" As featured on ABC Landline”
Reporter: Mark Willacy
First Published: 08/10/2006
SALLY SARA: According to that well-worn cliche, Australia rode its way to wealth on the sheep's back. But, today, many producers are riding high on what's under that once-valuable fleece.
The switch has been driven by surging overseas and domestic demand for Australian lamb. So producers are turning to sheep meat breeds like the Dorper and the dual-purpose Dohne. Now there's another player in the sheep meat market - an import from the South African plains known as SAMM.
MARK WILLACY: The light is fading fast over John Beynon's New England property but he still has plenty of mustering to do. But with his right-hand man skiving off, progress is slow.
JOHN BEYNON: Hoi, boofhead! Chase’m up!
MARK WILLACY: After a quick dip and a drink, Spot is back on the job herding the mob towards fresh pasture. These lambs are John Beynon's first cross South African mutton merinos or Samms for short. Originally known as the German mutton merino, the breed was imported into South Africa in 1932, and through careful selection it evolved into a fast maturing meat and wool sheep. It made the journey from the African velt to Australia a decade ago, bringing with it a reputation as a durable all rounder.
JOHN BEYNON: You've got that many more options, you can produce a trade lamb or an export lamb. And the thing is with a Samm, it's not a terminal option, it's 100 per cent merino. So if the wool job ever comes back, which I hope it does - I don't think it will but if it does - you haven't got a contaminated flock, you've still got 100 per cent merino flock.
MARK WILLACY: For half a century, the Beynon family built its livelihood on the sheep's back but, with the wool industry in a spin, these New England producers have switched from Samms and from fleece to meat.
JOHN BEYNON: They've got meat in all the right places so your valuable cuts are from here back on an animal and, as you can see, the loin is very full there. He's got a lot of meat coming down his legs. As I said, he's got the meat in the right places. Another main aspect of the Samm is that it's easy care - as you've seen, a bare breach. It's a very topical thing at the moment with the mulesing. We don't mules our sheep any more, we don't think they need it.
MARK WILLACY: So just like a South African cricket all rounder, the Samm is better at one discipline than another - in its case, it's meat over wool. For John Beynon, the Samm is still a good bet each way. In the current climate, he'll rely on selling prime lambs for slaughter. But if the market reverses he can switch back to wool where he can expect to produce a fleece of between 21 and 23 micron.
JOHN BEYNON: We're not gonna stand up here and tell people that you’re gonna sell your wool to the Italian spinners 'cause you're not.
But the bulk of the Australian wool clip is probably good to best top makers, it's not spinners' wool, and this wool fits straight into that market.
SAM GILL: It's a breed that's come out of South Africa. It's a breed that's focussed on both meat production as well as wool production. So it's got the capacity to produce a decent carcass as well as being able to shear a merino-type fleece off it.
MARK WILLACY: At the Beynons' Samm stud near Euralla, it's time for drenching, docking and DNA sampling. These sheep on the first step on the genetic ladder to creating a pure line of this South African breed in the eastern states. Here, every stud animal has its very own DNA profile and every lamb is genetically tested. But some important questions about the Samm remain unanswered.
SAM GILL: As a breed that's been imported in from another country, it's still got a few aspects in terms of looking to adapt to the Australian environment. Some of the criticisms that have been levelled at the breed include the whiteness of the wool, being able to maintain that whiteness especially in some of the higher rainfall areas. And at this stage we still don't know much about the breed in terms of its ability to resist worms, among other traits.
MARK WILLACY: Despite these concerns, the Samm recently scored the No. 1 ranking in a trial in Western Australia, topping the class for its ability to produce more lambs and more meat. And now the breed is starting to catch the eye of producers up north.
JOHN BEYNON: Put it this way, we can't supply the demand from the response we've had in Queensland. We can't breed them quick enough. We're gonna get to a stage here shortly where we're not gonna have any commercial sheep left.
CAMM LINDSAY: Listen, there's a lamb there. Just take him up to the corner and put him over the gate. He's just up near the front there, Dave.
MARK WILLACY: 1,200 kilometres north of new England, in the heat and dust around Longreach, Camm Lindsay is turning his hand to Samms. Last year, here at Euruga station, he ran only cattle, but now 60 per cent of his operation is meat sheep.
CAMM LINDSAY: We've had a big dieback in our perennial grass, which is Mitchell grass, and yeah, we're just getting better efficiency with the meat sheep. We chose Samms mainly because we're still getting a return for our wool. Extremely good growth rates and good fertility rates in the Samms and increased mothering ability - that's the main positive point for 'em, yeah.
MARK WILLACY: These six month old lambs are being weaned. It's been another season of below-average rainfall on Euruga station and it comes on top of three years of crippling drought. Despite the big dry and the dieback in his perennial grass, Camm Lindsay says he has recorded excellent growth rates in his young flock of Samms.
CAMM LINDSAY: Some of the country they were bred in is a lot harsher country than here in terms of rainfall and grasses, so I tend to think that they'll do quite well here. The growth rate that we've been getting is 200 to 220 grams a day on an animal that's 6 and 7 months old, which is a bit out there, I feel.
MARK WILLACY: In recent years, the combination of plummeting wool prices and unrelenting drought has forced western Queensland producers to let their sheep flocks dwindle. Instead, many have switched the focus of their operations to cattle. But that trend could be starting to reverse. For Bill and Sally Cripps of Melrose station near Blackall, it was a matter of diversify or die, so two years ago they invested in Samms.
BILL CRIPPS: In the dry condition we find our Samms, our Samm cross, our rams, at least one score, two scores above our merinos. They seem to have a desire to want to live and do well. They're good sheep to look after. They don't crawl through fences. Probably the only criticism we get for a Samm is that they're too big, and there's issues probably maybe shearing them.
MARK WILLACY: While the Cripps are investing in sheep, most of their neighbours are getting out. One used to run 100,000 head, but now they're out of the game altogether. The number of lambs on hand this year in Queensland has fallen by half on last year - the biggest drop in the country. But some in the state's west see meat sheep as a way forward, and a robust rival to the Samm is being touted as one answer to the industry's woes. The Dorper is also a hardy South African import, but Samm producers reckon this breed restricts their options because its fleece is a mixture of hair and wool.
CAMM LINDSAY: Yeah, they could be a tougher animal, Mark. However, you lose that wool quality. We like to have an each-way bet and we're still getting a return or I'm led to believe we'll still get a return for the wool, a handsome return. That's the main reason why we did pick the Samms as opposed to some other breeds.
BILL CRIPPS: Dorpers weren't for us because of the issues of shedding their wool, they're very hard to keep on your property. We don't want to compromise our neighbours' wool business and we don't want our neighbours suing us for contamination.
MARK WILLACY: With demand for Australian lamb soaring, processors are on the hunt for prime product. Here at the Country Fresh abattoir at Tamworth 4,500 lambs are slaughtered every day. About half the cuts are sold to Woolworths. The rest are shipped to export markets as far afield as Malaysia and the Middle East. It's Andrew Jackson's job to identify and best the best-quality lambs.
ANDREW JACKSON: We've had a few of the Samm lambs come through and what we've seen we're very happy with. Not discounting the other breeds at all but the Samms have come up to scratch and they have made our top export grade.
MARK WILLACY: At the moment, Samms only make up about 1 per cent of the Tamworth kill. But processors like Andrew Jackson reckon the breed offers up a quality heavy carcass with prime cuts fit for export.
ANDREW JACKSON: What we're seeing is they're not carrying excessive fat. Why pay for fat? We're saying now we want people to produce muscle, meat, red meat, because that's what we're selling at the end of the day.
SAM GILL: Over the years the Samm breed has been in Australia, they've improved growth rate, so the ability to turn off an animal quicker. They've improved carcass attributes, so lean meat yield so there's actually more meat on the animal, while at the same time focusing on the fertility aspects, so increasing the number of lambs on the ground and continuing to produce a good white wool fleece.
MARK WILLACY: While wool has been on the slide, exports of Australian lamb have been booming, rising by 16 per cent last year with total sales topping a record three quarters of a billion dollars. This year, more than 145,000 tonnes of prime product is expected to be shipped to markets overseas.
ANDREW JACKSON: At the present time, America is still taking a lot of product, but Japan are an up and coming market.
I think they're up 30 per cent year to date at the present time. We've got emerging markets like China and also Russia - Russia could be a very, very, very strong market.
MARK WILLACY: On the domestic front, consumption of lamb is strong, with sales for 2005-06 hitting $1.8 billion. The lamb slaughter for this period has increased to more than 18.5 million head - the highest level for more than two decades. It's this sort of demand which is drawing producers to the fast-growing meat breeds like Samms.
BILL CRIPPS: Samm is a way of increasing our meat carcass value and quantity size - all the attributes we want in a meat carcass - without compromising our wool business and our neighbours' wool business.
CAMM LINDSAY: At the time, I just went through probably three or four different breeds and the Samm seemed to come up the best, mainly probably to have an each-way bet, just keeping that wool factor.
MARK WILLACY: Once upon a time, wool was Australia's greatest export earner, generating wealth for farming families and creating outback legends that endure to this day. But as more and more shearing sheds fall idle, the more those legends are fading, and the greater the interest in sheep meat and new breeds like the Samm.
SALLY SARA: Mark Willacy looking at Samms sheep.
FARM FACT: WOOL PRODUCTION THIS SEASON IS FORECAST TO SLUMP BY 27 MILLION KILOGRAMS, DOWN TO 434 MILLION KILOGRAMS.
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