Show Notes
Ever wondered about farming New Zealand sheep in the UK, or considered farming UK shedding genetics in Australia? In this episode of Head Shepherd, Ferg speaks with Ian McDougall, a veterinarian whose career - and sheep - have taken him across Australia, New Zealand and the UK. Ian grew up on marginal country on South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula before moving into veterinary work and artificial breeding. Over the past four decades, his work has involved embryo transfer, semen freezing and larg...
More from Head Shepherd
What can carcass feedback tell us about breeding better lambs? Our guest this week, Isabele Roberts, shares how six years of carcass data, research and on-farm trials have shaped her approach to lamb production. Isabele runs Ridgehaven, a family sheep business in New South Wales that combines a stud, commercial lamb production and a research program. With her husband, sister and brother, she manages three properties covering 3,200 hectares, focusing on breeding sheep that meet the needs...
Selecting replacement ewe lambs is an opportunity to make more genetic progress in a flock, but how much are we missing when selection relies on visual assessment alone? In this episode, Ferg shares his thoughts on improving replacement ewe selection. He explains how environmental effects can influence what we see in the yards, and why putting objective scores around those observations can lead to better selection decisions. Ferg also explains how neXtRank accounts for environmental effects a...
neXtResist can tell you which sheep are fighting off worms, even when worm numbers are low. Emma Noble-Campbell has been running the test for New Zealand breeders since she joined us in February. Emma grew up on a sheep and beef farm in the North Island, studied agricultural science at Lincoln and did her honours on worm resistance and immunity in sheep. Since joining neXtgen, she has set up our "Spit Lab" (in Ferg's garage!) and is now running neXtResist, the SwabTec saliva test, for New Zea...
Join us to celebrate our 300th episode! For anyone lucky enough to attend LambEx this year, Gus Balbontin was one of our favourite speakers. So, when he agreed to come on for our special 300th episode, we were beyond excited. The messages Gus shared during his talk have stuck with many. He challenged (and succeeded) in getting us to think differently and to question any long-standing assumptions we'd had. Gus grew up in sheep country in Patagonia before leaving Argentina at the ag...
John Yates has spent the past 18 years helping develop the British Texel Sheep Society, including bringing performance recording in house and building the iTexel database. Rather than relying on an external system, the Society has developed an evaluation around the information its breeders are collecting and the breeding goals of a terminal sire breed. John chats with Ferg about that evolution and the thinking behind it. For him, breed development has to maintain focus on what commercial prod...