WAMMCO

Mt.Barker/Kojaneerup lamb producers Bruce and Graham Wright are celebrating a big delivery of 12,000 lambs to WAMMCO and live exporters for the 2008 season, by also winning their second November WAMMCO Producer of the Month title.

Bruce, a director of WAMMCO for the past six years, said the family’s biggest delivery year was also the toughest he could remember - because of the extremely wet early summer conditions.  “For the first time ever, we have had to shear about half of our lambs this year, to manage the flystrike problem,” he said this week.

The Wrights won their first Producer of the Month title for November 2006 with a large line of 929 lambs. The winning November 2008 consignment comprised 663 lambs from the Kojaneerup properties with an average carcase weight of 21.20 kg and return per head of $77.26 including an average of $5.55 for the skin.

A total of 238 lambs attracted top price on the day of $3.60 per kg to return $80 per head or above, with the top group achieving $104.58 per head.

The Wrights use a mix of Poll Dorsets, Border Leicesters and Merinos in their prime lamb enterprise and rely on turning off most of their lambs as suckers each year. Poll Dorset  genes from the Bradford family’s Hillcroft stud are prominent in the breeding program.

Bruce intends to retire as a director of WAMMCO in October 2009 and is proud of the contribution WAMMCO continues to make to the lamb industry.  "I believe we have made sound progress against considerable odds since the cooperative was formed,” he said.