Agriculture
1 October, 2024
The genes that are topping prime lamb market
RAM SALE - FRIDAY OCTOBER 4 PRIME poll Dorset rams used in flock breeding programs by Loddon farmers have shown their worth where it counts in the past year. The Derby Downs Stud rams have helped local farmers top prime lamb prices at weekly Bendigo...
RAM SALE - FRIDAY OCTOBER 4
PRIME poll Dorset rams used in flock breeding programs by Loddon farmers have shown their worth where it counts in the past year.
The Derby Downs Stud rams have helped local farmers top prime lamb prices at weekly Bendigo markets.
And according to stud owner Don McKinnon: “It’s about the end product ... that’s what is important for farmers.”
Mr McKinnon’s stud will next week put 90 rams under the hammer at the annual on-property sale.
A bonus for bidders will be five specially-selected rams - potential sires that have seen Derby Downs again in the breed’s ribbons at at Hamilton Sheepvention, the Australian Sheep and Wool Show and this month’s Australasian Dorset Championships in Bendigo.
At Sheepvention, Derby Downs was the most successful Dorset exhibitor. The stud had a similar run of wins at Sheepvention two years ago with Supreme Poll Dorset, Champion Ewe and Most successful lamb exhibitor.
Success has come not only for the stud’s rams but also ewes, winning Reserve Champion Poll Dorset ewe lamb at the Australasian breed show.
“We have been reasonably successful in the show ring,” Mr McKinnon said.
Success for the stud was also seen at Bendigo saleyards in 2021 when Derby Downs lambs sired by its rams made record a then record price of $ 357 for heavy lambs.
About 20 years ago, Derby Downs had back-to-back wins as the supreme champion Poll Dorset sheep and to achieve this “means everything”.
“Showing sheep allows the sheep industry to recognise correct structure, shape and muscle,” Mr McKinnon said.
Mr McKinnon said this year’s show successes augured well for the stud’s future breeding program.
He said the specially selection of five rams to be offered would give purchasers an animals that could be put straight into stud sire duties. Mr McKinnon said the stud genetics aimed to produce early maturing prime lambs that were sought after by market buyers and meat processors.
“We traditionally have auction buyers from the Hamilton and Ballarat districts and occasionally Mildura,” he said.
““But on the most part, the support at our annual on-property auction is from local prime lamb growers,” he said.
The McKinnon family started the Derby Downs stud in 1956 at Derby Farm, Leichardt with Dorsets.
Mr McKinnon was there for the start of the Poll Dorset breed, and remembers how it was a hard sell at times.
“Because the Dorset Horn was the dominant prime lamb breed, when the first Poll Dorsets came out of South Australia people used to hold horns that had come from the Dorset Horns up to the poll’s heads to show how they looked just like the Dorset Horn,” Mr McKinnon recalled.
But at Derby Downs, now based near Marong, they adopted the new poll genetics early on.
“We just like lots of others at the time would get what was a fairly good poll ram and just put them over your horn ewes and nearly all your lambs would be polled and about 50 per cent of your ram lambs would be clean polled,” he said.
Mr McKinnon judged the first Poll Dorset showing at the Sydney Royal Show in 1978.
“I just love the breed. I could have gone anyway when I first went farming, I was tempted by Corriedales at one stage and I love seeing a good Merino - I still do,” he said. According to Mr McKinnon, the Poll Dorset breed has proven popular over the decades because of its ability produce the lambs the market wants.
“So we’re hoping for another good clearance at this year’s sale,” he said.