Australia's biggest and most lucrative thoroughbred sale has been hobbled by the coronavirus crisis, with this week's Inglis Easter yearling auction to be held solely online.
The Inglis family has been auctioning some of the world's finest bloodstock for more than 100 years, including from elite nurseries like the New South Wales Hunter Valley.
The Easter sale has offered online bidding for the past decade in addition to telephone and ringside bidding.
But Inglis spokesman Sebastian Hutch said unprecedented times called for unprecedented measures, and all horses would not be sold in the flesh this year.
"As you can appreciate, there are challenges for people involved in the sale, not just for the people selling and breeders, but also buyers," he said.
"This sale is the premier source of elite equine athletes in the Southern Hemisphere, so it presents us with huge challenges.
"We are very fortunate that we can facilitate the sale through an online platform, and hopefully it can generate some positive outcomes for people."
Thoroughbred Breeders Australia president Tom Reilly said the pandemic had been a game changer — more than 150 of the 517 yearlings initially catalogued have been withdrawn from the sale.
"It is the first time a major yearling sale is now going to be held online, and so all the horses are remaining at their farms and people will be bidding online," he said.
"The the sale attracts people from all over the world, and going online is a real obvious example of how [coronavirus] is impacting."
Travel bans create uncertainty for breeding season
Outside of the sale ring there is more uncertainty, with the pandemic threatening the arrival of overseas stallions.
These dual-hemisphere stallions cannot fly alone and must be accompanied by grooms, but that is not possible with Australia's borders closed to visitors.
"The worry now is not so much the horses infecting anyone, but the people handling the horses," said John Messara from Arrowfield Stud.
"I am hoping they do shuttle back into Australia, as it gives us diversity in breeding and it is an important part of what we do here."
Reilly said the breeding season was crucial economically for dozens of regional and rural communities.
"Anything that disrupts that obviously has a flow-on effect in those communities," he said.
"We are doing everything we can to work with government to try and keep the industry going."
Horse transporter in limbo
Quentin Wallace has worked in livestock transport for 50 years and said he was not sure if international thoroughbreds would be able to travel this year.
"We have no difficulty moving the horses around the world, it is the grooms who go with the horses that are the issue," he said.
"[The grooms] are treated the same as any passengers who go backwards and forwards and therefore they're banned entry."
An industry study from December by AgriFutures found Australia had the world's second largest thoroughbred breeding industry.
There are around 660 stud farms across the country, predominantly in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland.
The study said the industry was worth more than $1 billion a year, employing close to 8,000 people, particularly in rural and regional areas.
