New genetics to eliminate eczema losses

Philip and Trevor Coley have introduced facial eczema tolerant Finn-cross ewes to their flock in a bid to improve productivity.

01-11-2002 | Mike Bland

In January this year Phillip Coley sent his father off to a Te Kuiti ewe fair with instructions to buy a specific mob of ewes, no matter how much they cost. Trevor Coley followed those directions to the letter and came home with 100 two-tooths for which he had paid the princely sum of $142 per head.

The price may have seemed high, but in Phillip Coley’s view it was fully justified by the subsequent performance of the Finn-cross sheep.

“They scanned at 169% and that’s the best scanning we’ve ever had with two-tooths. So the potential is there for a 200% scanning next season,” he says.

“We knew the ancestry of those sheep and we knew they would perform well on this property.”

The two-tooths, produced by a former King Country Farmer Of The Year, were an important part of Coley’s plan to replace a sheep flock that had performed poorly for many years.

In 1998 he and his father made the decision to fast-track out of the old flock by buying-in top sheep rather than breeding from the existing flock. The Coleys, who farm 375ha (325ha effective) of hill country on Ngapeke Road, 20 kilometres east of Otorohanga, searched as far as Northland to find suitable Finn-cross sheep to replace the Romneys that had been on the farm for almost 40 years.

A history of facial eczema tolerance was top of Phillip Coley’s priority list.

“Facial eczema has always been the Achilles Heel on this farm. It kept killing sheep and costing production,” he says.

The impact of FE was a key factor behind a swing to beef cattle over the past 20 years. “It wasn’t so much that the cattle were performing well, it was more a case of the sheep doing very badly.”

As a result, ewe numbers dropped as low as 600. But now that trend has moved into reverse and this year Ngapeke Farm wintered 1032 mixed age ewes and around 400 ewe hoggets. Ewe numbers may climb by another 400 head at the expense of cattle if sheep prices remain high.

The Coleys now have sufficient Finn-cross ewes to breed their own replacements, with the last of the original sheep going down the road this year.

Phillip can’t wait to see them go. When it comes to animal health, he says, the difference between the eczema tolerant sheep and the older ewes is as clear as day.

“You can ride through the paddock and pick the vintage of the sheep by the hunch in their backs.”

Animal health and fertility has lifted markedly as the ‘new’ sheep demonstrate the benefits of FE tolerance. Death and empty rates have plummeted and lambing percentages have leapt from 93% two years ago to 142% in 2001/02. Estimates suggest this year’s lambing should reach 147%.

FE tolerant rams come from Peter Jackson’s Piquet Hill Stud in the western Waikato where contour is very similar to the Coley’s property. “That’s why we like them. They are good hard-nosed sheep that are bred for a commercial environment,” says Phillip.

And the facial eczema tolerance is crucial. “Peter has been doing exactly what we are trying to do now.”

Trevor Coley supports his son’s decision to switch breed, although he admits it required a “change of mindset”.

“It was obvious that the sheep weren’t performing as well as they should be, but it wasn’t until Phillip said he’d had enough that we decided it was time to try something new,” he says.

“The Romneys we had originally were big and strong but they couldn’t cope with the eczema, particularly during the bad outbreaks in the 1980s. So new thinking was required and it’s certainly paid off.”

But it has taken Trevor Coley some time to adjust to the fact that, as he describes it, no two of the new crossbred sheep look the same.

“I came from a generation of farmers that believed sheep all had to be identical to be good. They had to be peas in a pod.”

The Romneys, along with Angus beef cattle, had played a key role in the development of the property that Trevor and wife Glenys have farmed since the mid-1960s.

“Half the farm was in scrub when we first came here and P levels were about 2. In some places they didn’t register at all and the soil structure was so weak that if you rode a horse over it, the horse would sink in up to its neck.”

The fertility of the Mairoa Ash soils has improved significantly with regular capital fertiliser application.

“Glenys reckons we’ve spent the equivalent of a Mercedes Benz on fertiliser each year,” says Trevor.

Phillip Coley describes the contour of the north facing property as “broken country, with every paddock rising from flat to vertical.”

Married to Tania, who works in nearby Otorohanga, he now runs the farm on his own, although major decisions are always discussed with his father. Trevor started diversifying into property investment (industrial and commercial) in the 1980s and this now keeps him busy virtually full-time. He and Glenys recently built a new home on the farm after deciding it was much more preferable to living in town.

Phillip, one of four sons, returned to the property in 1994 after completing a building apprenticeship and four years of overseas travel.

“I ran the farm until 1997,” says Trevor. “That year Glenys and I decided to have a two week holiday in Fiji and we told Phillip that as soon as we got back he would be running the place on his own.”

Trevor still does the odd job on the farm and Phillip jokes that he’s “very useful when I want someone to hold the other end of something”. He also manages the farm when Phillip and Tania are on holiday.

Trevor credits Phillip, 32, with bringing fresh ideas to the property and is pleased with the sound progress on the sheep front.

“At 93% lambing we didn’t have many options and the sheep weren’t making much money,” says Phillip.

“They were always our last priority until recently. But now that their performance has improved and lamb prices are good, they are being fed on demand.”

Lambing starts on August 20 and last year’s lambs were finished at an average of 16kg carcase weight. The first draft goes in December and the majority of lambs are sold by May with a few tail-enders carried through the winter.

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