The Boufflers’ redesign a modern sheep and wool operation

Andrew Bouffler is an inquisitive, out-of-the-box thinker, open-minded to change, and undaunted by doing things differently.

He’s also a self-described “hopeless wool-growing traditionalist”, nostalgic towards an industry that once drove rural Australia.

On Andrew and wife Mandi’s Lockhart mixed farming operation, this seemingly at-odds fusion of curiosity and sentiment has transformed their operation, all whilst helping drive industry progression.

Fourth generation on the Bouffler family’s mixed farming property, “Valera”, over their 40-year tenure Andrew and Mandi have overturned historic production systems, refined genetics, and diversified their enterprise mix, all in the name of creating a simplified and nimble business, able to move fast and mitigate risk.    

“Our most significant development, and one that continues to underpin our whole business, has been the transition away from a set seasonal production system,” Andrew explains.

“When I first came home, we followed a typical system that assumed a long hot summer, an autumn break, a long, cold, wet winter, plenty of feed in spring for lambing, and dry feed for early summer.”

“It was after the Millenium drought that I started to challenge this theory – we virtually had eight out of 10 dry winters and short or failed springs, and summer storms were becoming more common, so rather than butt heads with Mother Nature we decided to work with her.”

Today, pasture curves on the property align with rainfall distribution, and the couple has adopted a production system that’s flexible enough to leverage the variances in seasons, so that when it does rain, this moisture is efficiently turned into dry matter, and essentially, profits.

Mixed enterprises drives efficiency, and mitigates risk

Andrew has maintained the mixed farming component on his property at 50 percent pasture and crop and believes the benefits of cropping in conjunction with the family’s Trigger Vale Poll Merino and White Suffolk seedstock operations provides valuable synergies.

“I really enjoy the management of a mixed farm, there are more options to leverage rainfall, and value add thanks to the benefits of dual-purpose crops.”

“The amount of dry matter dual-purpose wheat and canola crops can produce for the sheep in what has been traditionally a low dry matter period through winter is game-changing.”

The farm has a two-year buffer of grain supplies to feed stock as a drought risk management tool, and each year sells one-third off the header, stores one-third on-farm, and warehouses one-third in the bulk handling system in the hope of picking up any spikes in prices post-harvest.

“This provides peace of mind if we need to feed sheep, yet if the outlook is favourable, we can also sell grain in a rising market – it’s another risk management tool as we price grain at different periods of the year.” 
 

Barley straw is also baled, and despite its low nutritional value, Andrew says it provides great roughage during containment feeding.

The introduction of a higher percentage of Lucerne into the pasture mix is another opportunity Andrew and Mandi have harnessed.

“We identified we were getting more summer rain than historically has been the case, and the opportunity to grow lucerne utilisers that rain to grow dry matter which has left us less reliant on grain over the summer period.”

“It also fixes nitrogen in the soil during the growing phase, which then lowers urea input costs for our winter crop by about 30 to 40 percent.

“Whichever way you look at it, we’re now able to turn this rain into money.”

The winter cropping program consist of canola, wheat and barley alongside crops that are targeted to provide feed for the sheep like 970 canola, vetch and multi-species crops, which Andrew acknowledges provide valuable biodiversity.

“In good years we will heavily graze the vetch in winter before locking it up to make hay in the Spring, and this hay is then utilised in late summer/autumn when the sheep are moved into containment pens.”

Sheep breeding for the future

The Boufflers’ have applied the same strategic vision to their sheep operation, having spent decades dedicated to developing a low-maintenance, low-cost, modern maternal Merino.

Following in the footsteps of his father and grandfather, Andrew is proud of the role his family has played in the progression of sheep breeding over the generations.
 

“We’ve been at the coalface of developing an article that we’re proud of, my father Jim was an early innovator when it came to genetics, and across the Poll Merino stud he was an early adopter when it came to measuring micron and other objective measurements.”

Andrew is grateful his father entrusted him with the farm at a relatively young age, and over the past four decades he has embraced the early adoption of Australian Sheep Breeding Values, genomics, eID tags, and “anything we can think of to make life easier and increase the rate of genetic gain in the two sheep studs.”

Management tweaks sure up production, and profitability

Andrew’s most significant turning point came after a Nuffield Scholarship in 2006 - the social license to farm debate was becoming louder internationally, and he could see the writing on the wall for the Australian industry in regards to mulseing.

After 20 years of breeding, today Trigger Vale Merinos are non-mulesed, dual-purpose Poll Merinos, which Andrew describes as easy care, and a lot less complex, requiring significant less labour to manage.

"A non-mulesed animal guarantees you have 100 percent of the market competing for your wool clip, so it not only has good animal welfare outcomes it also makes good business sense."

Andrew says they now breed a less complicated ewe, free of wrinkles and horns.

“My understanding is that the more traditional heavy-skinned Merinos require extra energy levels to maintain their skin and high wool cuts. A plainer-bodied sheep frees up some of that energy and can redirect it into more maternal attributes like producing more milk for enhanced lamb survival and weaning percentages.”

“Our Poll Merinos are bred for increased early growth, fat and muscle, and we’ve been able to develop a much better maternal ewe that can still grow a significant amount of wool while doing a better job on her lambs.”

“Our main objective is to make breeding decisions that deliver a more profitable sheep for our commercial clients, and the reality of this is we need to get more lambs on the ground, and they need to survive.”

“In the White Suffolk flock, it’s all about optimum birth weights to ensure greater lamb survival, then you want maximum growth.”

“We have clear breeding objectives to produce fast-growing lambs that will have high-yielding carcases with great meat-eating characteristics like intramuscular fat. In short, they need to be commercially relevant genetics that produce the sort of lambs the industry needs moving forward.”

“Our All-purpose Merino enables multi-income streams provided by a quality Merino wool clip, fast-growing, high-yielding lambs, and surplus ewe sales coupled with a lower cost of production.”

“Thirty years ago, my Nuffield Scholarship report concluded that for both the Australian wool and lamb industry to survive and thrive in an environment with a shrinking national flock, a maternal Merino that could put quality product into both markets would need to be developed. I think we are very close to achieving this outcome at Trigger Vale.”

Trigger Vale Stud has enjoyed favourable lamb survival rates based on these proven traits, and in the overhaul of their production system a transition to a late autumn/early winter lambing has also proven valuable. 

"My university professor would be rolling in his grave, but these days with the introduction of dual-purpose crops we generate high levels of dry matter during the winter period, enabling us to spell pastures and wean lambs onto them in the spring."

“If it’s a tight spring, we have options – we can sell, or container feed them – and thanks to the genetic fat being bred into our ewes they tend to run at a higher condition score, or in other words they carry their own haystacks.” Andrew explains. “Our sheep are bred to store condition during periods of surplus feed, and utilise this condition score during the dry times, so there’s less substitute feeding, which again helps the bottom line.”

Andrew explains that the operation’s genetic gains have directly coincided with a genuine focus on improving on-farm management techniques.

“Through participation in courses like Lifetime Ewe management, Best Bred Best Fed workshops and numerous online courses we have implemented many new management strategies to ensure the genetics has the best environment to express themselves and perform.”

Successful management changes include pregnancy testing for drys, singles and multiples and then precision feeding them according to their requirements, using temporary electric fencing to break down paddocks to ensure twins are lambed down in mobs with a maximum number of 80, the introduction of six-month shearing and the regular monitoring of worm egg count levels to ensure no extreme worm burdens. 

“The combination of the performance-based genetics expressing themselves in a “best practice” management environment has resulted in our weaning percent averaging 126 percent over the past five years - this includes maiden ewes which make up around a third of our flock.”

Sheep genetic evaluation systems, Lambplan and Merinoselect, have been used extensively for over 30 years to monitor, assess and select superior stock to maintain breeding goals.

An example of this in his flock has been the ongoing measuring and selecting for natural worm resistance, which has resulted in Andrew not drenching a mature sheep in 15 years, such is the power of genetics.

Another management redirection has been the implementation of containment feeding, with six pens each at 500 head capacity easing pressure on pastures, bolstering ground cover, and providing a platform for custom feeding.

“We try not to set stock, we want to encourage ground cover to utilise the rain that falls, and so when ground cover gets to a certain level we can get sheep off the paddock.”

“Being a seedstock producer, we can’t destock and lose over 50 years of genetic gain, so containment pens are a great opportunity to again de-risk our business and provide options.”

Encouraging biodiversity across his operation

Andrew admits that his commitment to maintaining tree lines, native vegetation, groundcover and fencing off watercourses is simply down to the fact that “biodiversity and the environment is important to me”, rather than any government directive or potential price premiums.

“Currently I’m experimenting with annuals such as tillage radish and grazing brassicas, and the way their roots break any hard pan, aerates the soil and encourage worms is really fascinating.”

“Once, I would spray lucerne religiously for red-legged earth mite and flea, killing many of the natural predators along with the targeted insect,” he explains. “Now I only spray sparingly, and let the friendly bugs and birds do most of the work.”

Thanks to his efforts encouraging biodiversity, animal welfare and workplace health and safety, Trigger Vale Stud is now Responsible Wool Standard (RWS) accredited, enabling the business to access even broader markets.

Yet Andrew resists any defined labels.

“We’re not team organic or team regenerative, while many of our farming philosophies align with both these systems, I want the ability to use a chemical if I need to. You must to be able to use every single tool in the tool belt and not limit options when it comes to building a stronger more resilient business.” 

Maintaining a thirst for knowledge

Not even 40 years of farming experience can quell Andrew’s curiosity, and he continues embrace learning opportunities. 

“I’m always keen to try something new, and despite the fact I’m approaching 60, I still feel like there’s more for me to learn.”

Next month Andrew will travel to Lambex in Adelaide, another opportunity to network and gain insights into innovation and industry best practise.

He also has a few clients who have entered the Lambex Feedlot Carcase Trial and is curious to see the final results and how they have performed. 

During his tenure Andrew admits he changed so many things at once that is hard to work out where the gains have been generated – he almost simultaneously implemented lifetime ewe management, six month shearing, started joining ewe lambs at eight month of age, changed the whole genetic make-up of his animals, established better pastures, introduced containment feeding and created value-adding winter crops for a more circular farming system.

And while he concedes so many levers are available to make the self-replacing Merino more profitable, it concerns him that Australian Merinos are still losing market share.

“Rather than walk away from the industry, I’d like to see more fine wool Merino producers look at these alternatives, to redesign their Merino to make her that better, dual purpose, maternal type of animal, which I believe will be the key to our future industry success.”