NT hay and cattle farm sold to Pickersgill family for $30m
Former Rabbitohs rugby league star Charlie Frith has sold Neutral Junction, a 460,900-hectare cattle station and hay farm between Alice Springs and Tennant Creek, to the Pickersgill family’s Bunderra Cattle Co for about $30 million as local buyers dominate deals in the Top End.
Neutral Junction, which Mr Frith and his wife Liz acquired in 2002, was offered for sale along with 7000 head of cattle and an oasis in the middle of the desert in the form of a 120ha irrigated hay farm.
Buyers the Pickersgills are major players in the beef sector, operating an organic operation across 10 properties in Queensland and the Northern Territory, including 447,500ha Murranji Station south-west of Daly Waters which they purchased for $23 million in 2020.
Last October, the family purchased 17,477ha Bandana Station north of Roma for more than $30 million.
The vendor of Neutral Junction, Mr Frith played 49 first grade games for South Sydney between 1979 and 1981, before establishing himself as a Queensland cattleman and beef producer,
He put Neutral Junction up for sale in February, appointing Olivia Thompson of Nutrien Harcourts in Katherine to secure a buyer.
Situated in the Southern Barkley Tableland region between Tennant Creek and Alice Springs, Neutral Junction includes a main homestead complex, about eight kilometres from the Sturt Highway, and an 800-head capacity main cattle yard.
Harvested on average five times a year, the hay farm produces between five and six tonnes a hectare.
Ms Thompson said there had been “really strong interest from a variety of buyers” for the property.
“The hay farm and cattle enterprise combined was a really big attraction,” she told The Australian Financial Review.
Ms Thompson declined to disclose the price, but said expectations had been met.
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