Australia’s biggest cow ‘Knickers’ has a new protege to keep him company while he reigns as king of the herd on a Western Australian cattle farm.
Standing 6ft 4in (194cm) to his shoulders and weighing more than 1,400kg, the massive eight-year-old Holstein Friesian steer shot to global fame last year after he was filmed towering over the herd.
His new pal, dubbed Lucky, is no stranger to the limelight himself as he was dramatically taken from a dairy farm on camera by extreme vegan activists a year ago.
Knickers, a massive 6ft 4in steer weighing 1,400kg and living as king of the herd on a Western Australia farm, is Australia’s biggest bovine and showing his tiny protege Lucky the ropes
The eight-year-old behemoth is believed to be the biggest in Australia and one of the tallest in the world, measuring 6ft 4in (194cm) to his shoulders and weighing more than 3,000lbs (1,400kg)
Knickers’ owner Geoff Pearson said the pair were inseparable since Lucky was separated from a group of 60 cattle his feedlot near Lake Preston, south of Perth, bought a few months ago.
‘They’re always together, they go for walks, eat, drink, and sleep together… you could say Knickers is protecting him from being stolen again,’ he told Daily Mail Australia.
‘He’s quite a friendly animal because of the handling he’s had, both from being stolen and with the police.’
Lucky was spared from the slaughter because he is now considered evidence in the case against the activists accused of stealing him.
James Warden, local leader of Direct Action Everywhere, and his co-accused Katrina Sobianina allegedly broke into White Rocks Dairy, near Bunbury, WA, last October and ‘rescued’ him.
The pair claimed Lucky was being mistreated and they were ‘forced to act’ when they saw him ‘collapsed on the floor of a massive factory farm’.
Lucky, is no stranger to the limelight himself as he was dramatically stolen from a dairy farm on camera by extreme vegan activists a year ago (Lucky pictured with vegan leader James Warden, 25, during the livestreamed ‘rescue’)
‘When animals like this calf are being abused, we try to help them,’ Warden, 25, said in April, claiming police ‘seized’ Lucky from a vegan family caring for him.
‘Ordinary Australians support us in these efforts. But instead of addressing the animal cruelty, the authorities are terrorising vegan families and sending their companion animals to slaughter.’
White Rocks owner Michael Partridge said he was ‘amazed with the lies [the activists] tell’ and denied Lucky was ever mistreated on his farm.
‘Our farm has been open on many occasions to show our production system. We’ve got nothing to hide here.’
Warden and Sobianina admitted to trespassing on to White Rocks and another farm late last year, but not guilty to stealing the $1,500 calf along with a piglet from another property.
The ongoing case means Lucky has teamed up with Knickers on Mr Pearson’s farm for the foreseeable future, where the record-breaking steer is dealing with his celebrity.
Knickers will make his first public appearance at the Brunswick Agricultural Show, near Bunbury, on Saturday, where families can get up close to him for a $2 donation.
‘It’s quite daunting being up close to him, he’s far bigger than any other steer I’ve had. But he’s very placid, not aggressive, just inquisitive,’ Mr Pearson said.
Knickers’ massive 70lbs-a-day (30kg) diet is a mix of natural green pasture and rations of cereal grain that helped him be a standout steer from an early age
Knickers is only slightly shorter than Mr Pearson’s son Tex, 17, (left) who stands at 6ft 7in (204cm), and is even taller when measuring to the top of the massive beast’s head
All proceeds go to the Blue Tree Project, which helps farmers battling mental illness brought on by the crippling drought.
Getting Knickers to the show will be a tough task as during a trial run this weekend it became clear he was far too big to fit on Mr Pearson’s truck trailer.
The enormous animal is so big, double the weight and half a metre taller than an average Holstein Friesian steer, that he was too big to be slaughtered in an abattoir and made into steaks.
His massive 70lbs-a-day (30kg) diet is a mix of natural green pasture and rations of cereal grain, but his gargantuan size is mostly the result of genetics.
Knickers will make his first public appearance at the Brunswick Agricultural Show, near Bunbury, on Saturday, but getting him there will be a tough task as during a trial run it became clear he was far too big to fit on Mr Pearson’s truck trailer
Knickers is so big, double the weight and half a metre taller than an average Holstein Friesian steer, that he was too big to be made into steaks and lives out his life as king of the herd
Knickers was only slightly shorter than Mr Pearson’s son Tex, 17, who stands 6ft 7in (204cm), and is even taller when measuring to the top of the massive beast’s head.
Vets said steers grew to be far bigger than bulls because they were castrated young and don’t go through the hormonal changes that stop bulls growing.
The world’s tallest living steer, or bovine of any kind, is an Italian chianina ox called Bellino that stands just over two metres, and the heaviest ever weighed 5,000lbs (2,267kg).
A South Australian Guernsey steer named Big Moo was the previous Australian record holder but only came up to 6ft 2in (190cm).