Making your sheepfarming easier and more profitable.
Environment
Wairere has been described as “The worst climate I have ever worked in!”.
Wairere is 1070 hectares effective of medium to steep Wairarapa hill country, rising to 532 meters above sea level.
The climate is typically winter wet, summer dry and a Class I wind zone (average year round wind speed of 35kmph on the high ridges).
Rainfall is 1125mm average, but the six months from November to April average around 400mm.
Only 2% is flat land.
The wet cold, windchill-prone climate is a serious testing ground for constitution and feet.
Stock Carried
Normally around 5,350 ewes, 2,000 ram hoggets, 2,400 ewe hoggets (with 4-500 dry hoggets sold in late July) 240 rams and killers, around 10,000 sheep in total.
Cattle policy is 300 cows, selling most weaners. After a good autumn more cattle are wintered. Overall stocking rate: 11.2 to 12.3 su/ha depending on the season.
Mob Stocking
Apart from lambing to weaning, ewes are mob-stocked and rotationally grazed. So, too, are ram lambs and ewe lambs. Mob-stocking lambs in mob sizes of 1,000 to 3,000, soon shows up those lambs which cannot cope with competitive grazing pressure.
Eighty Years of Rambreeding
Len Daniell started the Akoura Romney stud in 1929. John Daniell selected the best Wairere 5 year ewes in 1967, and mated them to several top Akoura rams. Thus was born a Wairere hill country flock, fully performance recorded from that year. After the accidental death of John in 1983, Derek Daniell took over as studmaster.
Expansion
Romney ram sales expanded in the late 1980s as Wairere became a nationally known rambreeding enterprise. In 1993, the Wairere South joint venture started selling rams in Otago, and in 1996, the Wairere King joint venture had its first selling season in the King Country. In 2005 the first of 200 Romney rams were airfreighted to Melbourne, for sale in Victoria. Two years later, seven Wairere sires were airfreighted to London, forming the start of a joint venture in southern England.
