Rain, at last! We were able to continue with planting our cereal crops and begin lamb marking. We got a first look at the lambs from the November ET and AI program that brought in fresh genetics.
Joy and Allen took a quick trip to NSW to view the Coonong Dohne Sire Evaluation trial. This is the first AMSEA trial using a majority of Dohne rams alongside two Poll Merino link sires.
Congratulations to the Coonong owners and staff for their enthusiasm in hosting an event of this scale. It was a very worthwhile excursion for us as we have used two of the sires entered and had bred two here at Glen Holme, both of which had been trialed elsewhere.
We found that the daughters of both Glen Holme rams performed to our publicly stated goals. That is to breed a line of sheep with balanced production traits to suit both meat and fibre markets.
It was valuable to see the hogget progeny of a Harewood rams that we had just marked lambs from here. It was reassuring to view what we might expect to have as ewe hoggets next year.
Many thanks to the Australian Dohne Breeders Association Council for supporting this project with significant funding to bolster the entrance fees paid by breeders, along with support from AWI.
We also recognise the courage of studs who entered rams not knowing how they would perform in a new environment, well done.