Macquarie

The Macquarie Sire Evaluation site is currently located at the Trangie Agricultural Research Centre (TARC), which is located 7 kilometres north west of Trangie in Central West NSW.

Trangie Agricultural Research Centre comprises 3900 ha of mixed red and grey soils in the heart of the Macquarie Valley.  About 2800 ha are grazed as native pasture, with 800ha managed for dry land cropping in rotation with lucerne pastures, and 300ha developed for flood irrigation. The balance of 290ha is occupied by roads, buildings etc.  The property has a livestock carrying capacity of 12,000 dry sheep equivalents and is the largest research station operated by the Department of Primary Industries.

TARC is located in a non-seasonal rainfall region. The climate in Trangie is warm and temperate and the annual rainfall is 544 mm.

The ewe base involved in the 2022 drop at the Trangie site are sourced from the NSW DPI commercial flock at TARC, based on a Currawarra bloodline.

The ewe base joined for the 2017 and 2018 MLP drops were commercial ewes from the Central West region with one representing a bloodline selected for increased wool production and body size; and the other representing a dual purpose bloodline, where selection aimed to improve wool, fertility and growth traits.

MLP

The Breeding Objective is to breed a highly commercially viable flock of sheep suitable for the climatic and pastoral conditions of the Central West of NSW. Sheep should not require high management inputs but be highly productive (fleece weight) relative to a fine/medium wool type (18 to 20 micron adult fibre diameter) and have good carcase characteristics that make them suitable as 1st cross or prime lamb dams. In addition to soundness the production emphasis is equally on increasing fleece weight and increasing early growth while maintaining fibre diameter.

2022 MSE

The Macquarie 2022 CTSE breeding objective is to breed a non-mulesed self-replacing Merino suitable for mixed farming environments with high fly strike resistance. Fleece weight is to be increased while maintaining fibre diameter, increasing number of lambs weaned and growth, and maintaining adult weight.