Economic modelling of ewe lamb mating enterprises

Summary

A lack of information on the cost-effectiveness of joining ewe lambs has contributed to relatively poor adoption of the practice. In this project whole farm systems modelling indicated that joining maternal ewe lambs was profitable in all regions and times of lambing that were examined.

The increased profitability from joining Maternal ewe lambs were greater than the benefits from mating Merino ewe lambs and greater for longer growing season environments regardless of ewe breed. Mating ewe lambs is a low priority in the wheat belt region.

In all analyses it was more profitable to join ewe lambs at 8 months of age rather than at 7 months of age and for the Maternal ewe lambs it was always more profitable to mate all ewe lambs. This was generally the case Merino ewe lambs as well, however the marginal return was often low when more than 50% of Merino ewe lambs were mated and therefore not mating a proportion of the ewe lambs maybe a practical solution for farmers to reduce costs.

The economic optimum liveweight at joining varied from 60 to 80% of their mature weight, and only in the SW Victoria scenario was it profitable to allocate more feed between weaning and joining to the ewe lambs to be mated, and for all scenarios feeding to gain more weight during joining itself was more profitable. Selling the dry Maternal ewe lambs was always more profitable whereas it was generally more profitable to retain dry Merino ewe lambs.

This analysis was successful in generating an understanding and the economic response curves to factors influencing the reproductive performance of ewe lambs. The analysis informed the development of a decision support tool for consultants and farmers to help them decide whether mating ewe lambs is a technology that they should be evaluating compared to other production alternatives. The DST also determines the optimal management system if mating Merino or Maternal ewe lambs together with the impacts on profitability of sub-optimal management. The DST will allow farmers to focus their decision making and management on components of their production system that will provide the greatest financial returns.