FATHER and son team, Terry and Wayne Scholz rose before the crack of dawn last week to make the long trip from Pleasant Hills, NSW, to Melbourne to watch their wool being sold.
However the trip was worth the effort, with their 82 bales topping at 923 cents a kilogram greasy.
They chose to sell their wool on a day the wool market lifted significantly. Their agent, Landmark Albury's David Johnson said the price was 150c/kg up on last year's result.
"That works out to about $300 per bale, so it's a big lift," he said.
"There's just not enough wool around, and that's combining with strong demand for the product."
This is good news for woolgrowers like Wayne and Terry, but they both were hopeful of the good prices continuing.
"It really needs to be at that level or higher," Wayne said.
Although some woolgrowers rely heavily on their wool cheque for income, the Scholzs run a mixed-farming operation.
"We like to dabble in everything. It's about spreading the risk around," Terry said.
They shear 2500 Merinos annually on their property Carolen – near Henty, which includes ewes, lambs and wethers.
The breeding flock consists of 1000 ewes, which have been bred from polled genetics.
They also manage 1000 hectares of wheat, canola and barley, and the flock in particular benefit from this part of the enterprise.
"The sheep are grazed on lucerne and wedgetail wheat," he said.
"The grazing wheat is great, because you can get a couple of good feeds for the sheep, and then close it up – and still get a good harvest."
The family also run 65 Angus breeders. Calves are grown out to 300-500kg depending on the market at the time and sold via the Barnawartha markets.
Recently they sold Merino wether lambs at Wagga Wagga, NSW, at an average of $116.
