Corriedales and Progeny Testing with James Cusack

In today's episode, we have James Cusack, a fifth-generation farmer and Corriedale breeder hailing from south-west Victoria.

While James grew up on a farm in Western Australia, he spent time completing a diesel mechanic apprenticeship before returning to farming in Victoria. James explains, "I was always told I had to do something else, so becoming a diesel mechanic was a practical skill to have. It's come in handy in various ways, but ultimately, my heart was in farming."

Now located in Skipton, south-west Victoria, James manages his family's farms, including the original Corriedale stud in Australia, flock number one, a lineage established in 1911. In 2012, James inherited the stud and has since dedicated himself to ramping up production and genetic improvement across both wool and meat.

James' dedication to improving his flock led him to join the Performance Corriedale Group. This group of passionate Corriedale breeders collaborates to enhance the breed's performance, particularly in meat quality and growth traits. James elaborates, "We aim to change the traditional look of the breed, improve rearing ability, and boost lamb weaning rates while maintaining the valuable wool characteristics."

To achieve this, the Performance Corriedale Group established a progeny test. This project involves joining 270 commercial ewes to 11 different sires, including Corriedales, Border Leicesters, Dorsets and maternal composites. The goal is to assess eating quality and growth traits in the offspring: "We're looking forward to processing the lambs in the new year and analysing carcass traits such as shear force and intramuscular fat."

James is optimistic about the future of Corriedales and believes that projects like these will help showcase the breed's potential. He emphasises the importance of encouraging other breeders to embrace objective measurement tools and select for desired traits.

To stay updated on the progress of this exciting project or get in touch with James Cusack, visit the Performance Corriedale Breeders' Twitter account or email James at jocusack94@gmail.com. Don't miss their field day on 1 March  2024, where you can see the progeny on display and learn more about their findings first hand.


If you have any questions about anything mentioned on this podcast, or one for our upcoming Q&A, email us at info@nextgenagri.com or leave a voice note here: https://thehub.nextgenagri.com/c/ask-your-questions-c7d0a4/.

Head Shepherd is brought to you by neXtgen Agri International Limited, we help livestock farmers get the most out of the genetics they farm with. Get in touch with us if you would like to hear more about how we can help you do what you do best - info@nextgenagri.com.

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Transcript

Mark Ferguson: 0:05

Welcome to the Head Shepherd podcast. I'm your host, mark Ferguson, ceo at Next Gen Agri International, where we help livestock managers to get the best out of their stock. I want to take this opportunity to thank our friends at MSD Animal Health in Orflex for sponsoring Head Shepherd again this season, and I'm also excited to introduce our mates at Heinegger as brand new sponsors of the show. Msd in Orflex, or perhaps better known as Cooper's Animal Health in Australia, offer one of New Zealand, australia's, largest livestock product portfolios, with a comprehensive suite of animal health and management products connected through identification, traceability and monitoring solutions. Like us, they see how the wealth and breadth of information born out of this podcast can help their men and their farming clients achieve their mission of the science of healthier animals. Heinegger will need little introduction to our audience. A market leader and one-stop shop for wool harvesting and animal fibre removal, together with an expanding range of agricultural products and inputs, the Heinegger name is synonymous with quality, reliability and precision. The Heinegger team have a deep understanding of livestock agriculture, backed by Swiss engineering and a family business dedicated to manufacturing the best. It's fantastic to have both of these sponsors supporting us and bringing Head Shepherd to each week, and now it's time to get on with this week's episode.

Mark Ferguson: 1:17

Welcome back to Head Shepherd. You're with Fergan Sophie at the start of this episode. We're looking forward to welcoming James Guzak onto the show shortly. He's a current operator but, most interestingly, at the moment he's running a progeny test which I think is going to be intriguing results. It's in early stages. We won't have any results for a while, but it'll be good to chat with James in a second about how that progeny test is set and what its aims are. He's there in South West Victoria. What else is coming up on Head Shepherd Sophie?

Sophie : 1:46

Hey, ferg. Yeah, we've got some pretty good stuff coming up on the podcast in the next few weeks. We've actually got Q&A coming up, so we'd like to get you all to send in some questions for Ferg, if you would like to flick as an email, or there will actually be a phone number in these show notes which you can send as a voice note and we can answer that for you.

Mark Ferguson: 2:05

Excellent. So we're looking to instigate, I guess, a caller of the week looking for people to send those messages in those questions in, and we'll find something useful to send out to them. It's half feet in pie or something, or something better than that, hopefully.

Sophie : 2:21

Yeah, maybe something a bit fresher than that. But yeah, we'd like to get some stuff out to the listeners and start building a community.

Mark Ferguson: 2:29

Yeah, excellent. It's definitely interesting times out there and there's times like this where we feel like the Head Shepherd community can really start to provide some more assistance and get some good community aspect to the show. So looking forward to getting those good questions in so we can help people as much as we can on the show. But we better start rattling on here and actually get to what people are listening to, which is interviewing great guests. So we'll welcome James to the show. Welcome, james, great to have you on the show.

James : 3:01

Yeah, good, I mark. Thank you for having me.

Mark Ferguson: 3:05

Alright, so you're there in South West Victoria, Southern Victoria, south West Victoria, I suppose. Yeah, it'd be good to just start with where you are farming there, but also your background into a bit of a career then back on the farm and how well that's been for you.

James : 3:25

Yeah, sure, yeah, so I'm located at Skipton, well South West of Ballarat, about 40 minutes, and yeah, so I guess my introduction to farming started quite young. I was born and raised on a farm and was actually born in Western Australia, and I'm a fifth generation farmer on both sides. Yeah, when I was eight we moved to Donald Victoria and then, yeah, from there went to boarding school in Ballarat and finished my senior school education there, and then after school I worked on a range of different farms, both shape cropping, and ended up on a cattle station in Northern Western Australia. And then, yeah, after then returned back to Victoria and completed a diesel mechanic apprenticeship and then, yeah, from there, sort of transitioned back into the farm. So part of that was, yeah, I went to Mark's Oldham for a year studying agri business and, yeah, since then I've been back on the farm and, yeah, been here for five years now.

Mark Ferguson: 4:41

Excellent. So obviously you got a second diesel mechanic, or that was always to get that skill set to, which is pretty handy on a farm obviously.

James : 4:50

Yeah, it was sort of always drilled into me that had to do something else, yeah, so it was very handy to have. Probably should use it more often as a skill, but yeah, anyway, it's good to know and handy to get that experience in a different workplace.

Mark Ferguson: 5:08

Yeah, so they're intrigued about the three locations. And yeah, obviously I don't know how many people be fifth generation on both sides, but that's pretty impressive in Australia. Yeah, so the whole family moved back from WA to or from WA to Donald.

James : 5:23

Yeah, so the dad side of the family, yeah, reigned in Western Australia and, yeah, mum's side of the family were Donald on a sheep farm.

Mark Ferguson: 5:34

so, yeah, All right, I say yeah, yeah, excellent, and thenack a full day of education there, rainy, yeah, yeah, excellent. Concerning the decision to move south, or that was accidental or married related, well, it was, yeah, obviously farm and family related.

James : 5:55

So I managed the farm for my uncle and auntie who, yeah, it wasn't obviously through their plans or my plans, but they had a death in their family and sort of it was a bit of a very sad time for everyone but, yeah, sort of stepped in to manage that commercial side of the sheep farming enterprise and yeah, so here we are.

Mark Ferguson: 6:21

Excellent, very good. So yeah, I guess you tell us a little bit about what you're farming there. The Corridor start number one is obviously a strong association with Corridor through those five generations to be flock number one, but a few other things going on there as well.

James : 6:38

Yeah, so we commercially run Corridorals and we obviously have the Corridor start as well, algendra Corridorals. As you said, they're flock number one and established in 1911 and it's running the family for obviously many years. I inherited it in 2012 and I probably just managed to run it over the years as I was not full time on the farm. But, yeah, with support from my mother and uncle and auntie, I was able to lease a farm and keep that bloodline going. And, yeah, it's probably since I've come back that I've really ramped up the production and the genetic gain of the sheep, mainly in the stud, and, yeah, it's been quite a process of change, but it's been quite rewarding at the same time.

Mark Ferguson: 7:36

Yeah, so I guess what are the key aspects that you had to change, or how did you go about sort of understanding that things needed to change and what the opportunities were?

James : 7:46

Yeah, I think, running the commercial operation, you're able to see pretty quickly what needs to change and how to change it and obviously we breed our own ram so we have control of what we need to change and we can put a lot of different genetics and things in our stud which filters through and we're able to see that on a commercial scale. So, yeah, I guess probably changing the type of Coradale versus like they were quite traditional and we sort of changed the look at them a little bit, sort of opening up their face and legs and, yeah, ramping up that production in terms of probably rearing ability and their lamb's weaned. So yeah, they certainly have always been fertile but yeah, getting the lamb's weaned has been a key criteria of mine since returning.

Mark Ferguson: 8:48

Excellent, and a bit of opportunity to find them up as well while that change is going on.

James : 8:58

Yes, yeah, when I returned they were a little bit finer, but then I probably ran them, run a bit better of a nutrition management program and got blamed for increasing the micron that way. Anyway, now that we're under control there, we are on the way back down and aiming to find up the micron, whilst keeping the kilos of clip there and, obviously, the soft handling of the product.

Mark Ferguson: 9:32

For sure. There's a group of, I think called Performance Corridor Breeders, is it? And obviously that's a group of Corridor Breeders, that sort of work together a bit to, I guess, to use objective information and the subjective to improve the Corridor Breed.

James : 9:48

Yeah, so yeah, it's a performance Corridor Group. I joined there a couple of years ago and it was a part of the performance Corridor Group you got to be a part of, like, land plant. So that was a good change for us because we had to go that way anyway and, like, I guess, with the support from people in there, that makes it quite easy. Yeah, so it's a group of Corridor Farmers that obviously are all on land plan and are passionate about their sheep genetics and we get together annually once a year for an AGM and annually at the Bendigo sheep show also. And, yeah, we just discuss different things that are going to benefit the breed, yeah, different things that are going on within all sheep industries. And, yeah, and currently we are hosting this satellite flock that was formed through the performance Corridor Group in 2022. And yeah, here we are with the now lambs on the ground.

Mark Ferguson: 11:00

Yeah, it's a really interesting project and obviously early days with the first lambs on the ground, but it really isn't until they have their own lambs that I guess the things get excited. Obviously, you'll gather data along the way, but yeah, I guess just explain that project and the variety of breeds and types you've got in there. I think it's destined to shed a lot of light on a lot of things.

James : 11:26

Yeah, so, yeah, there's a fair bit going on within the trial, but the Performance Corridor Group has they've completed a meat eating quality trial down Tasmania and it's pretty much the next step of the process to ensure that we have a quality product. And yeah so the satellite flock came to head at one of these annual meetings. And yeah so we've joined 270 commercial shape of ours, two thirds of that being composites and one third curridales to 11 different size. And in those side groups there's two composite, maternal composites, a Bordelester and the rest of curridales that were nominated within the group. So, yeah, it's a big range of size. It's obviously the two different U groups and, yeah, a large crop of a variety of lambs.

Mark Ferguson: 12:38

So I'm not a lead people Australia. Is it taking them through to maternal traits or is it just eating, quality and growth traits that you're looking at?

James : 12:45

Pretty much eating quality and growth traits. So, yeah, the weather portion will be headed off for processing in the new year and I think we have to have a minimum of seven progeny per sire. To complete that, and yeah, that's it, the MLA meat quality team will, yeah, analyze the carcass for pretty much sheer force and IMF and, in the interim, will scan them for fat depths and muscle.

Mark Ferguson: 13:17

So yeah, excellent so, and obviously they're all being genotypes, so that'll go add information to the central database so that, yeah, you'll, I guess, add accuracy. Genomic predictions is that that'd have to be a big part of the year.

James : 13:33

Yeah, it'll obviously crease our accuracy and form a few other linkages and as more times the size use, the Obviously the more progeny is on the ground, so creates a stronger link there.

Mark Ferguson: 13:47

And was there any Sort of known superstars in the group for IMF, or are they're all a bit? They're all sort of young, young size that are hoping to be the best, or is it ever? You got a bit of both in there.

James : 14:01

I think, well, yeah, probably the most exciting part is that there's such a big range of size in there. Yeah, obviously you could Find them pretty much all on on sheep genetics. But, yeah, it'd be good to be obviously good to see the, you know, the end product and the Comparisons between breeds and, yeah, and size. So, yeah, it's quite a sort of exciting project that it's been going on for obviously a little while now and, yeah, it's good to see some absolute cracking lambs on the ground and yeah, it was a Not a stressful process joining them but yeah, it was certainly rewarding.

Mark Ferguson: 14:45

Yeah, excellent, sure, I mean, they're all just Tag blindly. So do you pull them into their side groups and have a look, or have you there was? Because I think it's always one thing we always Encourage anyone to do was to see different genetics on their own farm, because it's such a powerful thing to see. But you get to see that, or you just see the variation.

James : 15:05

This far we've only seen the variation. Obviously we completed lamb marking there months or so ago and and yeah, it was, surprisingly enough, pretty hard to pick what was what. But obviously you see a variation of lambs come through. There's a pretty big day there. But we will through, obviously, identification through the tags. We we DNA tested all the lamps and we obviously will DNA test all the use to find out the parentage. So yeah, we Tess you'd the lambs at lamb marking and we'll TSU the use at weaning time. A.

Mark Ferguson: 15:50

Quick interruption here to remind you of head shepherd premium and our consulting services at next to Niagara International. If you love this podcast and want to hear more of them, visit the hub next to nagricom and sign up for head shepherd premium and get an extra podcast each week. If you're listening to this and thinking you really do want to maximize the genetic gain of your lifestyle and Feel more confident around the decisions you're making on farm, then send me an email at market next to nagricom and we'll get in touch and see. See where that takes us. Yeah, and the females from that they just become. They're either go for eating quality as well or they they hang around. And I mean there wouldn't be enough numbers to get good repo data, but it'll be a start.

James : 16:32

Yeah, I think. Well, yeah, certainly hold on to them and, and yeah, harvest as much reproduction data as we can. Yeah, I think we have the choice of what Si goes on over those, over those use that we keep. But, yeah, which would be much more straightforward than the trial, but Obviously there'd be a lot more hands-on work In terms of recording that data.

Mark Ferguson: 16:57

Yeah for sure. So, yeah, lots of, lots of things going on. I guess the resource flock generally is always continuing to build that link between dynamics and and Measured, and that's particularly important for anyone wanting to do Eating quality traits. It they do things like this to link their data in. Otherwise we're sort of relying on older correlations or trait correlations and an older genomic set. So it's always great to keep building that information so that those genomic predictions are as accurate as they can be. We tend to place, I guess, increasing emphasis on those traits and we have to be careful that we're not what. We have to put structures in place to make sure that's information as good as it can be. Yeah, yeah.

James : 17:41

And I think from the previous trial that they did dance Tasmania, you know. It showed that the corridors do have a premium meat eating product and I think the more that we can, more work we can do to show that, the better the breed will be.

Mark Ferguson: 18:00

Yeah, exactly as a sort of relative newcomer into performing, into measured breeding, I suppose, or using land plan there's a better way to put that and just for clarity, land plans. There's two kind of components to sheep genetics in Australia, which is the overriding organization, but land plan tends to focus on meat breeds and marine asloaked, obviously on wool breeds. Obviously, carotidyle sit pretty smack back in the middle and probably could have gone either way. So I guess, as you've transitioned the flock and continued to, I guess what's the experience been like starting to get information on those sheep and I guess, yeah, things that you've kind of might have annoyed you or things that have gone well or surprised you.

James : 18:44

Well, it's a great question because, yeah, it's being a dual purpose sheep. You know it's often hard deciding what you want to correct first. Luckily, carotidyle breeders and my grandfather was pretty obsessed with wool at the time. Obviously we've found that up, found that up a little bit for now and want to take it further. But yeah, I think we had wool, we had the structure of the animal and there's just things that we needed to correct like post-weaning weight, survivability in the paddock and obviously, weaning rate and, yeah, pretty much hitting those targets of getting lambs off the farm quicker.

James : 19:28

So it was, yeah, a pretty big process at the time deciding what to do first. But I think the biggest encouragement has come out of the performance carotidyle group. There's some pretty influential people within the breed in that group and you know they're always there to lean on and sort of guide you in the right direction. And yeah, obviously, the more change we make within the stud, you know we get to see it firsthand as we use our own rams in the commercial side of things. So it all in our enterprise it has a big flow and effects and we're not scared of introducing new genetics and yeah, it's as I said before, it's really rewarding seeing that gain and from where we've started you can see that gain very quickly.

Mark Ferguson: 20:20

Yeah, excellent. Yeah, I think there's always. Yeah, it's always. The strength of those groups of breeders has always been a really positive feature, I guess, is the equivalence in what's up X and Borelesters and Poltors, and they are great, great programs to support each other. And I guess the other great thing that those groups tend to do is make sure your linkages is maintained, or connectedness as it's called in New Zealand. But what underpins breeding ways is obviously having progeny in common across different environments and different breeders so that the data can be compared, Because the computer isn't magic. It needs a link between properties and that's what those groups are really great at maintaining, or using a common size so that your data is as good as it can be.

James : 21:11

Yeah, it's yeah and sort of to address the question you asked before it's to breed that sort of stuck more or less in those two in between Merino select and the sort of primary production shape, pretty much. And yeah, it's sort of. I've always thought of it. As you know, we technically should be able to achieve similar reproduction traits as the, as like the sort of terminal shape. But obviously you have that wool side of things where we can chase a little bit as well. So I think knowing we can hit a lot of reproduction traits and getting a valuable wall clip and not paying for shearing, it certainly sort of encourages, pushes the boundaries in terms of what you can achieve.

Mark Ferguson: 22:11

Yeah, definitely. I think anyone that's listened to me very often knows that I'm pretty convinced that genetics can do anything. So it's all about having a clear goal and when you know there's plenty of people out there so you can't have a woolen meat or whatever. But I think with time and time again that's been proven wrong. Obviously it's harder to do have more than one trick, but it doesn't mean it's impossible and there's certainly good examples of individual sheep and breeders and where that combination is coming together. I think it's a, as I've said before, it's going to be.

Mark Ferguson: 22:52

The industry is looking a bit like you either have a good wool or no wool at the moment, and that's. I don't think that there's any. I haven't seen any trends that suggest that's not true still. So we need to. There is some change happening in the industry at the moment. It's happening on both sides of the ditch. New Zealand's gone very much focus on shift to shearing sheep and I guess the reason I'm in New Zealand the first place was to help breed a final animal that could do two, both. So, yeah, I guess, interestingly when we just decide story. But we started that group about 10 years ago and ended up being called Southern Cross, and when I Googled Southern Cross, I found that it was the. It was actually one of the original names that was considered for Corridor, so when the Corridor breed was developed, it was actually one of the first. Yeah, it was considered as one of those names, so it was an interesting full circle there.

James : 23:47

Yeah, it's a full circle. But yeah, I think in terms of our breed, there's a certainly great opportunity there and doing things like this and also encouraging other breeders to get on and create ASBVs with your flocks and really put that selection pressure on and increase the numbers of those dual purpose sheep out there.

Mark Ferguson: 24:18

Yeah, I think that's the case. I think there's probably as yeah, I think, like lots of braids, there was a fair focus on the on the show circuit and structure and one thing that what we found over here since being here as a Corridor structure is awesome in terms of physical, physical structure, yeah, and I guess, with the addition of some measurements and focus on that performance, there's a lot of opportunity there that probably hasn't been captured as well as it could have in the past. So, yeah, it's a pretty exciting space.

James : 24:50

Yeah, yeah, it certainly is. Yeah, obviously in the Western districts you're either pretty much one or the other and when you catch up with fellow farmers they obviously sort of they ask pretty much why. And it's either why do you farm Corridor? Or I am, my grandfather or my dad used to have those, but they're out of the system now. And I think that's certainly something that's got to me over the years in terms of that question of why. And I think sort of people have got out of them for various different reasons, but no one, I mean people have done stuff about it, but I think there should have been probably a larger push back to keep the breed relevant and potentially these farmers that did have Corridor's generations ago could still have them on their farm today. And it was work like this and big marketing push. It would be good for people to jump back on board one day. But anyway, that's up to them and time will see which way the sheep industry goes.

Mark Ferguson: 26:12

Yeah, excellent. So the plans there commercially is, I guess, focused on the traits you talked about, your own ability through the Rams, while you're running other enterprises as well, or it's predominantly from the sheep.

James : 26:25

Yeah, so here at Skipton one third of the farm's sheep and the rest is cropping both pretty much wheat and canola, a little bit of hay. We do a fair bit of that with a local share farmer and up where my uncle and auntie live they also run a winery there. So that's been my uncle Tom's passion for many years now and he's fully stepped aside from the sheep to focus on that. And when I say stepped aside, he's still classing the wool first next week at Shearing. But he certainly has a passion for wool and a passion for wine A bad combination.

Mark Ferguson: 27:10

I think I'd probably have to agree with him on those two. Yeah, that's for sure. Excellent. Hopefully he brings the latest vintage down with him, does he when he comes to class?

James : 27:20

Well, yes, he says that my role in the winery is just working on consuming, so I can't complain with that.

Mark Ferguson: 27:31

That's not a bad spot to be Better than some of the other jobs here, I'm sure. Well, excellent, james. Thanks for the chat. Yeah, really look forward to hearing those results. How do if people want to hear about that trial? What's the best way to do that?

James : 27:48

Yeah, so we do have a Twitter account under the performance curtail group, but we're also hoping to have a field day on the 1st of March. We're going to split those, the progeny, up, and have them on display. I think it's an important thing to obviously have the shape on display to one one, compare wool types and obviously the carcass well, the live carcass of the animal, before going off to the processed.

Mark Ferguson: 28:20

Yeah right, so 1st of March 2024, and presumably we can put your email or something in the show notes if people want to find it more or go on to a reserve?

James : 28:33

Yeah, that'd be great. Email or just getting in contact, yeah, yeah.

Mark Ferguson: 28:40

Excellent, excellent mate, we'll let you go and do some work, but yeah, thanks very much for your time and, yeah, look forward to seeing the results of that trial.

James : 28:49

Yeah, thank you for having me, and yeah, it's been great.

Mark Ferguson: 28:53

Cheers. Thanks again to our mates at Heinegger, who are proud world leaders in the manufacturing and supply professional sheep shearing and clipping equipment. They understand that their customers rely on the quality and performance of their products each and every day. Also, thanks to our friends at MSD Animal Health and Orphlix, they offer an extensive livestock portfolio focused on animal health and management, all backed up by exceptional service. Both of these companies are wonderful supporters of the Australian and New Zealand livestock industries and we thank them for sponsoring the Hedgehead podcast.