- Vote for the people’s choice award for the Sheep and Wool Challenge
- Final breech strike genetics program newsletters available
- RamSelect Plus
- Drought and climate adaptation program
- Upcoming events
- eBulletins
1. Vote for the people’s choice award for the Sheep and Wool Challenge
The Sheep and Wool Challenge has closed and it is now over to you to vote for the people’s choice award.
Click on this link http://bit.ly/2g7hPyU to watch the five video entries.
And then click here to vote for your favourite video https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/votingsheepwoolchallenge.
There is $500 up for grabs for the winning entry. Voting closes 9am Tuesday 5th September.
Click here to find out what the Sheep and Wool Challenge was all about.
2. Final breech strike genetics program newsletters available
Australian Wool Innovation projects on breech strike genetics run in Armidale, NSW (CSIRO) and Mt Barker Research Station, WA (DAFWA), were completed in 2016. During this time breech strike resistance and susceptible flocks at both locations were fully pedigreed and comprehensively measured for a wide range of traits whilst managed under flystrike challenge conditions.
Both projects concluded that indirect measures of breech strike, including breech wrinkle, dag, urine stain and breech cover are good measures to use and much simpler than breech strike itself. However, the extent to which they will reduce breech strike is dependent upon your sheep type, specific climate, production environment and breeding objective. Any struck sheep should be culled.
There were some moderately unfavourable associations between indirect selection criteria for breech strike and economically important production traits (there is a trend for lower wrinkle sheep to have lower fleece weight but there are sufficient numbers of lower wrinkle sheep with higher fleece to find and breed and gain breeding momentum over time). The same applies for low worms and higher dags but again there are sufficient numbers of sheep that are good for both. Finding the best balanced animals for your business can be obtained from the MERINOSELECT ASBV Website Search Function.
The unknown causes of breech strike have remained difficult to find despite considerable effort. However in ewes breech strike risk factors are largely influenced by breech wrinkle dag stain and cover and significant progress can be made using this traits.
Further information, including results from the two breech strike genetics projects are presented in the final two newsletters, available here:
- CSIRO Armidale Newsletter Issue 7 – November 2017 (PDF 1933Kb).
- DAFWA Breech Strike Resistance Newsletter Issue 7 – July 2017 (PDF 953Kb).
3. RamSelect Plus
RamSelect Plus is the latest version of the popular web-based app designed to simplify the use of Australian Sheep Breeding Values (ASBVs) so that you can quickly and easily identify the right genetics for your flock using objective data from Sheep Genetics— MERINOSELECT, LAMBPLAN and DOHNE.
RamSelect.com.au quickly searches all rams currently listed for sale and selects those that align with your specific breeding objective.
And RamSelect Plus now features new benchmarking tools so that you can better manage your ram team, compare your ram selections to national averages and track team performance and impact over time.
RamSelect Plus is mobile friendly and can be easily used on a phone or ipad.
Click here to go the RamSelect website.
4. Drought and climate adaptation program.
The Drought and Climate Adaptation Program (DCAP) is an initiative to improve drought preparedness and resilience for Queensland producers. The program aims to do this by delivering a range of research, development and extension projects, improve seasonal forecasting and provide tools and systems that will support producers in their decision-making.
DCAP consists of a number of projects that are managed and funded through a series of partnerships with government and industry partners. The largest partnership is the establishment of the Queensland Drought Mitigation Centre (QDMC) with the University of Southern Queensland and the Department of Science, Information Technology and Innovation.
QDMC aims to improve seasonal forecasts for northern Australia, provide decision support tools for farm managers, and provide advice on climate change projections at regional level and how to adapt to the changing climate.
Another major component of DCAP is the GrazingFutures project that aims to help graziers in Western Queensland build resilience in their businesses and to recover from drought as quickly as possible.
5. Upcoming events
SEPTEMBER 2017
1 September, Getting to know and manage your soils, Injune. For more information click here.
4 September, Biosecurity Workshop, Charleville. For more information or to register click here.
5 September, Biosecurity Workshop, Morven. For more information or to register click here.
5 September, Pest Animal Management and Chemical Training workshop, Hughenden. For more information or to register click here.
6 September, Biosecurity Workshop, Augathella. For more information or to register click here.
6-12 September, RCS Farming and Grazing for Profit, Toowoomba. For more information or to register click here.
12 September, Workplace Essentials seminar, Goondiwindi. For more information or to register click here.
12-13 September, WestTech, Barcaldine. Click here to visit the website.
13 September, Workplace Essentials seminar, Stanthorpe. For more information or to register click here.
14 September, Pest Animal Management and Chemical Training workshop, Longreach. For more information or to register click here.
15 September, Pest Animal Management and Chemical Training workshop, Muttaburra. For more information or to register click here.
26 September, Property Computer Mapping Workshop, Yaraka. For more information or to register click here.
27 September, Property Computer Mapping Workshop, Barcaldine. For more information or to register click here.
28 September, Property Computer Mapping Workshop, Winton. For more information or to register click here.
OCTOBER 2017
4 October, Grazing BMP Accelerated Workshop, Taroom. For more information or to register click here.
4 October, Feral Pig Trapping Workshop, Longreach. For more information please call Desert Channels Queensland on 07 4658 0600.
10-12 October, Nutrition EDGE, Quilpie. For more information please contact Darren Jennings.
17 October, Pest Animal Management and Chemical Training Workshop, Bollon. For more information or to register click here.
19 October, Pest Animal Management and Chemical Training Workshop, Injune. For more information or to register click here.
19 October, Livestock Technology (StockTech) Field day, Quilpie. For more information or to register click here.
20-22 October, Channel Country Ladies day, Jundah. For more information click here.
24-25 October, Grazing BMP, Thargomindah. For all enquiries please contact Andrea Wiles.
31 October, Decision Making Workshop, Longreach. For more information please contact Kiri Broad.
NOVEMBER 2017
2 November, Decision Making Workshop, Charleville. For more information please contact Darren Jennings.
16-17 November Young Beef Producers Forum Roma. To visit the website for more information, please click here.
21-22 November Grazing BMP, Morven. For all enquiries please contact Andrea Wiles.