FOR a "difficult year", woolgrower Murray Hall, AH Hall & Co, produced a result many farmers will be envious of.
With just three quarters of the annual rainfall his farm at West Kendenup usually receives, Mr Hall increased his cut per head slightly at a second-half-of-November shearing in a season when many other farmers saw both their wool volume and quality decline.
That November main shearing produced 177 bales of clean, stylish wool, averaging 19.3 microns and 100 millimetres staple length with a well-defined crimp, which sold to good competition in 20 lines at the Western Wool Centre (WWC) on Thursday last week.
The top fleece line of 13 bales sold for 1293 cents per kilogram greasy, equivalent to 1799c/kg clean.
Specifications for that line were 19.7 microns, 93mm length, 71.9 per cent yield and 40N/kt strength.
Mr Hall's clip tested at less than 0.5pc vegetable matter with high yields, a significant achievement in a dry year with little rain to wash dust and seeds out of the wool.
"We had forward cover on this wool which expired this week, otherwise it could have been in (for auction) a bit earlier, but I normally sell in January," said Mr Hall last Thursday on a visit to the WWC.
He came up to Perth with farm hand and "stock person" Meagan Parsons, who is from a nearby farm, to watch his wool sell.
"We've had a good wool growing season on the back of a much lower rainfall," he said.
"For example, we're in a 525-550mm region and last year we had 392.5mm on the farm.
"Considering that, we've had a good season and the numbers on this wool are good.
"Right now there's issues with water and we're into a fair bit of hand feeding - we only buy lupins and produce the rest of the feed on farm - but it's manageable.
"It's been a difficult year to manage but we've come out of it OK.
"We're sitting at 7500-8000 sheep at the moment and we'll lamb up on that."
Mr Hall said he had just completed another shearing of his one-and-a-half year old sheep so they will only have 10 months wool on them in November with a staple length of about 100mm and his weaners will be shorn in April.