Northern Tablelands Wether Trial uncovers unlikely leaders

Well-known Elders agent John Newsome is a regular competitor with his own home-bred team but this year he also opted to enter bought-in Bungulla-blood wethers from the Marshall family at Burren Junction.

Northern Tablelands LLS sheep officer Brent McLeod was on farm to randomly select Mr Newsome's team when he noticed the western wethers in another pen.

The original 320 wethers were secured online and split between another grower and Mr Newsome who has since on-sold his lot.

At the conclusion of the second shearing last year the team had the highest wool value in $/DSE and won the Rob Chappell Memorial shield for the highest valued individual fleece from the 35 teams of 10 wethers.

That wether cut 7.5 kilograms of 19.3 micron wool for a fleece worth $134.96.

The team also had the highest yearly fleece value for both 2019 ($1023.30) and in 2020 ($1098.30), the results surprising Mr Newsome.

"The last two years of the wool market has also possibly favoured heavier cutting sheep with the Italians being out of the market because of coronavirus...it has benefited the heavy cutting, bigger sheep," he said.

"We might see it swing back into the finer ones now that the market is moving that way a little bit at the moment but it does come down to three years and it'll be a good test to see where we are heading in the wool industry."

The final shearing will take place in November with the wethers processed two weeks later in Tamworth to produce mutton data.

Focus has already shifted to the next wether trial which the DPI wants to grow to 50 teams.

The trial has always been strongly supported around Glen Innes, Deepwater and Dundee but they hope to have more representation from the Walcha region and western-bred sheep.

Mr McLeod said a number of entrants had changed their bloodlines because of the wether trial, as the Fletcher family from Walcha had demonstrated with great success.

"They have been involved in the wether trail for the last two or three times and their traditional bloodlines that they used were in the bottom third of the trial," he said.

"At the first shearing they spent the whole day in the shed and they went through every team...because they were about to make some breeding changes at home. They made a change out of that...and they have bounced right back up and they are now in the top three."

The trial began in the early 1970s with sheep run on a different grower's property each year who was repaid with the wool.

One of the early organisers was Rob Chappell, who the shield honours.

His son John said Rob wanted people to see how their sheep could perform on an even playing field.

"...and let the genetics express themselves in a way where people can really get an appreciation of what different bloodlines can be doing," he said.

To enter contact brent.mcleod@lls.nsw.gov.au