 still an important part of station life in Australia's far 10:07 northwest. However, more and more stations are also using 10:12 helicopters, quad bikes and motorbikes. But horses are 10:17 still absolutely essential to the operations of many large 10:21 cattle stations. This is certainly true at Roebuck Plains 10:28 Station where both helicopters and horses are used to muster 10:32 the cattle. Some of the paddocks to be mustered on this station 10:36 are nearly 100 km/sq. and the cattle spread far and wide to 10:41 graze and so the use of helicopters is integral to the 10:46 mustering operation. Often the heli musterers work in tandem 10:51 dipping and diving to drive the cattle home. They're continually 10:56 in what pilots call the dead man zone, flying low and flying slow 11:02 using small maneuverable helicopters for the muster is 11:06 now common place on many of the vast stations across 11:10 Australia that holds a total of 30 million cattle. Each year 10 11:16 helicopter musterers die in crashes, so it's dangerous work. 11:20 The helicopters go to the back corners and far ends of the 11:25 paddock to bring the cattle in towards the watering points 11:29 where the horses and motor bikes will gather them together and 11:33 walk them towards the holding yards. Once the 1000 or so 11:39 cattle from this paddock are gathered together, they are 11:43 walked about 10 to 20 km to the cattle yards during their 11:47 mustering journey. The stockmen work as a team to keep the herd 11:52 together. They move the cattle slowly and methodically to keep 11:56 their stress levels low. At the cattle yards they are divided 12:01 into groups depending on age and size. Some will be trucked to 12:06 the abattoir and others will be prepared for live export while 12:10 many of the younger cattle will be weighed and vaccinated and 12:15 cows pregnancy tested before being returned to the paddock. 12:18 Once all that is done the mustering effort will turn to 12:23 the next paddock some of which are over 200 km/sq. in size. 12:28 Cattle mustering in the outback is hard work and it's not for 12:33 the faint-hearted. But the people involved here wouldn't 12:38 have it any other way and wouldn't change their way of 12:42 life for anything. 12:52 I'm a stockman. I do a bit of branding, mustering, a bit of 12:57 fence work, do a bit of horses work, a bit of quad bike. Rope a 13:02 few bulls every now and then. Pretty much everything mate. 13:05 I love working with horses, and cattle. My favorite work would 13:11 have to be mustering or horse riding. I enjoy, out in the bush 13:16 chasing the cattle 13:17 on horseback. Gives you that good adrenaline rush. Yeah. 13:19 When we are mustering, we get up at five. Go have breakfast at 13:25 5:30. Start moving around about six. 13:27 Get our horse about 6:30. Start moving it before 7:00 13:30 ♪ banjo music ♪ 13:55 And we've got to the yard or got to the actual site where we're 13:58 going to muster. Or jump off there and wait until the chopper 14:01 comes round to bring them in. Hold the mob together and start 14:05 moving back to the yard. To do a muster, you need eight men on 14:08 horses or nine or whatever number you can make up. A couple 14:11 of boys on Toyotas, maybe a few bikes. Helicopter is the main 14:15 thing you need. That does the job quicker. The chopper would 14:19 be better to move faster than a vehicle or a motorbike or a 14:24 horse because it flies tree top height and it can move quicker. 14:27 And what if it gets out, and breaks out, you can bring it 14:31 faster. The choppers is what Roebuck Stations leaves off a 14:34 couple of acres at the back there. They're pretty much 14:36 company-owned by father and son. They own about three choppers, 14:42 R22s. They play a big role. Get the cattle out, get them all 14:46 together. Because with a horse it's take you a day and a half 14:50 to get to them or a whole day. With a chopper, it's only 14:52 something like 45 to an hour. How does it feel to muster a big 14:58 herd Numbers a couple hundred or thousand. 15:02 If you're handling about 800- 900 it'd be pretty hard 15:06 You've got to pull em up every 10 km's or something to get the 15:09 tail together 'cause you don't want to string them off too much 15:13 or they'll wander off. You've got to keep them all bunched up. 15:16 If a big bull breaks out, I'll try to get him in the mob. Bring 15:18 him back. If I can't I'll whip down in the chopper to bring him 15:22 in. When we try on horseback, we'll try to steady them cows up 15:26 And try to get them in a walking pace, not running. 15:29 Once we get them in a walking pace the calves can keep up with 15:32 their mums, they wouldn't get straggled behind. Team work goes 15:40 a long way. If you didn't have any team work you'd be pretty 15:43 much stuck in one place, you'd have gone round and round in 15:45 circles, not getting anywhere. Yeah, it's very important for 15:48 everyone to pull their weight around. You can't depend on 15:50 someone else to do your job and try and do the other one at the 15:53 same time. 15:54 ♪ cowboy music ♪ 16:10 Oh, we could be back anytime, twelve, one. This all depends on 16:13 gettin' em together. The process of mustering is is getting them 16:20 cattle out of the scrub and everything. Getting them all 16:21 together, bringing 'em all in. And pretty much clean that 16:24 paddock up. Like, you don't leave anything behind. Gotta 16:26 keep it clean because one of you'll put it back in that same 16:28 paddock. You want it to be the way that you'd put it back in. 16:32 So it's pretty much pull the livestock, export cattle up 16:34 All the marketing cattle, all your wieners. Put them with the 16:37 cows. Put your fresh watered cows back in. Leave it for a 16:41 next year run. Oh, it's a good place, this station. Yeah. Nice 16:45 cruisy little number here. A good little place to be. 16:48 Company owned. Working on a private station, you'd be in a 16:53 in a rush to do this messing around. But here you're just 16:56 pretty much just pluggin' along. 16:58 Roebuck Plains Station is about a million acres, It's huge. It 17:04 is pretty important for aboriginal people to own this 17:06 land, 'cause half the local people in town get an 17:08 opportunity to work on the stations. So with them owning 17:12 this place, well, I reckon about five percent of aboriginal 17:15 people would get a chance to come out here and have a go. 17:17 Roebuck Station is owned by the actual indigenous people. The 17:24 Yawuru tribe. ILC company pretty much just leases it and run 17:29 cattle. 17:31 ♪ cowboy music ♪ 18:08 It's been a privilege to spend some time on one of the large 18:12 and progressive cattle stations of the outback and see how they 18:16 operate and manage a herd of over 30,000 animals. It's 18:21 amazing to consider such a huge operation with so many cattle. 18:25 But let me tell you about an even larger operation, about the 18:31 ultimate cattle king and empire. Here's what it says in Psalm 18:34 chapter 50 and verse 10: 18:38 ♪ ♪ 18:44 Did you know that God is in the cattle business. Here God is 18:50 reminding us that he is the ultimate cattle king and that 18:54 his empire extends not across nine or even 19 huge properties 19:00 but across the entire planet. God is almighty He's the creator 19:07 the maker of heaven and earth and so everything belongs to 19:12 him. Every beast of the field and, yes, the cattle on a 19:17 thousand hills. His operation deals not with hundreds of 19:22 thousands, not even millions, but billions. He deals with 19:26 billions of creatures and billions of people. God is truly 19:31 the God of billions. But here's what's amazing. Although God 19:37 runs this huge empire and is God of the billions, he's also a 19:42 personal God to you and me. Isn't it amazing that Almighty 19:47 God wants to have an intimate relationship with you and me 19:50 today, and he personally cares for us. Listen to what the Bible 19:55 says in 1 Peter chapter 5 verses 6 and 7: 20:11 Jesus gives us some insight into just how much God cares for us. 20:18 When Jesus was here sparrows were insignificant little birds 20:23 that were sold for a very low price, two of them for a penny. 20:28 But listen to what Jesus said in Luke chapter 12 20:31 verses 6 and 7: 20:53 So insignificant were these little sparrows that you could 20:57 buy two for a penny. And if you bought four sparrows the seller 21:02 would throw in a fifth one for free. It was this extra sparrow, 21:07 this fifth worthless sparrow of which Jesus said, Not one of 21:12 them is forgotten by God. The point that Jesus was making is 21:17 this: If God is concerned about the fifth sparrow, the worthless 21:21 sparrow, and notes its fate how much greater must his 21:25 concern and love be for us who are worth immeasurably more 21:30 than the fifth sparrow. In God's eyes no one is worthless or 21:36 insignificant. Jesus said that God knows all about us. He even 21:40 knows the number of hairs on our head. He really cares about each 21:45 one of us. God's continued and certain care for us brings peace 21:51 and contentment to our lives and his love for us is immeasurable 21:55 and unconditional. Even though we may have made mistakes in our 22:00 lives that have separated us from God even though we may be 22:05 experiencing huge challenges in our lives, even though we may 22:09 feel worthless like the fifth sparrow, we are of immense value 22:14 to God and he still loves us with an unending love. God was 22:18 even prepared to give his entire empire in order to bring us back 22:23 to him and have a close relationship with us. He gave 22:27 his only Son Jesus to die in our place to pay the penalty for the 22:33 mistakes we have made in our lives. Here's what the Bible 22:37 says in John chapter 3 and verse 16: 22:53 When God gave Jesus, he didn't just give the best his empire, 22:59 heaven, had to offer. He gave all that heaven had. He gave 23:04 everything. He gave his empire. Without Jesus heaven just wasn't 23:10 the same, but God was prepared to give all in order to win us 23:15 back to him and have an intimate relationship with us. 23:18 That's how much he cares, that's how much he loves us. If you 23:24 would like to respond to that love and experience the peace 23:27 and fulfillment that God's care brings, why not ask for it right 23:32 now as we pray. Dear Heavenly Father, help us to 23:39 understand your greatness, your mightiness and your sovereignty. 23:43 May we grasp the truly amazing concept that although you are 23:49 the God of the billions, you are also our heavenly Father and our 23:53 God and that you are interested in us, know all about us and 23:59 love us personally. Lord, today we want to respond to that love, 24:04 accept Jesus and have a close relationship with you. Help us 24:09 to walk with you and talk with you today. In Jesus' name 24:15 we pray, Amen. 24:20 Thousands of cattle are regularly mustered from the vast 24:24 paddocks of the outback. It's been fascinating watching the 24:28 helicopters, bull catchers, quad bikes and motor bikes and horses 24:34 rounding up the cattle and moving them to the yards. 24:36 Watching it all happen on such a vast scale is a reminder that 24:41 God owns the cattle on a thousand hills and that he's the 24:45 ultimate cattle king and that his empire extends right across 24:49 this planet and beyond. Yet he's a personal God to you and me and 24:56 he's interested in each one of us and wants to have a personal 24:59 relationship with us today. He cares about us. If you would 25:04 like to respond to that love and experience the peace and 25:08 fulfillment that God's care brings, I'd like to tell you 25:12 about the free gift we have for all our viewers today. It's an 25:16 inspiring booklet called If God Is So Good. This popular book 25:21 shares the secret of finding true happiness in our lives. It 25:26 shows us ways to deal with the challenges we face in everyday 25:30 life and it shares the good news of God's great love for us. This 25:36 book is our gift to you and is absolutely free. There is no 25:41 cost or obligation whatsoever. So please don't miss this 25:46 wonderful opportunity to receive this gift we have for you today. 25:50 Here's the information you need: Phone or text us at 0436333555 25:59 or visit our website www.tij.tv to request today's free offer 26:06 and we'll send it to you totally free of charge and with no 26:10 obligation. So don't delay. Call or text 0436333555 in 26:18 Australia or 0204222042 in New Zealand or visit our website 26:26 www.tij.tv to request today's offer. Write to us at: 26:50 Don't delay phone or text 0436333555 in Australia or 26:59 0204222042 in New Zealand or visit our website www.tij.tv to 27:10 request today's free offer. Call or text us now. 27:15 If you've enjoyed today's journey, be sure to join us 27:22 again next week when we will share another of life's 27:25 journeys together and experience another new and thought 27:29 provoking perspective on the peace, insight, understanding, 27:33 and hope that only the Bible can give us. The Incredible Journey 27:37 truly is television that changes lives. Until next week, remember 27:45 the ultimate destination of life's journey. Now I saw a new 27:49 heaven and a new earth. And God will wipe away every tear from 27:53 their eyes. There shall be no more death nor sorrow nor crying 27:58 There shall be no more pain for the former things have passed 28:02 away. 28:03 ♪ ♪ |
Revised 2020-09-23