We are only interested in selling rams and ewes if we are confident it can contribute to improving the flocks of our clients. In turn clients and potential clients need to be resolute in asking for performance data, especially for the Edale Medium Fine and Edale Superfine flocks, as they make judgements about the value that can be added their own flocks.
Breeding by pedigree is an essential element of the stud breeding program adopted by Edale. All Edale's stud progeny have their maternal pedigree (except where there are mistakes) and these records have been collected since 1989. Pedigree recording is made into a computer that allows the data processing power which is crucial for breeding. Few, if any other merino sheep breeders across the country, have this depth of genetic records. Even worse, without the maternal pedigree, and the record of single/multiple births, breeders unwittingly cull fertility.
Without identifying the progeny with both the sire and the dam, the rate and quality of genetic progress reduces to simply population genetics rather than structured breeding. Pedigree recording with the aid of a computer pedigree package has taken place at Edale since 1989. Edale was amongst the earliest in Australia to have adopted this practice.
It is a very important part of the sheep classing procedure. Once a maiden ewe is classed into the stud using visual supported by measurement aids (rather than the reverse) the selection criterion is determined solely by its ability to breed on. A number of ewes would have been classed out - wrongly - had it not been for the pedigree records of the progeny. There is enormous power in this system - aiding both the genetic progress and the predictability of the sheep's performance.
