Troy and Nette Fischer, Ashmore Rams, South Australia

Focusing on cost of production has allowed the Fischer family to triple the area they farm and double sheep numbers, all with the same labour force.

Objective performance measurement and being conscious of their return on investment has allowed Troy and Nette Fischer to significantly expand their operation.

In the past seven years they have more than tripled the area they farm and doubled their sheep numbers, all with the same labour force.

This has been achieved with a strong focus on planning their operations, using simple proven systems, doing things on time and making sure everyone is working towards the same goals.

Troy and Nette, along with daughters Isabelle, Indigo and Elke, operate Ashmore Rams on their 1440ha properties, a mix of owned and leased, at Wasleys in South Australia.

They join 1000 White Suffolk stud ewes annually, breed and market 500 rams a year and join 100 Ultra White and Ultra White-cross ewes. The sheep run on 260ha of annual pasture during winter and alongside this they, a crop 1200ha.

Troy and Nette Fischer of Ashmore White Suffolk stud from Wasleys in South Australia.

The turning point for Troy and Nette was rebuilding their business after the Pinery fire – which burnt 86,000ha – ravaged their farm in 2015.

While their stud took a massive hit from the fire, it was a chance to start rebuild their business, which they took in their stride.

Troy and Nette undertake on-farm benchmarking through Farm Owners Academy and take an objective approach to all of their decisions.

“We are conscious of our return on investment and we know the cost of production of the rams we produce and we are constantly trying to improve that,” Troy said.

With both Troy and Nette working in the business, they have one other full time employee, and Troy said they aimed to “do the best we can with the team we have to deliver a good financial performance”.

“Our ongoing focus is to achieve healthy return on investment year-on-year, regardless of what the season and the market throws at us as we can’t control these things,” he said.

BREED PLAN

At Ashmore they are strong advocates for the White Suffolk breed, with Troy convincing his father Brian to purchase a ram and two ewes in 1989 to start the stud.

Now one of the biggest White Suffolk studs in the country, the Fischers have had a long and steady build.

“It’s arguably the most progressive (White Suffolk) association of any breed, they focus on objective measurement and LambPlan, which makes it an attractive breed to be a part of.”

In the past two years they have also added a second breed to the operation, purchasing Ultra White ewes.

“We could see the benefits of a sheep that doesn’t need shearing or crutching. We watched for a few years and realised it wasn’t a fad and the percentage of people wanting shedding sheep will grow.”

Nette said Ultra Whites as a breed aligned with their values of performance recording.

“We aim to build on and improve the growth rates, muscling and eating quality,” she said.

This year they had their 31st annual White Suffolk ram sale, where they offered 193 rams and averaged $1447.

GROWTH MINDSET

The key breeding objectives for the Fischers is to breed rams which produce profitable lambs in a range of environments.

While their breeding program aims to produce rams with moderate birth weight, rapid growth and muscling, worm resistance, eating quality and easy care attributes, the first and most important objective is growth.

“A lamb that grows fast is a low cost lamb,” fourth generation farmer Troy said.

“Growth, is really what clients get paid on.”

“If lambs can hit their market weight at a younger age, then there is less cost in that lamb.”

And to ensure fast growth isn’t just speculation, Troy said they have been measuring growth via carcass and birth weight for 30 years.

“We have pedigree and data back the whole way, and the data underpins the performance of the animals.”

Other traits that were important in the breeding program were eye muscle depth, to improve the amount of meat in high value cuts, as well as lambing ease and birth weight.

“Selecting for increased growth drags up birth weight. But we have a flat curve for our birth weight genetic trend,” Troy said.

In the past 10 years they have been focusing on worm egg count, as quite a few of their rams go to higher rainfall areas.

Eating quality traits, being intramuscular fat, has also become a key focus in recent years.

And at Ashmore the success is in the data, with LambPlan figures showing they are significantly above the breed average for IMF. The Ashmore sheep average an IMF of -0.11 compared to the breed average of -0.25.

To ensure they continue on the right track, Troy said they were sending a line of lambs to Gundagai Meat Processors annually, to get feedback.

“The goal of the consignment is to find variation. We are sending 130 lambs, 10 lambs per sire, to get a cluster of data for each sire for the hard to measure traits like marbling.”

Nette said they also ensured the rams and ewes they kept in their flock were structurally sound.

“We assess and record feet, toe and leg structure on every ewe, every year, plus wool and breed type. If they don't meet the standard they are culled,” she said.

SELECT LAMBS

All of the sheep at Ashmore are run under commercial conditions.

While the White Suffolk lambs can be grown to heavier weights, most of the Ashmore ram clients join White Suffolk rams to Merino ewes for a prime lamb to be sold as a sucker.

And some of the top clients are getting their lambs to 50-55kg in four months.

Joining at Ashmore is in January for four weeks, with lambing in June-July.

“We tag lambs at birth, but outside of that they don’t get special treatment,” Nette said.

Weaning is at 10 weeks old so ewes can get back into condition and lambs are weaned onto the best pasture they can offer “so the cream rises to the top”.

Ram lambs are then selected at seven months old, with the best 1 per cent used for joining for the first time at seven months.

Females are also selected into the flock at seven months.

“We join as many ewe lambs as reach cut off minimum weight in March, which is 45kg minimum,” Troy said.

Ewes are then 14 months when they have their first lamb.

An artificial insemination program is done each January and March, with about 300 ewes in each program which are joined to Ashmore sires or outside sires.

“We don’t buy in any outside sheep for biosecurity reasons, so the top rams are all used via AI.”

RELIEF VALVE

A cropping program is run alongside the sheep, with a rotation of wheat then lentils planted across 1200ha.

Troy said all sheep were run on stubbles over summer, which was an important part of the system.

“They eat the grain left behind, which reduces mouse and snail populations, and it helps to suppress a lot of summer weeds, meaning it is generally one less spray.”

Historically their average annual rainfall is 400mm with 250mm of growing season rainfall, however this year they got 200mm for the growing season.

“We are continually trying to keep up to date with the varieties we use, it is quite amazing how we can achieve yields we can with the rain we get.”

In good years the Fischers lock up some paddocks to harvest or cut for hay.

“It’s like a relief valve, if we need the feed the sheep eat it.”

Pastures are dry sown every year so they are growing at the opening rain, and feed is then available five weeks later.

All sheep live in confinement during April and May to create a feed wedge after the opening rain.