AN ADVENTUROUS approach to breeding and carcass feedback has helped Deidre and Ron Schlitz achieve the goal of heavy but lean prime lambs.

  • Deidre and Ron Schlitz, Kerang, Victoria

Their success was was well illustrated in the drought year of 2007.

The couple sold 1089 lambs averaging 26.14kg with a high meat yield of 55.61 per cent to processors Castricum Bros, attracting a bonus of 16-20c/kg.

The result was good enough to dominate The Weekly Times-RAS export lamb carcass competition, placing first and third. It was the culmination of 14 years of dedication in which the Schlitzs changed genetics and moved from buying rams to breeding their own to establish a flock producing high-value lambs under tough conditions.

The couple farm 924ha and lease a further 500ha near Kerang.

While they can irrigate 250ha when water is available, most crops, hay and sheep are produced on dry country that in a good year receives just 375mm of rain.

"It's very marginal country no matter what you are doing," Ron said.

Deidre said the tough environment was one of the reasons they experimented with East Friesians in 1998.

They particularly liked the breed's size, fertility and milking ability.

"We need to join our ewe lambs at a young age, as in this climate we can't afford to be carrying sheep that are not productive," Deidre said.

They started by joining a flock of Merinos to East Friesians, with the first-cross ewe progeny then joined to rams at just 10 months of age.

But Ron said they soon faced the problem of costly rams not coping with the conditions.

"We were spending a lot of money buying rams and often getting just one season out of them," he said.

So the couple started their own flock to breed maternal and terminal sires.

Ron said Deidre's passion and open-mindedness toward sheep breeding really blossomed and set the foundations for their lamb success.

Deidre has a Masters in Sheep Production from the University of New England.

"I know people that are in the sheep industry who will only use first-cross ewes because that's what their dads did," Ron said.

"Deidre isn't caught up in any of that tradition and is willing to try a lot of things with genetics."

Deidre said they learnt early that a simple cross of Merino and East Friesian alone didn't produce a lamb that would attract a premium under Viascan, a system rewarding shape and muscle.

Today, the Schlitzs have 1100 composite ewes bred out of Merinos and sired by East Friesian-Poll Dorset rams.

The ewes are then joined back to Poll Dorset-East Friesian or Texel-East Friesian terminal sires to produce second-cross lambs born in the spring.

Deidre said the rams were bred using artificial insemination, which meant they could access the top genetics from within the Poll Dorset and Texel breeds to use over East Friesian stud ewes.

She said this mix of genetics had given them high fertility and milking.

In the 2007 drought year, the ewes reared 156 per cent lambs, with their best result 176 per cent.

The mix also produced export-framed lambs with shape and muscling.

Aside from breeding, they usually buy lambs to grain feed, sometimes finishing 10,000 head a year.

Deidre said their lambs, born in July-August, were run on dryland lucerne or irrigated sub-clover pasture when available, before being grown out on stubble until about January.

Deidre said they aimed for a minimum liveweight of 40kg before entering the feedlot, with the lambs fed for 30-42 days for finished weights of 54-62kg.