‘White Baldy’: Evolution of a new breed at Bordertown

A love of the lamb industry, and a desire to supply genetics fit for purpose, underpin breeding decisions for the South Australian Day family.

If finding a commercially relevant genetic source in the lamb industry is a puzzle, then finding the right pieces provides a constant challenge for ram breeders like Lachy Day.

But it’s this quest that keeps things interesting, he said, and for his Bordertown, South Australia-based business, it has most recently meant the evolution of a new breed.

Lachy Day from Bordertown, SA, has created a new shedding prime lamb breed known as White Baldies.

With a catchy name of White Baldies, which is trademarked, Lachy is breeding shedding composite sheep which still have strong maternal traits.

A love of the lamb industry, and a desire to supply genetics fit for purpose, underpin breeding decisions.

Initially, Lachy was breeding White Suffolk rams, a market he still supplies today.

But when the cost and the availability to find ewes was becoming a challenge for his clients, Lachy saw an opening to be able to provide maternal composite genetics.

And now the latest challenge – low prices for crossbred and composite wool and increased rates for shearing – emerged, Lachy looked to genetics for the solution.

The name – White Baldy – encompasses all that he hopes to achieve with the new kid on the lamb block.

“A lot of the shedding breeds have white in the name (White Dorpers, Aussie Whites) and then I liked the name baldy because black baldy cows are the best in the industry, so wanted to align with that, plus of course, bald means no wool,” he said.

The process to develop the breed came from using his own maternal composite ewes which had barer points, and then infusing a mix of breeds like White Dorpers and Ultra Whites as well as White Suffolks.

“I’m not locked in to any breed in particular to get the right mix,” Lachy said.

The first rams from the venture will be offered for sale later this year, with a draft of about 35 which will be 13-14 months.

Watching the progress of this first drop, Lachy said he was excited by the performance of the White Baldies.

Lachy Day from Bordertown, SA, has created a new shedding prime lamb breed known as White Baldies.

“They have a terrific amount of growth and carcass and look really promising,” he said.

“Most of them will be 100kg plus, which just shows how quickly they have grown and matured.

“Raw weights don’t excite me though, it’s more about the data – what did excite me was seeing how well grown they were at seven months – they looked like they were 10-12 months.”

Taking the wool off has been one of the keys to this strong growth, with all energy converted into meat rather than fibre.

And while the temptation is there to ignore maternal traits and pursue terminal traits, Lachy said he would still focus on the maternal influence with breeding decisions.

“The idea is that producers can have a self-replacing flock of White Baldies,” he said.

“Early maturity will be good for lamb turnoff, but it will also allow producers to join their ewe lambs.”

Lachy hopes the breed will offer an option to those producers who were thinking of leaving the industry, or who wanted to avoid the costs of shearing.

Given the program is in its early stages, there is a small amount of wool on some of the white baldy rams, but Lachy said this would gradually become less and less as the breeding strategy got further down the track.

There is a small amount of wool on some of the white baldy rams, but Lachy said this would gradually become less and less as the breeding strategy got further down the track.

And he said commercial flocks which already had a high level of shedding genetics in it could handle rams with a little wool, while others who were starting down the path would probably opt for the bare genetics.

The excitement in Lachy’s voice when he talks about his new breed is infectious, and his background in the supply of White Suffolk and composite genetics in sheep, and Poll Herefords in cattle, stands him in good stead for his new venture.

The draft of white baldy rams, which will be sold alongside his other breeds on October 4, will have some figures as they are entered in the shedding sheep database, but this in an area where Lachy said submitting more and more information would provide a greater suite of figures down the track.

“I just love the challenge of putting genetics together to find something that is commercially relevant for the industry,” he said.

“I want our genetics to continually evolve to be industry relevant.”