With Rockhampton’s iconic Beef Australia expo just weeks away, the city has set about sprucing up its most prized assets … a herd of bull statues.
The six bulls, dotted along the main roads of Rockhampton, are a familiar sight to grey nomads always on the lookout for something just a little bit different.
The bulls have been in place for nearly half a century but have had their adventures along the way, including repeated theft of their testicles. According to the ABC, the council even employs someone who makes replacement concrete bull balls, although demand is believed to have declined since steel rods were inserted into the testicles to make theft more difficult.
Beef Australia is a national beef expo held every three years and the council will spend $15,000 sprucing up the bulls, and it has commissioned well-known local artist Bill Gannon to head the project.
“The bulls are very important … some people might think they’re just a bit of funny little regalia that go with living in the area, but I think they tell their stories,” Mr Gannon told the ABC. “As we’ve been painting them, each of them have their own character and we’ve enjoyed doing it.”
The six existing bull statues represent the main breeds of the area including Brahman, Santa Gertrudis, Romagnola, Braford and Droughtmaster.
But with more than 30 breeds to be represented at this year’s expo, there have been calls to boost the highway herd.
“It would be nice to have 32 bulls right throughout Rockhampton, but that might be a bit of an overkill,” Beef Australia chief executive, Denis Cox, told the ABC. “It’s great to have at least six or seven around town.”
The beef expo will be held in May and is expected to attract as many as 100,000 people.
• Are you a fan of the Rockhampton bulls? Are you heading into town for the Beef Expo? Comment below.
Does Rockhampton have free camping facilities before,during and after the Beef Expo for Gray Nomads
not if the caravan park owners have a say in it. At this point Kershaw Park free is still going but for how long….
As a young bloke growing up in Mackay, it was the local sport to drive down to Rocky and knock off the bulls balls.