There's room for sheep and crops in the Mallee, says one mixed farmer

That’s the opinion of Nullawil mixed farmer Denis Ryan, who is running "Gunbar" Merino ewe weaners to be joined to Poll Dorsets in November on 1100 hectares.

“It is a small area, if you went north of here, the sheep have cut out – south of here and it’s much the same as here.” Mr Ryan said.

President of the Nullawil BEST WOOL/BEST LAMB group, Mr Ryan said one of the best ways of showing grain and grazing could continue to co-exist was the use of electronic ear tags and regular weighing of animals.

“We used tags on the last lot of ewes and electronic tagged all the lambs,” he said.

“For fifty cents extra you get a lot of value – if you use the three way scales properly, you can really pick the time the lambs are ready, on the weight gains.”

He said he used to wean his lambs at 15 weeks but had reduced that to 10 and put them straight onto the crops.

Paddocks used for grazing were usually sown to barley, split into three 16 hectare sections and grazed for up to a week.With the use of electric fencing.

“It’s amazing what the range of weight gains in a mob of sheep is,” he said.

The electronic ear tag reading system recorded weaner weights, through a three way Pratley drafting system.

The system was set up to record weights as the lambs, grazed on barley crops, went to the water trough in a MLA trial.

Mr Ryan said he generally aimed to have lambs dropped by the first week in April.

There didn’t seem to be any reason behind the resistance to ear tags.

“It’s a lot of fuddy duddies, that’s the reality,” Mr Ryan said.

“It’s a big resistance, and I don’t think there’s need for it – it would make life so much easier, they would never have to count a sheep out again, in the yards.”

The grazing crop system had resulted in less biomass and fewer trash and blockage issues, at sowing and harvest time.

If the paddocks were locked up before stem elongation, they recovered well.