WA Merino producers will have a university student to thank once a study on the trade-off between breeding sheep for meat production and ewes' maternal efficiency is completed.
Andrew Kennedy is currently researching maternal genetics and how they are managed, as part of his PhD studies at the University of WA, which is funded by the Sheep Cooperative Research Centre (Sheep CRC) and the Agriculture and Food Department.
The study aims to quantify how selecting sheep with both meat and wool traits affects ewes' maternal efficiency and ultimately how this affects farm profit per hectare.
Mr Kennedy, who after completing a Bachelor of Applied Science in Agriculture at Melbourne University and working for the Victorian Department of Agriculture before moving to Perth last year, said during the next three years, his work would focus on developing a better understanding of the management and selection of maternal genetics and how it affected overall farm profits.
"Maternal efficiency encompasses several aspects, including mature size, reproductive rate and a range of easy care traits, such as reduced wrinkle, worm resistance and robustness when exposed to nutritional stress," Mr Kennedy said.
"There is increasing speculation that big ewes are not always the most efficient because they have a higher energy requirement, however they may also produce the bigger lamb.
"We hope to offer some direction to producers around this trade-off.
"We are trying to prioritise traits and determine the relevant selection pressure, based on regional constraints, such as drought or growing season, from an economic viewpoint."
Mr Kennedy said, for example, taking sheep from a drier region into a high rainfall environment may require the sheep to be managed differently because they may not possess the traits required to be profitable in that environment.
Mr Kennedy's work is being assisted by the commissioning of a feed intake facility at the Medina research station south of Perth.
The facility, which is funded by a State Government Centre for Excellence grant, can measure the individual feed intake of up to 240 sheep at any one time, the largest currently available in Australia.
In addition, Mr Kennedy is using a flock of about 450 sheep from Merinotech WA and Moojepin Multi-Purpose Merinos with full pedigree and Australian Sheep Breeding Values (ASBV's) to provide the basis for his modelling. These sheep are located at UWA's Pingelly farm.
"To effectively determine the impact of selection for growth and carcase traits on maternal efficiency, it is important to understand the biological correlations between these traits and growth parameters and feed use," Mr Kennedy said.
"Then we can determine the impact of such a selection strategy on farm profits using models that take into account seasonal variation over a 40 year period.
"Ultimately, this information will help Merino producers make more informed decisions about their breeding strategies to optimise profitability."
DAFWA senior scientist and Sheep CRC program leader Dr Andrew Thompson said that the overall project would be greatly assisted by the feed intake facility and would link in with other projects measuring methane output from sheep.
Dr Thompson said the work would make a significant contribution towards understanding the true value of production and disease resistance traits.
"The average liveweight of Merino and crossbred ewes has increased by six and eight kilograms respectively since 1990," Dr Thompson said.
"Because selection indices are developed based on per head production we don't know if this translates to extra dollars per hectare."
In regards to the sheep industry, Mr Kennedy said it's looking very positive at the moment.
"There is great demand for sheep, and people are trying to get back into the industry," Mr Kennedy said.
Project leader Mark Ferguson, also from DAFWA, said with all the right breeding values, sheep will be a good industry to be in.
"You will always make money off the sheep's back, so if you get good lambs, sheep is hard to beat," Mr Ferguson said.
"Wool is a low risk commodity, sheep will always produce wool."
Mr Kennedy said farmers should be able to benefit from their research by the end of the year when economic data will start to become available.
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