In recent years, Lifetime Ewe Management has been one of the most successful extension courses in the sheep industry, leading to many graduates lifting their ewe survival and the number of lambs they have to sell.
According to course deliverer Rural Industries Skill Training, in the past 15 years nearly 5000 producers have completed the course, which is subsidised by Australian Wool Innovation for eligible woolgrowers.
In general, men make up the majority of LTEM groups but in the Limestone Coast, one of the few all female groups has just completed the course.
The participants say it has been a great environment for them to ask questions and learn practical skills, such as condition scoring ewes, feed budgeting and pasture assessment.
The idea was born when the group's coordinator and Allflex-Coopers territory manager Stacey Lehmann moved to Kingston SE a few years ago and got talking to some local women on farms.
Many of their husbands had completed LTEM a few years ago and raved about it.
"I have been coordinating courses for about a decade, which were predominately men," she said.
"I felt like the women farmers felt not intimidated but a level of pressure that they didn't know as much as them and they didn't want to move forward in the course,
"I could see there were women interested here who wanted this information so it was easy to get the group together."
COVID border restrictions delayed the group starting as Vic facilitator Jess Revell, Rumenate Livestock Services, was unable to get into SA for many months, but the women-only group has been such a success they are exploring how to continue learning together.
Ms Revell says her first all-female LTEM group has been really enjoyable.
"The comments have been that they have found it a safe space to learn and talk to other females about things their husbands say that they might not understand," she said.
Kirsty Starling, Maroona, Kingston SE, has really enjoyed the experience, particularly visiting other group members' properties.
"We have really learnt a lot from each other and it has been terrific to see how other people's operations work," she said.
Ms Starling says Ms Revell has been terrific sharing her "wealth of knowledge", and is grateful to the male partners who have also really engaged with the group during each of the farm visits.
The women working on-farm, full time, have also been a great asset for those like herself, who juggle an off-farm job with helping on the farm
"It has been really good to have the science to back up what I had been hearing for years," she said.
"It is nice to be more involved and be able to have those conversations."
LIFETIME EWE GROUP LEARN TOGETHER
A YEAR after her husband Gavin undertook the Lifetime Ewe Management course, Blackford sheep producer Tammy Parker says it has been great to complete it too, picking up ideas for their farming business that they can discuss together.
"I followed it a fair bit with him but I didn't get it all," she said.
One of the biggest reasons Mrs Parker wanted to participate though was to show their children, who are in secondary school, the importance of continuing to learn.
"They have seen us on plenty of committees in the last few years but not really expanding our own learning," she said.
"If nothing else, it is so the kids can see we are still happy to learn and go do courses for our own education."
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Mrs Parker says with the participants in the group in a diverse range of environments - up to 60 kilometres apart between Kingston and Robe - it has been interesting to get an insight into their different businesses.
"If we did this on the one property and the same one, we would still learn although not quite as much," she said.
"By us having the group we have we have been able to see some different country in the SE."
