The latest Better Wool Guide, HSI Australia, includes 221 brands

More than 200 retail brands have been named in the Humane Society International's latest Better Wool Guide, which includes brands available to consumers that are mulesing free.

HSI Australia animal welfare campaigner Georgie Dolphin said 10 million lambs were mulesed in Australia each year, and consumer trends favoured wool from non-mulesed sheep.

"Australia is well and truly singled out, being the only country in the world supplying mulesed wool," she said.

"Aussie consumers and retailers alike are making it clear they are calling time on this practice."

The guide listed 221 retail brands, with large-scale companies including Nike, Kmart, Adidas, ASOS, The Iconic, Big W, Calvin Klein, David Jones, and more.

There are brands which decided to avoid purchasing Australian wool, including Surya, Neem London, and JOOP!.

White Gum Wool founder Nan Bray, Oatlands, Tas, manages 650 Saxon Merinos and started her non-mulesed flock in 2000.

She said she disliked the idea of mulesing along with her stockman, and stopped docking tails on her sheep in 2009.

"This decision was considered radical at the time, and I received a lot of criticism, including advice that I would not be able sell my surplus sheep if they were not mulesed," she said.

"I changed my production system in 2009 to improve animal and landscape health by reducing the grazing pressure dramatically."

Ms Bray said the farm's management approach, along with improved nutrition, meant there were no flystrike, worm treatment, or scour issues.

"Mulesing does not stop flystrike on its own, because other management systems also need to be in place," she said.

"Since it was originally developed, the operation has been altered and now involves taking far more skin off the breech, significantly affecting the well-being of the lambs involved.

"Fortunately more effective methods of flystrike control have been developed which have essentially made mulesing obsolete."

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Fourth-generation farmer Doug Wright, Cowra, NSW, made the transition 13 years ago and said farmers could achieve a non-mulesed flock within two generations.

He said in his first generation he achieved 60 per cent non-mulesed lambs, and his flock was mulesing free by the second generation.

He manages a self-replacing Merino flock and joined 1400 ewes in 2022.

"Up until 2010 we used to run all Merino wethers and we used to buy them in and they were all mules," Mr Wright said.

"I made the decision in 2010, I decided to breed my own sheep and I started off buying non-mulesed sheep in to start and went to a non-mulesed ram supplier."

He said it was important for woolgrowers to select a stud with a long history of non-mulesed rams.

He said he has not used chemical backlining for 12 years, and the breeding benefits included higher lamb survival and fertility rates, and a better ease of care.

"I prefer the idea of running a few less ewes to produce the same number of lambs," Mr Wright said.

"I can support this because there's a way we can breed sheep that don't need mulesing, it's not as if we don't have the answer.

"It's important that you can go from a mulesed flock to a non-mulesed flock with the right introduction of genetics, and doing the selection that's required of the ewes that you produce."

Ms Dolphin said HSI Australia had called on the government to introduce pain-relief mandates for woolgrowers and a deadline to phase out mulesing practices by 2030.

"There's a strong market signal that the days of mulesing lambs are numbered," she said.

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