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Are you heading to Lambex this year? If you’re not already going, you’ll want to be there after listening to this week's podcast! Our guest this week is Jason Schulz, chair of Lambex. After a six-year break, Lambex is back and better than ever.

For those not familiar with the event, Lambex is a three-day event that celebrates and promotes Australia’s sheep and lamb industry, with more than 1,200 people attending.
Speakers range from the likes Dr Tim Elliott talking about drench resistance, to Steve Wiedemann discussing carbon, to our own Dr Mark Ferguson discussing “The very real future of Artificial Intelligence”. Other speakers will address heat tolerance, ewe lamb joining, pain perception, and much, much more.

Jason discusses his role as chair of Lambex and highlights how events like Lambex provide an opportunity for everyone in the industry to come together and learn from one another. “I like to think that the producers that have attended Lambex in the past have really gone home and made a change from what they've heard … or they've met a … contact within the industry that they may not have had before, which could be enterprise-changing or give them the opportunity to learn,” says Jason.

If you are interested in attending Lambex, early bird tickets are available until 30 June. Accommodation options can be booked through the Lambex website here: https://www.lambex.org.au/register.

Head Shepherd is brought to you by neXtgen Agri International Limited, we help livestock farmers get the most out of the genetics they farm with. Get in touch with us if you would like to hear more about how we can help you do what you do best - info@nextgenagri.com.

Thanks to our sponsors at MSD Animal Health and Allflex, and Heiniger Australia and New Zealand.

These companies are leaders in their respective fields and it is a privilege to have them supporting the Head Shepherd Podcast. Please consider them when making product choices, as they are instrumental in enabling us to bring you this podcast each week.

Check out Heiniger's product range HERE
Check out the MSD range HERE
Check out Allflex products HERE

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This week on the podcast we have one of the fantastic winners of the 2024 Zanda McDonald Award, Tessa Chartres, to discuss her career, how she manages her work-life balance and much more.

Tessa grew up on a farm in Bathurst. She became an accountant, specialising in agribusiness and farming, and later moved to Deniliquin to be with her husband. There, she joined Murray Irrigation, where she is now the General Manager of Business Development. With Muray Irrigation providing irrigation for 740,000 hectares of farmland, Tessa's role is certainly diverse.

“The thing I love about irrigation is I get to be a part of so many different industries across the ag sector. I see so many different crops or livestock or dairies or any of those things,” she explains. “Being part of the water sector means I get to have an influence on all of those parts and enable all of those different strains of the ag sector to exist in our footprint.”

Tessa sees irrigation as the lifeblood of the region and believes that Murray Irrigation is vital in ensuring the growth and sustainability of the region. With that comes a huge responsibility, particularly in light of climate change, environmental impacts and the concept of water as a tradable commodity.

“What has been interesting about it, has been how people have adapted to the change in water availability, both from water being removed through mechanisms for the environment and just with climate change,” Tessa explains. “What I see is often people adapting to those in really interesting and different ways within their business models. Concepts around permanent and temporary water and how people can structure their businesses to suit the commodity that they're producing is something that, from my business mind, I've found that interesting.”

Tessa and Mark also discuss work-life balance, the importance of good employers, a lively community and how she made all of this happen with two young twins! Tessa's story is a great example of a mutually successful career trajectory and personal life.

Head Shepherd is brought to you by neXtgen Agri International Limited, we help livestock farmers get the most out of the genetics they farm with. Get in touch with us if you would like to hear more about how we can help you do what you do best - info@nextgenagri.com.

Thanks to our sponsors at MSD Animal Health and Allflex, and Heiniger Australia and New Zealand.

These companies are leaders in their respective fields and it is a privilege to have them supporting the Head Shepherd Podcast. Please consider them when making product choices, as they are instrumental in enabling us to bring you this podcast each week.

Check out Heiniger's product range HERE
Check out the MSD range HERE
Check out Allflex products HERE

Send us a Text Message.

Breeding values are something we discuss a lot here at neXtgen Agri. We decided to do a podcast episode explaining exactly what they are and how they are ‘built’.

Today, Daniel Brown, Principal Scientist at Animal Genetics and Breeding Unit (AGBU), joins us to discuss what breeding values are, how they are developed, their role, the impact of genomics and the future of genetic evaluation.

Mark and Daniel begin with the basics of breeding values and the benefits of genomic testing. “Breeders record pedigree and performance information for a range of traits. A breeding value amalgamates all that performance information on an animal - and its relatives - for a range of traits, into an estimated genetic merit,” explains Daniel. “It’s essentially taking individual performance data and amalgamating it through the pedigree and adjusting for things like environmental effects … to get the best estimate we can of an animal's genetic merit.”

Daniel explains that as more and more producers utilise genomics, the reference population is getting considerably larger, which opens up the opportunity for breeders to get fairly accurate breeding values for young animals from just a DNA sample. Genomics also gives you the ability to see which genes were inherited from which parent. It’s often assumed that both humans and animals inherit 50% from each parent, but this isn’t true.

“The genomic information gives us a much more accurate measure of the relationship. Unlike the standard assumption, that you get half your genes from mum and dad, it actually varies from … 25 to 60 … it might change between individuals. So it gives us the ability to estimate relationships much more accurately,” Daniel explains.

Mark and Daniel discuss both the history of breeding values and also the future. The field of genetic evaluation is constantly evolving, with the potential for changes in genotyping methods and the inclusion of new traits. With more data, comes more answers - we just need to find them, says Daniel.

Head Shepherd is brought to you by neXtgen Agri International Limited, we help livestock farmers get the most out of the genetics they farm with. Get in touch with us if you would like to hear more about how we can help you do what you do best - info@nextgenagri.com.

Thanks to our sponsors at MSD Animal Health and Allflex, and Heiniger Australia and New Zealand.

These companies are leaders in their respective fields and it is a privilege to have them supporting the Head Shepherd Podcast. Please consider them when making product choices, as they are instrumental in enabling us to bring you this podcast each week.

Check out Heiniger's product range HERE
Check out the MSD range HERE
Check out Allflex products HERE