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Police in New South Wales are investigating the theft of eight calves from a property near Cowra, worth between $150 and $3,000 each.
It’s part of a broader rural crimewave that NSW police say has cost farmers about $930,000 in stock so far this year.
The Holstein and Speckle Park calves, as well as an Ayrshire heifer and a steer, were discovered missing from a Gooloogong dairy farm during the morning milking on Saturday.
“We went to get the cows in at four o’clock for milking, and around half past five we went to head off and start feeding the calves,” said Ellen Zell, a dairy farmer.
“I went to the yard and thought, ‘There are supposed to be 12 calves in here and there are only four.’”
Zell and her partner finished the milking while the sun came up, hoping the eight calves would turn up in their own time, but discovered a neatly cut hole in the fence instead.
Zell said the bull calves would only be worth about $150 but the mix of highly sought-after dairy cows could fetch up to $3,000 a head.
“This is our livelihood, the heifers are replacing our stock, it’s so brazen,” she said.
Earlier this month three men were charged over the theft of 306 cattle from a cattle station in the Western Australian Kimberley region. The cattle were worth $250,000. In April another pastoralist in WA was sentenced to three years in jail for stealing 150 cattle. In January a 66-year-old man was charged with stealing 15 cattle from his employer in southern NSW.
Dr Kyle Mulrooney, co-director of the University of New England’s Centre for Rural Criminology says rates of on-farm crime are “significantly underreported”.
Mulrooney and his colleagues conduct the Australian Farm Crime Survey, and he said their results do not match the reported police statistics.
“The surveys that we do have show 80% of farmers reporting victimisation, 30% [were affected] seven or more times – those are very high levels,” he said.
Mulrooney said the effect of farm crime goes beyond the physical loss of stock, fuel, vehicles and tools. “Having someone trespass or steal your property has a psychological impact,” he said.
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“There is an awareness among farmers that they are alone when these offences happen. Fear plays such a big role in relation to other mental health issues, and we know farmers have a much higher rate of suicidality and much higher rates of self-harm compared to the general public. Crime really factors into it.”
The NSW police state rural crime coordinator, Det Ch Insp Cameron Whiteside, said primary producers had already “incurred a financial loss of at least $930,000” due to stolen cattle and sheep in 2024.
“Rural crime is not just about stock theft,” he said. “It is all incidents of crime that impact the pastoral, agricultural and pastoral industries.
“This includes, but is not limited to, fuel theft, machinery theft, farm fraud, illegal hunting, rural trespass, rural malicious damage, chemical theft and rural break and enter.”
Whiteside said stock thefts “normally” follow market price trends, where higher cattle and sheep prices lead to higher rates of theft. He urged farmers to report any apparent thefts.
“We understand [a] farmer may not know the quantity of fuel stolen, when the livestock was taken or how the machinery was removed, but we still need the crime reported,” he said. “There may be other incidents occurring in the area that they are not aware of that we do know about.”