Mertex Texel & White Suffolk stud wins supreme champion at Bendigo

Mertex Texel & White Suffolk, Antwerp, has celebrated two years in a row of supreme champion at the Australian Sheep & Wool Show, with their ram impressing a debuting judge and taking out the top prize.

Mertex Texel & White Suffolk stud co-principal Tim Jorgensen said they started showing their White Suffolks in 2015, 14 years after they started showing the Texels.

"It was pretty overwhelming, it was a great day," he said.

"To do it two years in a row, last year we got both champions and to do it again is overwhelming."

Mertex won both grand champion ewe, 220280 Mertex, and reserve champion ewe, and supreme champion ram, 220500 Mertex, in the White Suffolk showing and Mr Jorgensen said the ram had been a stand out from the beginning.

"The champion ram, the supreme, I've liked him all the way through, I've used him as a ram lamb and he's an embryo transfer progeny out of one of the elite ewes," he said.

"He's got a tremendous carcase, deep in the hindquarter, beautiful butterfly muscle on his back and beautiful White Suffolk head.

"He's a ram I'd like to breed day-in and day-out."

He said he already had the ram's progeny on the ground and had collected semen, but was yet to decide whether or not he would sell the supreme champion.

The ram's estimated breeding values included a birth weight (BWT) of 0.45 kilograms, weaning weight (WWT) of 11.02kg, post-weaning weight (PWWT) of 16.83kg, PFAT of -0.59 millimetres, post eye muscle depth (PEMD) of 1.85mm as well as -0.67 per cent intramuscular fat (IMF).

He was sired by 200247 Detpa Grove and out of 190555 Mertex, the first ewe over 1.5 years with lamb at foot for all shows exhibited in 2022.

Meanwhile the grand champion ewe's EBVs included a 0.53kg BWT, -0.59 per cent IMF, 1.98mm PEMD, 16.91kg PWWT, -0.20mm PFAT, and -0.59pc IMF.

She was sired by 210326 Mertex and out of 200206 Mertex.

"The ewe, she's pretty special, very feminine, a very good-structured sheep," Mr Jorgensen said.

"The ewe went to Ballarat but it's the first time the ram has been shown, they'll get shown at Sheepvention in three weeks."

First-time judge Damian Hawker, Omad White Suffolk, Kaniva, said the ewe was a magnificent representation of the breed, with hind-quarter depth and good muscle.

"It was my judging debut, I absolutely loved it," he said.

"Mertex has had a day out, it's pretty hard to look past them, fantastic carcase animals and carried meat all the way through them.

"Stand-out animals for most of the day, there were very tough decisions in all the classes, some classes you were splitting at hairs."