Wether trial uncovers substantial variations in value of production

A Pingelly wether trial has found huge variation in the value of production of wool and meat from the progeny of industry-leading Merino sires. Sharing his research at the Pingelly Merino Lifetime Productivity Project field day last Thursday at the University of WA’s Ridgefield farm, Murdoch University adjunct associate professor John Young presented the value of production per head. Mr Young said Murdoch University’s assessment of the wether trial found there was up to 50 per cent variation in the value of production, derived from the MLP Project’s battery of 29 good-quality sires. He said meat value varied by $15/head when animals where assessed at a young age, and wool value varied by $25/head when assessed after three shearings. “This tells us that there is a lot of genetic variation in the industry so it does seem that some form of genetic evaluation is important,” he said. Mr Young said the wethers were measured as part of the Genetic Evaluation, Productivity Efficiency and Profit add-on project, funded by Australian Wool Innovation. “Mostly this add-on project measured the amount of income generated per animal (wether) weaned,” he said. “The calculations were per animal at the start of the trial, taking into account the number that died.” He said the industry did not have a way to select rams on the basis of mortality. “There is a pending review of MerinoSelect to address this issue,” he said. Shearing at 30 months of age was significant, derived from wool income achieved at that time divided by the number of animals weaned. “The wool from each particular sire’s group was put into a line and valued as a line of wool, which is what actually happens on-farm,” he said. He said 10-month-old lambs were individually valued for the prime lamb market, the ones that weren’t up to standard were valued as stores and the older lambs were valued for the export market. “Some sire progeny teams had high total value at both the early and late assessment which would give producers flexibility to move between production systems,” Mr Young said. “I believe that profit per hectare, the project’s next phase, is the most important measure for commercial producers. “Profit per hectare is in our sights and our assessment would be made available at next year’s field day.”