Caretakers of the land

Our property

The farm is a mix of gentle rolling to steep hill country, primarily with kikuyu and browntop grasses and clover. The ridge at the north end of the farm extends along the boundary, past a large patch of bush at the top of a grassy paddock, and down to the Araparera River. We run 200 breeding ewes including hoggets, plus the property carries through the breeding and sale rams and the young stock. Rams are grown out and wintered on the hill country.

Farming sustainably

We are only here as caretakers of the land which will long outlive us. Our goal is to improve what we can; plant trees, fence waterways, grow more pasture with minimal inputs and good management, improve pasture quality through species diversification, improve soil health and subterranean ecosystems. We follow biological farming principles as we can apply them to our farm.

Raising livestock ethically

It was written "every cow is a mother, treat her like one" - well so is every ewe! As a stud we handle our sheep a lot, and they get used to it. Gentle handling. Gentle shifting. An open gate is an invitation to new feed - we shift every mob every day to new feed. Putting a harness on a ram means a bucket with yummies and a paddock of ewes. The prevention of problems is paramount, staying on top of our health management program, avoiding issues and ensuring sheep are well fed and healthy.

Breeding livestock ethically

As stud breeders our job is to improve the animals through breeding, and not just to make them more profitable. We think it's important that lambs have a good start in life, hence why we DNA test for cold tolerance. We also think it's important that ewes can raise twins, hence why we've been milking the sheep at lambing to assess milk production, udder quality and ewe body condition, and weighing lambs at weaning to identify great ewes. We use state of the art software technology to select and mate our flock to identify the best ewes, rams and matings, to avoid inbreeding and ensure that we can do so into the future. We also think it's important to give our top stock good lives, here or elsewhere, so we let the good old ones retire and live out their days, and the younger ones find new homes as we make room for our younger replacements.