Muskerry Wiltipoll breeder is a stickler for 'conformation' in his sheep

Mr Newman, from Muskdale stud, runs 30-35 Wiltipoll breeding ewes on his 35-hectare block at Muskerry, near Axedale.

He will again be exhibiting the shedding meat sheep at the Australian Sheep & Wool Show in July.

"I don't sell any of my young stock until the following year for two reasons - they are fairly fast growing but slow maturing," he said.

"If the ewe goes into lamb at seven months of age, you knock the guts out of her and you lose it at the other end.

"We can be breeding for up to nine or ten years of age, where other sheep are breeding for five or six years."

Mr Newman said he also wouldn't buy or sell a ram that was under 10 months of age.

"Because when they hit that 9-10 months of age they are around 90 kilograms and that's when they start putting weight on their feet," he said.

He said it was then feet problems, which were previously hidden, could become evident.

Mr Newman said he had all his sheep scanned for muscle and fat.

"Even if they scan extremely well, if they haven't got the conformation, they don't stay in my breeding program," he said.

"If they have got excellent conformation, and they don't scan quite as well, they will stay and I will try and improve on that muscling.

"I'm a conformation freak - that's my number one thing, I study it all day, everyday.

"If you ask any carpenter or concreter what's his best tool, it'll be a spirit level.

"If you haven't got the walls and beams across the house straight, you won't do any good.

"So you have to have an excellent conformation."

He said there was a bright future for Wiltipolls, as many producers were getting out of wool because of the shortage of shearers.

He said the Wiltipoll/Dorper combination was a "great cross" and they also were good over Merinos.

"The Wiltipoll has a leaner meat, while the Doper tends to go 'fattish', so you get a bit leaner carcase and better-flavoured meat," he said.

He said they also crossed well with Australian Whites.

He will be taking a show team to Bendigo again this year, believing showing sheep was the best promotion there was.

He culls for poor mothering, late lambing, conformation faults and temperament.

Prior to moving solely to Wiltipolls, he was also running Wiltshire Horns.

"I like the Wiltshire Horns, but it was just too hard to keep so many separate paddocks," he said.

"You can't put them together as they fight one another.

"The Wiltshire Horn will break the Wiltipoll's neck with one hit.

"I had to have different paddocks for mating - it was becoming too much to concentrate on, too costly and too much work getting them ready to show."

He said he wanted to infuse some different breed genetics into the Wiltshire Horns.

"They did need some more muscling in the back end, a lot of them had 'cat hams' - they didn't have that rounded bum," he said.

He put a Wiltipoll over his stud Wiltshire Horns and polled about 90 per cent on the first mating.

"The Wiltshire Horns are a big majestic animal, [but] a lot of people are frightened of the horns," he said.