Off the back of a record tumbling week for horned Merino ram prices, industry specialists and producers have said the horned ram will always have a place in the industry.
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Last week a horned ram sold for $52,000 in Victoria followed on Monday by Yarrawonga stud’s $60,000 private sale at Harden.
The big prices prompted stud stock specialist Rick Power to highlight the value of traditional Merinos despite the rising trend to polls.
“People in commercial operations are chasing polls for growth rates, easy care, doing ability and market influences.”
Yet all too often Mr Power said he had seen the better polls being a PH (heterozygous polled) not a PP (homozygous polled).
“It’s all about genetics crossing within to get the right vigour,” he said.
“If the stud master concentrates on growth and high weaning weight along with yearling weight he will more than likely have plainer type sheep with below average fleece weight.
“Chase wool cut and the opposite will happen. The same selection principles apply to both breeds.”
He said the current talk was that it’s very hard to find a heavy cutting Poll Merino ram, but he said it was also also hard to find a heavy cutting Merino ram
“Simply because many of the top Merino ewes are getting the poll ram and the balance are getting the Merino ram,” he said.
In Mr Power’s view, it has been a period of three years where sourcing a top horned ram has proved difficult.
“Now people are paying the bigger premiums for the better-end of the horned rams because they know they are harder to come across,” he said.
“It’s because a lot of the profile studs are putting the poll ram over the Merino ewes chasing the market, so they don’t have as many horns coming through to pick from.”
From a stud breeders point many sales that have both breeds, the polls, on average, are getting a premium compared to the traditional Merino with polls averaging between $600 to $1000 dearer.
But purchaser of the $52,000 Merino ram at Wallaloo Park ram sale last week, Scott Pickering of Derella Downs Merino and Pyramid Poll Merino studs, Esperance, WA, said he was defying the current trend.
“Our horned rams have beaten polls when it comes to sale averages for three years,” Mr Pickering said.
“This year we also picked up three new clients who were after horned rams.”
In his view, a horned ram produced more wool than a poll and their ASBVs was generally higher.
Yet, he said the preference can be as simple as a horned ram being easier to find in a mob of ewes.
Syndicate member of the $60,000 ram sold by Yarrawonga stud this week, Guy Evans, Tara Park stud, Boorowa, said he was only interested in the horned Merino.
“I believe the genetic base of a lot of poll studs isn’t deep enough,” Mr Evans said.