Like everyone 2023 turned out to be a very difficult year and a year we would not like to see again. The lamb, mutton, surplus sheep and cattle markets crashed with the season. Haddon Rig received only 300 millimetres of rain last year with 150 mil falling after the 20th of November. The wool market provided us with some much-needed income to keep everything running.
We had a reasonable summer but then the rain stopped mid-January ’23 and there were no significant falls until mid-November. As a result of the lack of rain we fed leading up to and all through lambing. The survival rate in the lambs was good but the quality in the old summer feed was very poor and ewes and lambs were well behind when we early weaned them at the beginning of August. Lambs were trail fed Barley and Lupin until rain started in November. Since then, we had a very hot humid summer with the moisture producing excellent feed. The natural perennial grasses on all our grazing country were great and is still green now in the Autumn.
As a result of introducing grain and a favourable summer, the ram lambs coming up for sale in September are excellent. We have the largest number of Poll Ram lambs to date with 1150 shorn in April. There DNA results will be back soon to finalise their pedigree and poll gene, fleece weights have been collected at shearing in April and eye muscle and fleece samples will be taken closer to the sale to give everyone true and accurate information prior to the hogget rams being sold. It is encouraging to see the rapid progress we are making in our poll stud by combining the use of ASBVs and accurate data collection with visual hands-on selection and classing.
Our Poll Stud is rapidly improving in quality, numbers and genetic improvement. On-farm results and client feedback has been excellent and evidence of our rigid breeding program.
The ewe lambs have also done very well which allowed Stuart to class them early before shearing in April. The big AI and ET programmes are really paying off with the top end quality being excellent.
All our 22 drop wether lambs were put through the feedlot again because of the season which enabled us to start selling them late May last year (27 kg @ $6.20 plus skin = $174/hd). This year’s wether lambs are also on feed and have been locked in at $7.20 so will come back very close to $200 per head. The ’23 drop wether lambs were shorn in April and wool was sold at the start of May. Fleece wool averaged 17.6 micron at 1900c/kg, cutting 4.5kg/hd coming back at $35/hd. This will cover the cost of feed in the feedlot and some of their running costs.
We have kept pushing our AI and ET numbers this year to quickly improve our numbers and quality doing, 2150 Special Stud AI ewes (including 350 purchased Moorundie Poll ewes) and 20 Elite Poll ET ewes. Lambing conditions and survival have been fantastic for these ewes, I will get my hands on them at tagging in a couple of weeks and can’t wait to see how our fresh genetics are going. It is great to have ample natural feed for lambing and leave them alone.
Callum Mclean accepted a manager’s position at Steam Plains in the Riverina for Parraway and left in December. Callum worked with us at Haddon Rig for 6 years, I would like to congratulate Callum, wish him all the best and thank him for all his hard work. He will go very well at his new job.
Matt Kelly has joined us as Assistant Manager, Matt was with us for a couple of years then went to ‘Egelabra’ for two years then Marcus Oldham for two years. I would like to welcome Matt back to HR, he has already settled and fitted in very well and I look forward to working with him in the future.
Finally I would like to thank all of the jackaroos and staff at Haddon Rig for their dedication and hard work, you all do a great job.
Warm regards,
Andy Maclean