PRIME lamb producers at Esperance have scored an historic trifecta by taking the top three placings in WAMMCO's Producer of the Month awards for April 2022.
The Malaysian-based Russell family, trading as JA Russell Pty Ltd, won the April award with a draft of 323 White Suffolk-Prime SAMM lambs from their 'Oaks' property that were processed at Katanning on April 7.
The winning draft averaged 22.93 kilograms to record an impressive WAMMCO sweet spot of 99.07 per cent.
Second place went to Ash Reichstein and wife Megan McDowall, Laurina Farms, Esperance, with a line of 243 Merino lambs also processed on April 7, that averaged 21.6kg with a sweet spot of 97.12pc, while third place went to Matthias Reck, Falom Pty Ltd, Esperance, with 127 Dohne cross lambs with an average weight of 21.31kg and a sweet spot of 96.85pc.
Nutrien Livestock, Esperance agent Barry Hutcheson and Nutrien Livestock, Esperance representative Jake Hann were responsible for preparing, booking and marketing all three consignments.
The winning lambs were processed during a period of turmoil at WAMMCO Katanning when worker absenteeism induced by COVID played havoc with production, creating a serious backlog of unprocessed lambs.
The announcement of the April Producer of the Month winners last week also coincided with a visit to the Esperance properties by JA Russell director John Russell.
Mr Russell said the family began farming at Esperance as part of a global investment push that started in Malaysia and other Asian countries in the 1980s.
Other Australian investments include the Nerada tea plantation business in Queensland.
"We started out in Australia with two separate properties some distance apart then proceeded to buy up the land between," Mr Russell said.
At one stage the Esperance properties carried about 30,000 ewes and in the 1990s there was a significant investment in Dorper sheep.
A shift to Prime SAMM and later White Suffolk genetics took place about five years ago and now involves about 4000 ewes.
There are plans to increase the Merino ewe component from 2000 currently to about 6000 ewes.
"The family has not purchased extra land for the past 25 years, but we continued to reinvest profits in the business to ensure we stay ahead," Mr Russell said.
He said the company's recent appointment of a new Esperance manager, Mitch Greaves and his partner Demi, was already indicating exciting new directions for the family business.
Mr Russell predicts a bright future for Australian farming with special opportunities for commodities such as Australian lamb.
"People in some countries will not eat pork and other meat products, but all of them eat lamb," he said.
"There may be new opportunities for our lamb in countries like Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia."
Mr Greaves said the decline in Australia's sheep and lamb industry appeared to have stabilised and producers who were still in the business were focused on improving productivity to capture high global prices for lamb.
"There has been an almost perfect start to the season with 150 millimetres already recorded and hopefully the balance of our annual quota of 525mm is yet to come, while a starting price for canola of around $1000 per tonne and with lamb still around $8 per kilogram, isn't a bad start," Mr Greaves said.
Second placegetter Mr Reichstein said he was one of the few remaining sheep and lamb producers in the area about 40 kilometres north east of Esperance.
The property was taken up by his father David who was contracted by Esperance Land Development to seed 25,000 acres of pastures a year during the development phase of the 1960s.
"We have never looked back," Mr Reichstein said.
Students of Australian Sheep Breeding Values, the family spent a decade breeding Centre Plus breeders using AI before moving to buy Centre Plus breeders from Willie Harvey at Kojonup and later from local breeder Dave Vandenberghe, Wattle Dale stud.
Third placegetter Mr Reck said most of his Dohne crossbred lambs had been sold over the hooks to WAMMCO over the past six years, initially through local Nutrien Livestock agent Neil Brindley and over the past two years by his successor Barry Hutcheson and local representative Jake Hann.
Mr Reck's family moved from Germany to take up their west Esperance property in the mid 1980s.
After taking the reins of the business in 1995, Mr Reck moved from Merinos to Dohnes, sourcing his Dohne genetics firstly from Geoff Beeck, Summerfield stud, at Katanning and more recently from Kintail Park at Jerramungup.
He said his mother Maria played an integral role in the business.