The Yelland family had always bred Devon cattle in Cornwall. Subsequently, around the late 1870’s to early 1880’s William and Mary Yelland made the decision to breed cattle in Australia – more particularly they selected Herefords not Devon. No accurate date of the first purchase is available, however by 1882 the stud had a number of females and was registering progeny.

The original stud name chosen was ‘Treverder’ after Treverder Farm, which they left in Cornwall. By 1935 the two brothers Howard W. and Cecil Yelland agreed to divide both the property and the stud. Cecil retained the stud name ‘Treverder’, whilst Howard and his wife Margaret selected the prefix ‘Glentrevor’ for their half of the original stud.

Some years later, the original ‘Treverder’ property and stud was reunited with the Glentrevor half when Howard’s son John and his wife Enid incorporated all land, assets and stud stock back under one operation – this time under the ‘Glentrevor’ prefix.

While much use was made of the show ring in the early days, it is clear from the comparative weight records that the selection of ‘good doers’ was part of selecting stud sires as early as 1900. Early records also show heifers calving at two years and rearing a live calf every year up to sixteen years of age.

Structural soundness must have been a feature of the early cattle as show animals were exhibited at shows up to 100km distance and LED all the way. During Howard Snr. childhood he can even remember a breeder buying a bull at the Newlyn property, yoking it into a bullock team and driving the team some 500km to East Gippsland. Clearly, even the slightest structural defect in feet or legs would make this impossible.

While photographs show mature ‘Glentrevor' animals in very heavy condition, only limited grain feeding was carried out on growing cattle in those early days. Although the period immediately after the war saw the emergence of the first ‘professional’ stud grooms, and a sharp increase in heavy grain feeding of show cattle, ‘Glentrevor’ continued to rely on predominantly grass fed animals and subsequently were often excluded from the winners circle by ‘show ring specials’.

Howard W Yelland Snr. and John Yelland continued to ‘show’ animals, although they were becoming increasingly convinced that the show ring was of little relevance to the commercial beef industry. Supporting their belief was the fact that no sire introduced into the ‘Glentrevor’ stud ever came from the show system. As a result, in 1963 the decision was made to abandon showing in favour of a combination of expanded performance recording and carcase competitions.

In 1968 the stud was relocated to Milawa in North East Victoria to allow for an expansion of the stud cow numbers. In the late 1980’s John’s son Howard Jnr. became the 5th generation to be involved with the operation of the stud. During this time the stud grew to offer up to 85 bulls at an annual on property bull sale.

So effective had been the recording system of their comprehensive live weight recording, that during 1985 when BreedPlan became available, Glentrevor was able to process all previous records through the computer, which gave details of all sires back to those born as early as 1952. Effectively ‘Glentrevor’ now has over 60 years of records on BreedPlan.

In the early 1990’s John’s other sons Robert and Bruce joined the operation. The stud was relocated to Berrigan and Oaklands, which is situated in the Southern Riverina of New South Wales, to allow for further expansion by including cereal cropping, steer backgrounding & rice growing.

Unfortunately in 1997 the ‘Glentrevor’ operation was placed in the hands of receivers, which led to the complete dispersal of the entire ‘Glentrevor’ herd, all land and assets. The lot was lost.

At the stud dispersal Howard Jnr. and his wife Allison purchased 25 cows & calves and the ‘Glentrevor’ prefix to continue the tradition. In 1999 they purchased a property in Berrigan, this was the home of ‘Glentrevor Herefords’ up until 2016. The Berrigan property was sold to purchase a larger property at Finley, and this currently remains the home of ‘Glentrevor Herefords’.

This makes ‘Glentrevor’ the oldest Hereford Stud in Australia, albeit with a name change & slight hiccup along the way. Furthermore, Glentrevor is reputedly the oldest cattle stud still operating in Australia and is undeniably the oldest cattle stud still under the ownership of the founding family.
Many of the early stud records and photos have been retained by the family.

Fortunately the early records include many weights and fertility records, beautifully written in magnificent old ledgers. These records have been recognised by the University of New England as the earliest known beef cattle performance records in Australia.

Enlarged photographs of some examples are hanging in the foyer of the main entrance to the University. Howard Snr. died in June 1996, aged 93. He was a Foundation Member of the Australia Hereford Society and a Patron of the Beef Improvement Association.

The contribution by Howard Snr. to the beef industry since the early 1900’s has been acknowledged by his peers, through an annual award in honour of his pioneering contribution to objective measurement in the beef industry, entitled ‘The Howard Yelland Award’. This award is regarded as the highest honour in the Australian Beef Industry. John Yelland was honoured with the ‘Howard Yelland’ Award in 1996.