How Genetic Strategies Can Solve Farming Problems with Robert Peacock
This week on the podcast, we’re chatting all things livestock breeding with Robert Peacock from Orari Gorge Station. Robert discusses how and why they’ve been breeding for worm resistance. They have also been one of the first to measure feed efficiency and methane emissions, demonstrating the role of genetics in addressing these farming challenges. Tune in to discover how Orari Gorge is setting the standard for sustainable farming.Farming sheep, beef and deer in South Canterbury. How to ...
Show Notes
This week on the podcast, we’re chatting all things livestock breeding with Robert Peacock from Orari Gorge Station. Robert discusses how and why they’ve been breeding for worm resistance. They have also been one of the first to measure feed efficiency and methane emissions, demonstrating the role of genetics in addressing these farming challenges. Tune in to discover how Orari Gorge is setting the standard for sustainable farming.
Farming sheep, beef and deer in South Canterbury.
How to begin testing for WormFEC.
The importance of feed efficiency in livestock.
What goes on in a central progeny test?
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Show Transcript
WEBVTT
00:00:00.321 --> 00:00:04.983 Welcome, robert Peacock to Head Shepherd Morning Ferg.
00:00:04.983 --> 00:00:05.746 Thank you for having me.
00:00:05.746 --> 00:00:07.262 Excellent.
00:00:07.262 --> 00:00:08.208 Thanks for your time, mate.
00:00:08.208 --> 00:00:11.048 We might just start, as we do, with a bit of background.
00:00:11.048 --> 00:00:19.121 I think maybe we'll do it in three chunks, as in the property, the studs and your own sort of journey, how you end up back.
00:00:19.121 --> 00:00:38.161 I assume you did some other things at some point, but I guess just yeah, how long, the harare gorge, the station itself and then the four studs there and then your own journey yeah, yeah, so the the property is harare gorge station, uh, just near geraldine, which is south canterbury, about two hours south of christchurch.
00:00:38.741 --> 00:00:52.874 We're just tucked in the foothills so got about 10 flat, 15 rolling and lower hill and that's sort of 70 to 75 percent sort of proper hill, just standard south island hill country.
00:00:52.874 --> 00:01:04.932 Goes up to just over a thousand meters, about three and a half thousand feet, uh running, uh about 9 000 ewes, just under 700 cows and nearly 2000 hines.
00:01:05.953 --> 00:01:18.221 So about a sort of uh just under 50 percent sheet 25 cattle, 25 deer roughly all right, and have the studs always well always been there in your time, or are they?
00:01:18.221 --> 00:01:18.861 They're your addition?
00:01:20.224 --> 00:01:22.305 uh, yeah, mostly here before me.
00:01:22.305 --> 00:01:29.975 So the Hereford Stud Arari Gorge, herefords started by my grandfather, originally as Nithdale Herefords.
00:01:29.975 --> 00:01:45.245 He started that stud back in 1940s and he had another property called Nithdale Station just down near Gore, which my cousin, andrew Tripp, now farms Family succession of late 80s.
00:01:45.245 --> 00:01:45.966 Early 90s.
00:01:45.966 --> 00:01:54.772 The stud moved up to Harare Gorge and about 2010, we rebranded it as Harare Gorge Herefords.
00:01:55.579 --> 00:02:03.412 The sheep studs started off with the Romney stud which the previous manager, ian Dent, started in the early 80s.
00:02:04.740 --> 00:02:18.850 So he wasn't happy with the old traditional Romneys he had here and he had a conversation with my grandfather about what else he might do with the commercial sheep and he would think he was thinking sort of Coopworths for the front country.
00:02:18.850 --> 00:02:25.469 And I think at the end of the conversation my grandfather stood up and as he left the room said, well, I don't care what you do, as long as they're Romneys.
00:02:25.469 --> 00:02:29.770 So he thought, well, I'm going to have to do something here.
00:02:29.770 --> 00:03:02.466 So he set up the stud by buying North Island Rams and in the process of the stud he also set up a group breeding scheme Canterbury Romney Development Group which got up to about 16 breeders at one stage in the early 90s group, which got up to about 16 breeders at one stage in the early 90s in the I came home, so about 2000, about 2008, I added the romney texel maternal stud stabilized cross and then in 2018 added the terminal stud, which is a sort of softex type cross.
00:03:03.266 --> 00:03:03.727 Yeah, righto.
00:03:03.727 --> 00:03:10.681 So journey between you coming home to the farm and, I guess, leaving school.
00:03:10.681 --> 00:03:11.605 What did that look like?
00:03:12.580 --> 00:03:15.509 So mother's family farm.
00:03:15.509 --> 00:03:20.050 My grandfather had a Rarri Gorge and Nithdale down near Gore.
00:03:20.050 --> 00:03:24.330 But on ROE she met my dad who was a Yorkshireman.
00:03:24.330 --> 00:03:33.960 So I actually grew up in Yorkshire, went to school and university in England, did a BXI with honours at Newcastle University.
00:03:33.960 --> 00:03:40.193 At school I loved farming but I wasn't really sure if it was going to be a career.
00:03:40.780 --> 00:03:52.322 The year between school and university I spent out here at a rarie gorge and, yeah, just loved it, chose sheep around the hills all week and played rugby and cricket each weekend and had a great time.
00:03:52.322 --> 00:03:52.943 And that was me.
00:03:52.943 --> 00:03:53.685 I was hooked.
00:03:53.685 --> 00:04:01.209 So the moment I went back to go to university I was always going to come straight back as soon as I'd finished, which I did.
00:04:01.209 --> 00:04:02.632 I did a bit of travel.
00:04:02.632 --> 00:04:10.218 Then did a postgrad at Lincoln, partly just to put a bit of a New Zealand spin on what I'd learned at Newcastle.
00:04:10.218 --> 00:04:12.679 It was quite a scientific degree at Newcastle.
00:04:12.679 --> 00:04:21.211 The Lincoln degree was a bit more applied, which was good, and also made a few contacts and got to make some Kiwi friends and stuff.
00:04:21.211 --> 00:04:33.547 Did a couple of years working in the Hawke's Bay on a farm there and then a bit more travel and then settled back here late 99, just after the World Cup.
00:04:34.420 --> 00:04:41.161 Saw that and then had to come home, yeah right, excellent, you're fitting into Kiwi culture well, measuring everything.
00:04:41.161 --> 00:04:43.208 By which World Cup it was closest to?
00:04:46.899 --> 00:04:47.721 Now, yeah, with the four stars.
00:04:47.721 --> 00:05:05.086 Now it'll be interesting to get your reflections on maybe the challenges and and rewards of each of those, or which ones you find sort of easy and harder, I guess, in those different breeding herefords and then three different sheep breeds yeah, I'm often asked sort of which I prefer or which is most difficult.
00:05:05.107 --> 00:05:16.795 But, um, it probably tends to go through the season, like in general, we're busy with one, so that seems to be the focus for that month and then the next month we're doing something with the other.
00:05:16.795 --> 00:05:24.610 So I know fairly equal sort of passion for both and with both we're our own biggest client.
00:05:24.610 --> 00:05:32.331 So that that's the important thing for us trying to get it right for our own commercial stock, especially with the sheep.
00:05:32.331 --> 00:05:36.125 Yeah, we use about 100 ram hobbits a year on our commercial use.
00:05:36.125 --> 00:05:43.002 Yeah, across the three studs, and then those rams plus others are available for sale as tutus.
00:05:43.002 --> 00:05:46.690 So we get get first crack at the top genetics.
00:05:46.690 --> 00:05:50.327 But it also means we're not keeping the best and the best are still available for sale.
00:05:50.327 --> 00:05:52.824 There's a lot of stuff we're doing that.
00:05:52.824 --> 00:06:02.574 If I was just in the business of selling rams I might struggle to justify the time and cost recording, unless you're sure you're going to be selling more rams as a result.
00:06:02.574 --> 00:06:09.387 But the fact we get to use those genetics we're benefiting helps the equation a bit.
00:06:10.451 --> 00:06:11.132 Yeah, 100%.
00:06:11.132 --> 00:06:18.889 We might delve into cattle for a bit and then we'll head back towards the sheep, considering we've got a three-to-one ratio on studs.
00:06:18.889 --> 00:06:24.285 But I just had a look there before and I saw that you put your efforts through the feed efficiency units, the vital units.
00:06:24.285 --> 00:06:25.711 What was anything surprising there or any learnings from that?
00:06:25.711 --> 00:06:28.160 Just had a look there before and I saw that you put your efforts through the feed efficiency units, the Vitali units.
00:06:28.160 --> 00:06:29.821 Was there anything?
00:06:29.841 --> 00:06:30.762 surprising there or any learnings from that.
00:06:30.762 --> 00:06:38.170 No, I haven't really got the data back yet but I mean that sort of it was sort of everything sort of fell into place really.
00:06:38.170 --> 00:06:45.142 I was lucky enough to be on the beef and lamb trip MPI trip to America last year.
00:06:45.142 --> 00:06:47.115 There was a group of 16 of us went to the beef and lamb trip mpi trip to america last year.
00:06:47.115 --> 00:07:03.461 There's a group of 16 of us went to the beef genetics conference and then a study tour around beef research institutes through sort of montana, wyoming, kansas and places and became apparent to us quite quickly just how important the feed efficiency was.
00:07:03.802 --> 00:07:07.271 Everywhere had had feed efficiency bins recording it.
00:07:07.271 --> 00:07:11.411 Not just the universities but individual farms had them as well.
00:07:11.411 --> 00:07:13.788 So we could see the importance there.
00:07:13.788 --> 00:07:26.314 And then when we came back there was a group of us Hereford breeders that got given the opportunity to put them into the Tumania feed trial there, which was great.
00:07:26.314 --> 00:07:30.632 So four studs had yearlings in heifers or bulls.
00:07:30.632 --> 00:07:31.781 I put heifers in.
00:07:31.781 --> 00:07:35.331 The others might have put bulls in, it didn't really matter, they were separate pens.
00:07:35.331 --> 00:07:55.490 So that's great for us and also great for Hereford's that we got that data and we had a link size between the studs and also linked sires between our studs and the beef and lamb progeny test at Kepler, and the beef and lamb animals will be going through there now, so they'll all help the database, with them all being linked.
00:07:57.093 --> 00:07:59.723 We'll swing now to the sheep.
00:07:59.723 --> 00:08:06.867 And there has been a heavy focus on traits that improve animal health, welfare and reduce labour and the cost of running sheep.
00:08:06.867 --> 00:08:07.891 What do you think?
00:08:07.891 --> 00:08:12.408 Obviously, you're your own biggest client, so it's probably obvious, but why has this become a focus for you?
00:08:14.182 --> 00:08:16.629 For some reason it's always been something I've been interested in.
00:08:16.629 --> 00:08:27.680 I just did my honours in the mid-'90s on breeding sheep resistant to worms, and back in the early-'90 90s there was no shortage of research data.
00:08:27.680 --> 00:08:33.092 The australians started breeding um sheep resistant to worms back in the 70s.
00:08:33.092 --> 00:08:35.907 New zealand started in the 80s on research farms.
00:08:35.907 --> 00:08:48.110 We've basically had resistance to drenches pretty much since the drenches were invented and so yes, yes, I've been involved for a long time, but then more recently that's become more apparent.
00:08:48.110 --> 00:08:56.671 Over 30% of New Zealand farms now have resistance to triple combination drenches and it's become really serious for a lot of people.
00:08:56.671 --> 00:09:07.607 And the quick changes you can make with management sort of like grazing and cattle ratios and things like that are sort of fairly quick and cattle ratios and things like that are sort of fairly quick and instant and easy to see.
00:09:07.607 --> 00:09:18.453 But the moment you change those practices back again you've still got the same problem, whereas with genetics you don't get the quick fix, it's a slow burn.
00:09:18.453 --> 00:09:27.561 But once you start building it into your flock it's permanent and it's cumulative, and so what I call is compound interest.
00:09:27.561 --> 00:09:32.352 It's gradually going to build up and up and then if for some reason in 10 years time.
00:09:32.352 --> 00:09:35.346 Um, you can't run cattle for whatever reason.
00:09:35.346 --> 00:09:37.491 You've got to change your ratio back to sheep.
00:09:37.491 --> 00:09:43.268 They've got more chance of of coping if you're in a heavy sheet ratio.
00:09:44.389 --> 00:09:49.375 Yeah, and there's a variety of reasons, sort of with the drenches.
00:09:49.375 --> 00:09:51.505 The drenches are failing.
00:09:51.505 --> 00:09:54.207 The consumers don't want the product.
00:09:54.207 --> 00:10:01.529 I mean, obviously we have residue tests and we're obeying withholding periods, but still, the cleaner you can keep them the better.
00:10:01.529 --> 00:10:16.663 But also staffing Shepherds love being out on the hill mustering, drenching and dagging they're not so keen on and yes, I think the latest figures I saw just recently, it's costing them.
00:10:16.663 --> 00:10:20.385 Even with effective drenches it's still costing.
00:10:20.385 --> 00:10:27.792 Worms are still costing the New Zealand sheep industry well over $100 million a year, I think $70,000 per average farm.
00:10:27.792 --> 00:10:33.244 So that's a pretty big cost to bear, even if the drenches are working.
00:10:34.668 --> 00:10:41.710 Yeah, that's a big number and there's obviously lots of little subclinical losses that we kind of don't even get to see.
00:10:41.710 --> 00:10:56.639 You hosted the Beef and Lamb Prodigyy test, which I think's finished up now, but that was all all focused on on health and labor and labor saving trade, so I'm trying to avoid the words easy care, um, just because I think that's it's more important and that's more detailed than that.
00:10:56.639 --> 00:10:58.083 I guess run us through that trial.
00:10:58.083 --> 00:11:01.780 That was some of the more intense measurement that I've ever come across.
00:11:01.780 --> 00:11:05.649 Anyway, there's lots of different worm egg counts and day schools and yeah.
00:11:05.669 --> 00:11:14.830 So, as I said in the field, uh, I never knew there was so much work involved in the low input trial, but yeah, we did record pretty much everything.
00:11:14.830 --> 00:11:21.352 So it was started by a group of breeders that were already passionate about the low input.
00:11:21.352 --> 00:11:24.522 And sheep are very sensitive to environment.
00:11:24.522 --> 00:11:30.749 So if you've got sheep in the normal progeny test, they generally have to be run under best management practice.
00:11:30.749 --> 00:11:32.907 So they are getting drenched regularly.
00:11:32.907 --> 00:11:35.707 They're being measured for all the production traits, which is great.
00:11:35.707 --> 00:11:41.552 But what happens if the world isn't perfect and they don't get drenched when they need drenching?
00:11:41.552 --> 00:11:47.422 And it can quite quickly change the rankings of the rams in the production.
00:11:47.422 --> 00:11:50.547 So we finally got approval.
00:11:50.547 --> 00:11:53.692 2019 was the first year of mating.
00:11:53.692 --> 00:12:04.809 We we just tagged about 1,100 of our commercial ewes and they were mated by AI to 17 rams from a variety of breeds from all over the country.
00:12:04.809 --> 00:12:08.304 So these were proven stud rams with breeding values.
00:12:08.304 --> 00:12:14.261 And then we measured the progeny, so DNAed.
00:12:14.261 --> 00:12:17.182 At tailing, we left the tails on the boys.
00:12:17.182 --> 00:12:19.720 We measured the tail length, then the usual weights.
00:12:19.720 --> 00:12:20.009 We weighed them at.
00:12:20.009 --> 00:12:22.736 We measured the tail length, then the usual weights, we weighed them at weaning, we de-exhorted them at weaning.
00:12:22.736 --> 00:12:32.947 We then drenched and sorry, not drenched weighed the the male lambs well, and the girls about every six weeks all the way through to may.
00:12:32.947 --> 00:12:40.308 I had a control mob running with them that was drenched every time we weighed them to compare the growth rates.
00:12:41.054 --> 00:12:46.083 Every lamb was individually worm feck counted in February and again in May.
00:12:46.083 --> 00:12:50.578 They were DAG scored in February and May again as well.
00:12:50.578 --> 00:12:55.696 At those events the ewe lambs went down to Invermay measured for feed efficiency.
00:12:55.696 --> 00:12:58.340 They were measured for methane while they were there.
00:12:58.340 --> 00:13:02.788 They were then also measured for methane when they were back on the farm on grass as well.
00:13:02.788 --> 00:13:06.639 And people talk about the feed changing the methane.
00:13:06.639 --> 00:13:09.785 And yes, it does, but it doesn't change the rankings.
00:13:10.466 --> 00:13:16.287 If a ram's progeny are low emitters on high protein diets, they'll also be low emitters on the others.
00:13:16.287 --> 00:13:19.924 They're ranking the same whether they're on grass or clover or whatever.
00:13:19.924 --> 00:13:25.822 And then those females have been through and measured for the maternal traits, went back to the ram and made it.
00:13:25.822 --> 00:13:27.501 We got all the kill data each year.
00:13:27.501 --> 00:13:37.306 The reason we didn't kill them until May on that first year was maybe we just wanted to collect as much data as possible and if we killed them in February it wasn't really achieving the goal.
00:13:37.306 --> 00:13:49.642 So that first year they went all the way from a weaning drench in December through to May without a second drench, which was quite impressive and followed the worm counts through the season.
00:13:49.642 --> 00:13:50.905 It was very interesting.
00:13:51.375 --> 00:14:14.085 Yeah, it's intriguing that and it's often the problem with any central protein test or any ESR evaluation generally, is that they have to be run to kind of average the management so that everyone's kind of happy, which means that the really robust animals tend to get a little bit disadvantaged because they would be, they could put up with a bit less management, whereas others need.
00:14:14.085 --> 00:14:20.504 Yeah, so this is obviously something really important for genetic evaluation to build that connectedness or linkage, depending on which side of the ditch you're on.
00:14:20.504 --> 00:14:29.285 But yeah, it is always a bit of a challenge to make sure that we've got that combination of production traits and welfare and labour traits considered.
00:14:29.285 --> 00:14:32.083 You've been a member of the Wormfeck Gold Group.
00:14:32.083 --> 00:14:41.243 I wonder if you could just explain what that means for those who are outside of New Zealand and kind of the importance of that group and why they've come together.
00:14:41.423 --> 00:14:51.408 Yeah, sure, just before we move on from the beef and lamb trawling, there are reports on the beef and lamb website for sort of production reports and stuff.
00:14:51.408 --> 00:14:59.726 But one thing I would like to comment on is people often question how much of your farm is management versus genetics?
00:14:59.726 --> 00:15:04.005 And people often talk about genetics only being 10%, maybe 20%.
00:15:04.005 --> 00:15:10.495 But when you put all the lambs in one paddock then the difference is 100% genetic.
00:15:10.495 --> 00:15:24.304 If they're in the same mob for five months and some are growing like hell and stay clean and have a low worm count and some are not growing very well and daggy, then that is, they're all managed the same.
00:15:24.304 --> 00:15:31.331 So the difference is purely genetics and the difference we had between some of the sire lines was huge across all the traits.
00:15:31.331 --> 00:15:36.288 So people seem to think, claim to think, that genetics don't make much difference.
00:15:36.288 --> 00:15:37.393 Well, they do.
00:15:37.393 --> 00:15:39.419 It's massive when you you see those results.
00:15:39.419 --> 00:15:40.764 They're all under the same management.
00:15:41.575 --> 00:15:49.284 You've got 50-kilo lambs that are clean, that can go straight to the works, and you've got 38-kilo lambs.
00:15:49.284 --> 00:15:54.467 When you dag them we weighed the dags and we had four kilos of dags of some of those lambs.
00:15:54.467 --> 00:16:04.937 That's a huge cost in labor, labor trying to get those lambs clean and trying to not make the works too grumpy.
00:16:04.937 --> 00:16:07.302 We had some some fairly serious talks with the works.
00:16:07.302 --> 00:16:17.259 Even though we'd paid the shearers to crush them properly, they they still weren't happy with them at the works, and trying to get shepherds to do that stuff is just such a huge cost.
00:16:17.259 --> 00:16:22.028 So, yeah, I just want to really reiterate just how important the genetics are.
00:16:22.028 --> 00:16:31.225 And when you see those rams most of those rams in that trial were all from studs that were already putting emphasis on the traits, the low-input traits.
00:16:31.225 --> 00:16:40.562 If you put a high-performance ram that hadn't put any effort onto the health traits, then they might have really hit a brick wall and it could have been a disaster.
00:16:41.934 --> 00:16:43.903 Yeah, and thank you for pulling me up there.
00:16:45.782 --> 00:17:07.824 I think everyone that goes farming should run some form of progeny test, because until you see like I think it's always blown my mind and we get to see it fairly regularly as you do as a stud breeder, but I think people kind of get they never, ever see their different genetics under they see their genetics under their management often, and it's not until you do some sort of progeny test where you just see the true power of genes.
00:17:07.824 --> 00:17:16.078 I think every young person in ag should convince whoever's managing them to do some sort of progeny test, whether it's cattle or sheep or goats or whatever they're running.
00:17:16.078 --> 00:17:23.661 But it's so powerful to see when they're in the same environment, particularly these health traits but also just production traits the gap is always enormous.
00:17:23.661 --> 00:17:25.742 It's never a tiny gap.
00:17:26.474 --> 00:17:28.884 Yeah, and most commercial farmers.
00:17:28.884 --> 00:17:36.625 At best all they can do is judge the condition of the bull or the ram 12 months later and if he's held his condition, they think he's a great bull.
00:17:36.625 --> 00:17:38.961 But they've got no idea what his daughters are doing.
00:17:38.961 --> 00:17:39.784 Yeah, yeah.
00:17:40.875 --> 00:17:52.180 Yeah, yeah, I think it's really really powerful stuff and I know that within our team, the people that have you can completely change someone's view on genetics by getting them to run a progeny test.
00:17:52.180 --> 00:17:53.123 I reckon yeah.
00:17:54.895 --> 00:17:56.321 Once you've seen it, you're dead right.
00:17:57.400 --> 00:18:01.942 Yeah, just trying to get people to actually see it as a hard thing.
00:18:02.202 --> 00:18:29.519 Yeah, yeah, and I think, like you said, with DAGs, I think that's I could just in most talks I'll give these days I sort of sit looking into space, thinking about why for 200 years we kept cutting them off, when within about 10 you can kind of reduce it down to a much more manageable level with selection, like it is interesting to me, yeah, and to me DAGs was one of the biggest learnings of the trial, because it is a real cost and it is pretty heritable, like a lot of these traits.
00:18:30.021 --> 00:18:35.487 Yeah, you don't have to sort of put in shedding sheep or anything to really get rid of them.
00:18:35.487 --> 00:18:42.519 You can have some pretty woolly sheep that just don't grow DAGs, which is great and, like I say, it's bad enough.
00:18:42.519 --> 00:18:48.680 Trying to get shepherds to drench sheep, but trying to get them to crutch sheep is sort of even lower down the wish list.
00:18:49.734 --> 00:18:55.443 Yeah, and I ask, most crowds end ups, if you like, daging sheep, and I've never had one go up yet, so I don't think that's going to change.
00:19:00.694 --> 00:19:02.461 And the thing is, as a stud breeder it's it's free to measure.
00:19:02.461 --> 00:19:03.286 Yeah, I mean, we're weighing our lambs.
00:19:03.286 --> 00:19:04.692 Just have a look at the bum and put the number in.
00:19:04.692 --> 00:19:15.237 Yeah, um, it's done and um, and that was one of the reasons for sort of trying to drive the the low input trial in the start with um the group of breeders that were involved.
00:19:15.237 --> 00:19:21.144 So fec had been available since the early 90s when this trial started.
00:19:21.483 --> 00:19:28.310 We were nearly 30 years in and there was only 30 breeders countrywide measuring worm resistance.
00:19:28.310 --> 00:19:52.902 By doing the worm fec, partly because of the trial and partly because of the people realizing how serious strength resistance is, we've gone from 30 breeders up to about 90 breeders now measuring worm fat, which, as a stud breeder, is great because if there's only a few of you doing it it really limits where we can go and get outside size and the amount of times I've had to take a gamble on a stud ram.
00:19:52.902 --> 00:20:00.365 That's not measuring it and I agree with everything else he's doing, but he's not measuring the worms and time and time again he's got some great lambs at weaning.
00:20:00.365 --> 00:20:02.531 Four weeks later they're still pretty good.
00:20:02.531 --> 00:20:06.161 Another three weeks later they've hit a brick wall and they just can't handle it.
00:20:07.324 --> 00:20:33.425 Um, so by encouraging more stud breeders to measure it, it means we can all go faster, because we can all then use those genetics with more confidence and make less mistakes yeah, no, 100%, and that's awesome to hear, and I don't think the trend's that strong in Oz, but there's certainly been an uptick recently with more people getting into it and certainly something we badger away at trying to convince everyone to do within our clientele and anyone that's willing to listen.
00:20:33.425 --> 00:20:35.619 Yeah, it's just again.
00:20:35.619 --> 00:20:37.897 It's one of those things that, yeah, we're down to.
00:20:37.897 --> 00:20:40.192 I was at a place yesterday and they were down to.
00:20:40.232 --> 00:20:44.763 Startech has been the only, I guess StarTech and Zolvik has been the only actives and they won't last for long.
00:20:44.763 --> 00:20:54.944 So, once your triple resistance is in place, it's either change of shape, numbers or drastic changes of management or really work on the genetics.
00:20:54.944 --> 00:21:02.807 And, yeah, I think it's awesome to see the power of genetics in that space as well and really something we should have really been into.
00:21:02.807 --> 00:21:04.721 But it's great to hear that we have got a big lift in that.
00:21:04.721 --> 00:21:06.901 Where was I going next with that?
00:21:06.901 --> 00:21:25.766 Oh, yeah, if we talk about that group and I guess it's probably obvious what they're about obviously really hammering in or honing in on those worm resistance traits yeah, just talk to us about the group and, yeah, what the group's purpose is.
00:21:26.977 --> 00:21:37.442 Yeah, so that started a similar time to the low input trial Well, not when the trial started, but when the trial started being discussed, so probably about six or seven years ago now.
00:21:37.442 --> 00:21:47.258 So obviously it's a bit of a marketing thing, trying to promote the studs that are doing the work breeding these resistant sheep to sort of try and sell more rams.
00:21:47.258 --> 00:22:10.002 But again, a bit like the trial, it's also trying to encourage other breeders to get on board and we have criteria that new breeders can meet and get more and more breeders under the same umbrella and if you get enough traction, the ones that aren't doing doing it suddenly become the the odd ones out, rather than the other way around, and so more and more people start doing it.
00:22:10.002 --> 00:22:15.122 So the main criteria is um, you've got to be doing it for a while.
00:22:15.122 --> 00:22:22.541 You can't just go and buy someone else's high resistant ram and say, yep, I'm worm, fat gold, you've got to have some skin in the game.
00:22:22.541 --> 00:22:29.022 So we've got an eight year cut off if you've been doing it for six or seven and you've got some really good genetic gain.
00:22:29.083 --> 00:22:32.519 We have a case-by-case basis of looking at it from the committee.
00:22:32.519 --> 00:22:35.711 Letting people in, they've obviously got to be resistant.
00:22:35.711 --> 00:22:39.201 See, it's okay measuring it, but are you actually making improvements?
00:22:39.201 --> 00:22:48.680 So you do have to be above the average of the worm feck resistance, but also you have to be above the average for the new zealand maternal worth for the production traits.
00:22:48.680 --> 00:22:59.017 There are some people that still think that resistant sheep that are bred to be resistant for worms aren't very good at production, and that's absolute rubbish.
00:22:59.017 --> 00:23:03.368 We've got a graph on our website the worm feck gold production, and that's absolute rubbish.
00:23:03.368 --> 00:23:10.055 We've got a graph on our website, the WormFact Gold website, and it's got the New Zealand maternal worth of the WormFact Gold breeders and it's got the same graph.
00:23:10.055 --> 00:23:15.440 It's got another line for the New Zealand average for all the dual purpose, and the WormFact Gold breeders'.
00:23:15.440 --> 00:23:21.945 Average maternal worth is well above the maternal worth for the rest of the breeders.
00:23:21.945 --> 00:23:27.417 So you're not only getting resistance but you're also getting increased production yeah, I think that's really clear.
00:23:27.438 --> 00:23:31.299 Like we know, the genetic correlations are either weak or non-existent with worm resistance.
00:23:31.299 --> 00:23:38.255 It's one of those great traits where you can put a fair bit of emphasis on without really slowing up too much on the other things other than selection pressure and other things.
00:23:38.255 --> 00:23:46.325 So it's only really those few examples in history where people have only focused on that one trait until you get you lose production because you haven't used those measurements.
00:23:46.325 --> 00:23:50.887 But single trait selection always has other outcomes.
00:23:50.887 --> 00:23:56.965 But when you have it used in a balanced breeding objective, like you guys do, it all comes together, which is the great thing.
00:23:57.474 --> 00:24:05.136 Yeah, I remember when we first started I mean we started back in the 90s we did a bit of measuring for worm resistance and it was before I was involved.
00:24:05.136 --> 00:24:14.641 It was the previous manager and, like the most resistant rams weren't very productive but um, so he actually gave up on it to start with.
00:24:14.641 --> 00:24:21.730 But what he did do was really reduce his drenches, so focusing on production with a lot less drenching.
00:24:21.730 --> 00:24:30.165 And then when I came home 10 years later and started measuring, by default with doing that drenching, he had increased it.
00:24:30.165 --> 00:24:36.103 So when I started measuring we were able to find some top performers that were also good at resistance.
00:24:36.103 --> 00:24:46.421 And then, with a bit of selection, we've had more and more top performers being good at performance and at resistance and once you've got those, they're pretty quick to multiply out.
00:24:48.476 --> 00:24:51.141 You would have thought about this as much as most.
00:24:51.141 --> 00:24:58.291 I mean, part of what I think we see in that depression of production is particularly early days when you just start selecting.
00:24:58.291 --> 00:25:00.192 You've got your normal distribution of animals.
00:25:00.192 --> 00:25:05.832 So you've got some in there that have no resistance at all and just putting larvae all over the pasture.
00:25:05.832 --> 00:25:09.155 Then you've got your really resistant ones who are firing up an immune response trying to kill worms.
00:25:09.155 --> 00:25:21.525 And I think if you run them and the Western Australians Joanne and John Carlson showed this If you separate them out and put the worm-resistant ones away from the susceptible ones, actually their production goes back to normal.
00:25:21.525 --> 00:25:28.133 It's just that they're suppressed through because their immune system is costly to run and they're actually killing everyone else's worms.
00:25:28.133 --> 00:25:33.028 So I reckon there's I don't know, it'd be interesting your thoughts but there's probably early days when you start selecting for it.
00:25:33.028 --> 00:25:39.619 You might see a bit of a depression, but then as the population moves to a happier spot, then that all swings around again.
00:25:40.244 --> 00:25:43.085 Yeah, I think the key is if you're still measuring production.
00:25:43.085 --> 00:25:58.596 While they're under that challenge, by default, you're breeding for resilience as well as resistance, yeah, and so the production doesn't actually drop, even if you've still got a lot of susceptible lambs in the mob, shedding a lot of eggs.
00:25:58.596 --> 00:26:09.038 Larvae the ones that you're really wanting to look for are still growing, and that's why it's really important, as you mentioned, single trait selection is always going to get you in trouble.
00:26:09.038 --> 00:26:12.453 It doesn't matter what trait it is, it's always going to get you in trouble.
00:26:12.714 --> 00:26:23.365 So, as long as you're looking at growth and resistance and it's not like you end up picking one in the middle of the pack because that's how far you've got to go to get one that's also good at resistance.
00:26:23.365 --> 00:26:30.766 No, I mean you've got ones in the top two or three percent of production that are also right up there for resistance.
00:26:30.766 --> 00:26:36.797 Yeah, um, and yeah, it's putting them under pressure for a prolonged period.
00:26:36.797 --> 00:26:47.575 You sort of and then measuring the best that are growing and with the lowest counts you're selecting for resistance, resilience and for growth, all in the same journey.
00:26:48.457 --> 00:26:48.877 Exactly.
00:26:48.877 --> 00:26:56.151 I guess with that we've never got a control station to kind of look like what a Rari Gorge would look like today if you hadn't done all this selection.
00:26:56.151 --> 00:27:06.692 But have you got a bit of a feel for sort of what this has meant for the commercial operation in rari gorge in terms of is it compared to how your grandfathers or the manager used to need to have off in the drench or or dag or that sort of stuff?
00:27:06.692 --> 00:27:07.414 Is that was?
00:27:07.615 --> 00:27:16.094 that a bit hard yeah it's it is always hard to measure and, like the shepherds and clients, they often ask me if I think it's working.
00:27:16.094 --> 00:27:20.820 And there are seasons where it's just a really bad wormy season.
00:27:20.820 --> 00:27:23.192 You get a mild, wet winter.
