Sheep Industry News March 2025

Improving Flocks Using Genetic Data CAT URBIGKIT U ndertaking the longest journey to attend the ASI Annual Convention in Scottsdale, Ariz., was Bindi Murray, chair of Sheep Producers Australia, who explained to Genet cent lamb crop, he moved toward selecting for other traits such as parasite resistance, reducing the body size of the ewes and scor ing udders. He’s interested in tracking performance traits as well as things like health events and looking at older ewes to select for sustainability. Malooley is first-generation ag producer and is director of

ics Forum attendees how she has used sheep genetic data to make improvements in her sheep production system during the last 20 years. Murray’s livestock operation includes 6,500 Merino ewes in her wool operation and 2,000 Merino ewes mated to terminal sires. She practices winter lambing, summer shearing, confinement in the fall, and often feedlotting from summer to winter so the sheep are provided supplemental feed from six to 12 months of the year. Her breeding objects have been expanded to include traits associated with weights at different life stages – fleece weights, fiber length, and staple strength, to eye muscle depth – while also accounting for her father’s interests in maintaining certain conformational traits such as straight legs and minimal body wrinkles. Her participation in genetic research in Australia has led to using three different ge netic indexes, where she has been able to track her flock’s progress in meeting her breeding objectives while generally exceeding those of other flocks on the indexes. Murray’s presentation was followed by a producer panel led by Texas A&M’s Jake Thorne, with producers John Helle of Montana, Jim Malooley of Georgia and Isaac Matchett of Michigan talking about the impact of genetic progress in their operations. Helle is a third-generation sheep producer running about 4,000 ewes but with an inventory of nearly 10,000 sheep most of the time, keeping lambs until after they are shorn. Helle’s mantra is to always be thinking about the end product and consumer, leading to the startup of the wool clothing company Duckworth. Helle said that Duckworth was the result of intense genetic selection and persis tence in raising high-quality wool. He said several decades ago his family realized that they needed to change their operation in order to cover expenses, especially through increasing the number of lambs weaned every year. After switching from range lambing to shed lambing and incorporating genetic data collection, they were able to substantially increase the number of lambs weaned from their ewes, while maintaining their topline wool production. “Trusting the data is how we got where we’re at,” Helle said. Matchett – a fourth-generation farmer who runs 2,000 Polypay ewes – said that he selected the breed that naturally displays the traits he wanted, then used estimated breeding values to make improvements to the flock. Initially, the goal was to increase the number of lambs going to market, but once he reached a 200-per

agrivoltaics at Silicon Ranch, which runs about 2,000 sheep in solar installations in Georgia. Malooley said he has embraced all the tools offered through the National Sheep Improvement Program, but said he hopes the genetic database continues to grow. All three producers noted that these advances in genetics track ing have improved their operations, but all technology has limita tions. Malooley said that none of the technology works at the scale he needs, but felt that the investment was worthwhile so long as the flock continues to improve in traits such as feed efficiency and lambing percentages. Helle sees a challenge ahead in how to match what he’s selecting for to the environment he’s operating in; thus, “not going back wards, but steady progress forward.” Helle pointed to mistakes made in cattle breeding when one trait was pushed at the expense of growing animals that are too large. He suggested sheep producers need a more balanced approach rather than moving toward whatever trait is trending. Matchett agreed, suggesting that genomics have real potential to broaden perspectives, while too narrow a focus might result in an animal that is perfect in one way and lacking in others. “It’s a game of balance and at the end of the day they still have to be sheep,” he said. All three producers agreed that current indexes don’t account for all important traits. For Matchett, udder structure and health are non-negotiable traits. Helle pointed to his focus on wool, with in dexes not covering things like black spots or belly wool. Malooley pointed to the “stayability” of a ewe, asking if ewes are 6 to 10 years old and still raising twins, “why would you cull them at 6 years of age?” SHEEP GEMS PROJECT The traits raised by the sheep producers were some of the very traits being examined by the Sheep GEMS genomics project. Re cently retired Ron Lewis, Ph.D., of the University of Nebraska-Lin coln noted that Sheep GEMS is working to identify traits that define robustness and resilience, including traits related to lamb survival, ewe longevity, udder health and gastrointestinal parasite resistance. He noted that udder depth and teat placement are traits found to be heritable and highly genetically correlated in Polypay sheep. The Sheep GEMS project has enabled producers to capture

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