Sheep - Merino & Border Leicester 

The Mann Family first purchased Brie Brie in 1936. At the time the property was stocked with a Merino flock that I R Mann later substituted for the Pollworth breed in order to establish a flock providing better meat with more robust feet. Until 1996 the property remained predominantly stocked with a Pollworth flock, however, at this time E A Mann made the transition to cross Merino rams over his Pollworth breeding females with the explicit aim of developing a cross-breed with the qualities of size, resilience, high wool-yield, better quality fleeces and improved fertility.

 

Prior to the transition in 1996 the flock sheep had been considered unfavourably small, cutting approximately 4 kilograms of wool and with a micron ranging between 19-26 across the flock. In terms of genetics, no external rams had been introduced for an extended period and as such the breeding diversity was limited at that time. Nevertheless, with the changes implemented by E A Mann, today Brie Brie can attest to having a vastly improved flock of sheep producing upwards of 5 kilograms of very white, stylish wool, with a pronounced crimp and a finer micron ranging from 19-22 across the flock. In addition, Brie Brie wethers have proven to be in increased demand in the marketplace due to improved flock characteristics of size and weight. 

 

The introduction of externally bred rams was first led by a purchase from the stud at Woolaroo in Yass, NSW. Aside from selecting rams in favour of certain physical characteristics, the stud at Woolaroo demonstrated a similar philosophy to GPC in that their rams were reared in the natural environment with minimal force-feeding, pampering and housing, which were found to have been common practices to so many other studs at the time. Both Langdene and Nareeb rams have been used over the past decade, and over the past 6-8 years, rams have been incorporated primarily from the Walker Family at Yass, NSW. The rams were characterised by outstanding physical attributes and have since been joined to the 300 top breeding ewes from the GPC flock. As a result of this breeding, the offspring have proven to possess vastly superior characteristics of weight, size and fleece yield. The next generation of rams sired by the introduced rams have subsequently been crossed over the remaining GPC flock ewes with equally favourable results.

 

In the order of 2,000 Merino ewes are joined to Merino rams annually, 5,000 Merino ewes are joined to Border Leicester rams, and 5,000 First Cross ewes are joined to Poll Dorset rams. GPC operates a Merino and Border Leicester stud of 300 ewes each, producing rams for breeding purposes as well as for on-sale to the broader marketplace. The Border Leicester stud, currently commercial, is based on Ellengerrin bloodlines from Heather and Murray Stoney in Victoria, who have also mentored in the genetics and selection process. The Merino stud is currently dominantly Walker bloodlines. 

 

Fraser McKenzie has been actively involved in classing the GPC flock for the past decade. Fraser is sympathetic to the aims of the GPC breeding program in terms of selecting for specific characteristics in body weight, fleece weight, fertility, white wool and style. Fraser additionally selects sheep on the basis of conformation and hardiness in terms of prospering under a pasture-based feeding system. On this basis, Fraser classes the GPC flock by three means:

 

- Selection of the premium ewes from within the flock to establish the top 300 selected breeding ewes

- Selection of ewes suitable for inclusion in the GPC commercial flock

- Selection in favour of stronger wool characteristics in individual ewes to be subsequently joined to Border Leicester rams