The Willows in Coolac, New South Wales | Farm

The Willows

Locality: Coolac, New South Wales

Phone: +61 402 028 056

Address: 'The Willows' 188 Cootamundra Rd 2727 Coolac, NSW, Australia

Website: https://www.willowsplg.com.au

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25.01.2022 Sprinklers to settle the dust better for us, sheep and dogs thanks Peter and Mitch !

23.01.2022 *Maximising KG’s Lamb per Hectare Requires Low Birth Weight Rams* We made the following points in our last post: *To maximise your prime lamb enterprise performance (XB)*... 1. Use rams with low birth weight ASBV's so let genetics limit your single lamb size rather than starving the ewe. 2. Use teasers for 3 weeks before joining and 80 -90% will join in the first cycle. 3. Lamb all ewes on 1100kg - 1200kg of dry matter per hectare. 4. Remove dry's at lamb marking. 5. If you can't do the first 4 steps, scan your ewes into ewes that will lamb in their first 3 weeks and ewes that will lamb in the second 3 weeks of your 6 week lambing period. Remove dry’s. 6. Could also scan for singles if you’re very short of feed. Due to feed back we thought we should expand on the benefits of selecting genetics to manipulate birth weight and maximise growth rather than inhibiting the ewes feed intake. Limiting ewe feed intake also reduces lamb weight gain so in turn reduces kgs of lamb produced per hectare. ******************************************************************** If you want to increase the KG’s of lamb produced per ha - buy low birth weight (BWT) rams. One attached table shows the BWT (Birthweight) ASBV averages of our rams as compared to the averages for Terminal genetics. You can see that we have been consistently well below the terminal averages, due to heavy selection pressure on BWT. We rarely pull a lamb, and if we do it is usually malrepresented multiples, not big singles. Our ewes lamb at an average CS of 3.5-4 and live weight of 75-85kg depending on the season yet still have average birth weights of 5.3kg for singles and 4.7kg for twins. According to Life Time Ewe Management optimal birth weight is 4.5-5.5kg. Often the discussion seems to be about manipulating the environment to manage lamb birth weights, which is missing half of the equation the genetics! Low BWT is antagonistic with growth hence many terminal breeders don’t put much selection pressure on it and rely on manipulating the condition of the ewe to control lamb birth weights. It can be done though, as shown by the other table which lays out the PWWT (Post-weaning weight essentially growth from birth to post-weaning) averages for the same years as the BWT table. You can see that our PWWT ASBV’s have either been on par with the rest of the terminal database, or in recent years have surpassed it, all while maintaining low BWT. *Summary* 1. Match available pasture to when ewes lamb, more important than singles or twins. 2. Use genetics to limit birth weight of singles so you can maximise lamb growth rate. 3. Use genetics to maximise lamb weight gain.

15.01.2022 In US dollars US lamb prices due to variations in our exchange rates were higher than now from June to Aug 2019 and half of 2011 this is going to support current lamb prices with current low supply

10.01.2022 We have tried a few different tag options for tagging our stud lambs at birth. We tag with one EID tag and one Visual ID tag. Most brands have at least one disadvantage - ID number not printed in an easy to read place on both tags, piercing stem too large for tagging newborns which results in higher rates of infection and poor tag retention, tags being supplied in differing strip amounts which makes handling the tags in the paddock difficult. This is our first year trying Zee...tags and so far we are impressed. The tags are small and light with clear numbers on each and a small, sharp piercing stem. The visual and the EID tags are the same except for a different coloured female end on the EID. Same applicator for both tags, and both come in the same boxed amounts. They are much better for tagging of newborns. Will be great to see results at lamb marking time - we are expecting much higher rates of retention and lower rates of infection or rotated tags. See more

08.01.2022 Thankyou to Rachel for visiting our farm https://www.dropbox.com/s/gm2sd65y732zqx2/Farm%20Trip.mp4

07.01.2022 A successful set of quads!

06.01.2022 Please see my webpage

02.01.2022 Lambing is kicking off for 2019!

01.01.2022 Mum checking on her lambs while we are tagging and weighing them. Showing fantastic maternal instinct!