| 31 What began with four coloured merino ewes and one ram – a tenth birthday present – has grown into a significant breeding operation. MEAT & WOOL » Bluestone Coloured Merino Stud The success of Farmtech New Zealand Ltd. has been (and will continue to be) the simplifying and integration of technology into farming to make it functional and of great value to farmers. HamishMonteath (or Monty) has been pregnancy scanning sheep for over 30 years now. Ten years ago, he upgraded his kit and skill base to cater for ive commercial clients that had elected to use electronic identi ication tags (EID tags) with their ewes. These clients were keen to harness individual animal data to enhance their quality and pro itability of their operations. One of those clients also challengedMonty to incorporate scales into his scanning trailer which he duly did. Those irst few clients had about 12500 ewes between them. Word of mouth spread, and the past few years have seen him scanning, weighing and EID data recording up to 75000 ewes (with EID tags in) per annum. Monty also still pregnancy scans a decent number of non-EID tagged ewes and cows each year. He sees a lot of diversity on his rounds. This diversity extends from ine wool merino’s to milking sheep, to a top client in the Hanmer Basin that has been successfully lambing his ewes twice a year. He says the common denominator of the clients is that they are all Helping you achieve top results passionate about what they are doing - as Will Gibson is with his Bluestone ColouredMerino Stud and consultancy work. “A big bene it of having EID tags in ine wool sheep is that no raddle, or spraymarker is required to identify twins, singles and empties, and/or whether the pregnancies are early/mid/or late,” explains Monty. “This means that none of the high value wool produced from these sheep is destroyed frommarker dye in the process. Pregnancy scanning on these ewes is performedmore often than not before pre lamb shearing. So it means that when the ewes come o the shears, they can be drafted into their respective early, mid and late bands. This is hugely advantageous for set stocking (feed allocation and shelter consideration). It has transformed into very real bottom line increases over the years for his clients.” Of course, where the real advantage of utilizing EID tags in ewes is that data collected against the tag is lifetime information farmers have for that animal: “Providing,” Monty says with a smile, “that the tag stays in the animal. This means that culling decisions can be assistedwith actual factual, accurate data on an individual animal basis.” “We commend Will for his passion for both fine wool sheep breeding and specialist niche marketing. We wish him and family all the very best for the future.” Monty and fellow scanner Guy Heard checking scanning accuracy on Mike Gibbon’s hoggets, Hanmer Basin For all your EID scanning requirements Contact: Hamish Monteath “Monty” 0274 397 838
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