WITH increasing scrutiny of farming practices, South East producer Deane Goode believes it is important to meet consumer expectations of how livestock should be run.
For Deane, a focus on particular traits in his sheep breeding has meant a move away from mulesing and a simpler, more natural way of running his family’s sheep.
Deane farms at Barooka in the Wangolina district with his sons Henry, Tom and William.
About 65 per cent of the 2800-hectare enterprise is devoted to sheep, with 400 Shorthorn cows also run, while cropping is done on a small scale.
Today, the sheep enterprise is 100pc Merino although the family used to have half of their flock devoted to crossbred production in the 2000s, for quick cash flow.
“We moved away from crossbreds as our Merinos got better and better, but it took a few years to get there,” Deane said.
Rams have been sourced from the Glendemar Multi Purpose Merino stud at Marnoo, Vic, for the past 18 years.
Deane went with the stud in a bid to improve his wool quality.
“I wanted to soften our wool up,” he said.
“I’d seen wool from that area and it was so soft and so white that I thought it was the way to go.”
Deane describes himself as a “fairly biological” farmer, having used methods such as integrated pest management for many years.
The family has not mulesed sheep for the past 11 years, which Deane attributes to sourcing good genetics and focusing on plain bodies in the breeding.
“I believe you’ve got to have sheep that can withstand challenges with minimal intervention, especially as consumers are becoming much more aware of where their products are coming from,” he said.
“Traceability and welfare are such big issues these days.”
The major emphasis in the breeding was good eye muscle depth, fat and early growth, followed by fleece weight and micron.
“By focusing on these areas, our sheep are easy to manage, because they hold their condition well,” Deane said.
The emphasis on these traits has lead to great fertility in the family’s flock, with high lambing percentages of about 117pc.
About 2000 ewe lambs are also mated each year, with lambing percentages of about 60pc.
Six-monthly shearing helps to avoid penalties for long staple length
THE Goode family of Barooka at Wangolina are gearing up for shearing soon, which will be their fourth year of six-monthly shearings.
“It used to be that our ewes would be lambing with seven months of wool on them, which was not ideal,” Deane Goode said.
Ewes are now shorn a month before lambing.
Henry said with yearly shearing, the family were being penalised for the length of their fleece but taking shearing to twice a year meant fleeces were coming out at a more preferred 65-millimetre length.
Deane says he has a good feeling about the future of the wool industry.
“I’m really optimistic about it,” he said.
“But I think the need to provide sustainable, low chemical wool from non-mulesed sheep will grow more important as time goes on.”
Deane said being able to move away from mulesing had great benefits.
“We run the sheep, they don’t run us,” he said.
“If we had 50 millimetres of rain before we went on holiday, it wouldn’t make any difference, because we wouldn’t have to rush out with chemicals.”
A focus on fertility and making sure the sheep are always in at least condition score three or above have lead to great results despite seasonal conditions.
“Our lambing percentage this past year is not much less than the previous year, when it was a really good year,” Deane said.
The family aims to sell their lambs to the trade at 18 kilograms carcaseweight to 24kgcwt, at seven to eight months of age.
Surplus sheep are sold through AuctionsPlus, generally staying in the South East.
