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Bought only Ridgway Advance bloodlines - Mallee Flock Advances |
Sourcing top genetics and making a few minor adjustments on-farm enabled Mallee mixed farmer Glen Farr and his wife Tracey to produce high-quality wool, increased growth rates and ensure lambing percentages of more thn 100 per cent.
At Pyap West the Farr's crop cereals and run 700 Merino ewes on 2630 hectares.
During the past five years Glen's lambing has not dropped below 100pc. This year, 2009 it was 108 pc. He puts the increase down to good genetics and slight changes made on-farm including increased fox baiting and strategic water-point placements. Pregnant ewes are supplementary fed to improve condition, run in small mobs to avoid mis-mothering & given the best stubble feed when lambing.
While simple, these practises have enabled Glen to produce 20 kilogram wether lambs, five months old, which are sold under contract to TMC for $4/kg. Glen's most recent draft of 270 wethers averaged 21kg.
Glen has not mulesed them for the past two years to avoid a setback. "When you are selling 5-month lambs, you don't want too much of a setback in a short period of time" he said. "So far we haven't had any dramas with flystrike"
The top 150 ewe lambs are kept and the rest are sold at offshears at 1.5 years, either at Lameroo or Murray Bridge. This year they were sold at Lameroo and Elders Ouyen, Victoria were buyers at $150 of the 165 Ridgway Advance-blood ewes submitted by Glen & Tracey Farr.
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