Moojepin Merinos host industry open day at Katanning

The sheep breeding enterprise, near Katanning, is known for pushing boundaries in the quest to breed Merinos of the future, with decades spent taking risks, experimenting and learning.

And with many pressures weighing heavy on WA sheep producers, co-stud principal Hamish Thompson shared exactly what strategies he and his family have used to unlock the full potential of their flock at an onfarm industry open day last week.

About 40 people attended the event which put a spotlight on the sheep industry's future and included keynote speakers from neXtgen Agri, Mark Ferguson, James Lines and Amy Lockwood, and The New Zealand Merino Company's regional manager, ZQ Australia, Steve Wainewright and ZQ & ZORX relationship manager, Emma Subtil.

Mr Thompson encouraged WA growers to keep their chins up, and said while it was easy to focus on the negatives, there were still plenty of positives.

"We are all in the same boat and all have the opportunity to learn just as much from each other," Mr Thompson said.

"Let's think about the industry's future."

In his own presentation, Mr Thompson delved into the world of electronic identification (eID) and its transformative benefits.

He revealed why focusing on genetics with low inputs was a gamechanger for the bottom line and also spoke about key strategies that not only make money, but save money in the long run.

Mr Thompson said the mandatory eID, for all sheep and goats by January 2025, could not come sooner.

He said eID was needed in the livestock game and, while it may hurt the hip-pocket initially, the long-term benefits would far outweigh the costs - including full traceability and transparency through the supply chain.

"Following a single carcase from the farm, through to an abattoir and onto a dinner plate is going to be a gamechanger," Mr Thompson said.

"It will allow producers to track performance more evenly and efficiently.

"I also think sheep sale transfers will become a much easier process, without the need for National Vendor Declaration documents as we transition to the National Livestock Identification System."

Mr Thompson said technically WA sheep producers did not have to invest in any new equipment if they didn't want to record data.

However, he recommended an eID reader, set of scales and scale head for those keen to start.

"These can help transfer your flock in terms of productivity," he said.

"For the most part, if you are a commercial sheep farmer, that's all you are going to need to record things like body weight and condition scores.

"If you want to do anything with that data, basic understanding of Microsoft Excel is beneficial.

"Otherwise, there are also people who can help with data management, analysing and making sense of the data."

According to Mr Thompson, collecting data, including weaning rates and condition scores, was a simple process that could be done in the yard, at shearing, or crutching.

He said recording pregnancy scan status could be highly beneficial and reduce the number of "freeloaders" on the property.

"If we know every year there is a ewe that scans single, clearly she's going to stay, but if she scans as dry, she's a lot easier to manipulate and remove off farm.

"There's no limit on how much data everyone can collect and put together."

Animal welfare has become a massive part of what the family does at Moojepin.

For too long, Mr Thompson said producers have allowed livestock to dictate what they do, whether that be through drenching, crutching or feeding.

And it was time this changed.

"We are always doting after animals and I'm not saying we stop that, but our lives have become increasingly busy and our enterprises are becoming larger," he said.

"I really think we need to start making the sheep work for us by using animal welfare to do so.

"I think for too long we were doing all the heavy lifting, while they were doing nothing, which is probably why there's a bit of a sentiment at the moment 'sheep prices are down, so we'll just get rid of them because they are too hard'.

"We need to make running livestock easier and we need to reduce how much work we do."

So how exactly can this be achieved?

Mr Thompson suggested producers focused on parts of their sheep business that were the most time consuming, for example crutching.

The aim is not to perhaps stop it entirely, but reduce the workload as much as possible.

This can be done through careful selection and application of genetics, which has been a heavy focus at Moojepin Merinos.

Eye muscle depth has come with a massive welfare trade-off, giving the Thompson family the ability to reduce their adult standard reference weight.

"We don't want them at 80-90 kilograms, we want to reduce that and target 65kg or less," Mr Thompson said.

"That will allow us to run more ewes per hectare and increase efficiency, so we can feed that sheep less and it will stay at 65kg.

"Obviously it's correlated with increased condition score again allowing that higher stocking rate, and highly correlated with higher production.

"Just by putting that muscle on we are reducing our feed cost, but also increasing our reproduction.

"We are also seeing a higher dressing out percentage."

Through pushing eye muscle depth (EMD), Moojepin's breeding values have crept closer to those of the terminal lamb market.

The top 50pc of breeding values for EMD sit at 0.5, while Moojepin has an average of 1.6 across its flock.

Mr Thompson said genetic fat correlated with EMD and had also been a focal point for breeding over the past 20 years.

He said the benefits of breeding higher fat animals were seen in times of hardship, including in WA's "six months of drought" each year.

"That's where these high fat animals are coming into fruition," Mr Thompson said.

"Again saving feed costs, increasing survival rates and also the number of lambs born.

"Having increased body fat will allow for higher stocking rates as well, much the same as muscle.

"All of this will culminate in an animal that requires far less supplementary feeding through the dry summer and autumn months we have had."

For Moojepin, crutching has been the biggest time waster onfarm and Mr Thompson said the sooner dags could be eliminated, the better.

He said they were becoming more expensive to remove, as shearers had a preference to shear sheep rather than crutch.

A higher rate of flystrike means wool is devalued with no returns.

However the good news is, like footrot, it is quite heritable and sits around the 30pc heritability mark.

This means it can be controlled with decent selection pressure and management onfarm.

"For the industry to move into the world of non-mulesed sheep, we need to be putting time and effort into eliminating that," Mr Thompson said.

"It is in front of our minds as ram producers."

Currently, the top 50pc of animals sits at around -0.1 compared to an average -0.2 at Moojepin.

As well as flystrike, worm resistance is another issue with treatments costing Australian sheep producers millions of dollars every year.

Now, many enterprises are running into huge issues in drench resistance, which is not desirable given new chemicals come with a hefty price tag.

Mr Thompson said higher resistant sheep actually grew quickly and had higher fat, correlating with EMD and genetic fat.

"This obviously coincides with better efficiency," he said.

"The resistant sheep are going to prolong and use the current drenches we have on hand and at our disposal.

"So we are trying to push our worm resistance as quickly and as hard as we possibly can."

A top 50pc animal, as the breeding values sit now, is -20, whereas Moojepin is sitting at -40 as a flock average.

Breech cover and wrinkle have become a thing for the ages in breeding, with a substantial amount of wool cut off a plainer bodied sheep.

Mr Thompson said both traits tied in with reproduction and as soon as the wrinkle was dropped and breech cover decreased, reproduction went through the roof.

"That goes without saying, we get less fly strike," he said.

"They're obviously highly desirable traits, if we're going to transition away from mulesing.

"In this environment that we're in, mulesing is going to become front of mind once again in the not too distant future.

"So these are things I think we really need to highlight."

Mr Thompson went on to say that producers should also focus on weaning rates.

He said losing any number of lambs was not ideal and this had perhaps become one of the nation's biggest animal welfare issues.

"There's obviously huge financial gains to be made in 5pc of lambs lost, let alone 10-15pc," Mr Thompson said.

"High weaning rate is up there with the biggest free kick I think.

"Programs like Towards 90 are going to help us drive that weaning rate up, but we can do it genetically as well."

Moojepin has found some of the genetics they are playing around with are superior in their weaning rate.

These tie in with almost all of the traits Mr Thompson touched on, including eye muscle depth and fat, which are huge drivers of such.

Mr Thompson said weaning rate could be bolstered by removing any free loaders or dries from the flock - this is something eID can help with.

He said the top 50pc breeding values for weaning was 0.09 - equating to about nine extra lambs per 100 ewes joined.

"Welfare is a really powerful tool moving forward," Mr Thompson said.

"We have had a bad rap and that's sort of encapsulated with many organisations that we don't really align with.

"However, it has allowed us to tap into these problems head on and find a few solutions for."

Mr Thompson added, "if we adopt even just a few of these traits we have the power to reduce so many of our inputs in our livestock enterprise.

"I would just say be targeting the area where you spend the most time and that you hate most, that's where you would start," he said.

"We don't leave our cropping enterprise by chance, so just don't let your sheep merely be sheep.

"Let's make them work for us."