Willera Poll Merino Stud
The Willera Merino Stud is located on the banks of Victoria’s second largest river, the Loddon, at the junction of Serpentine Creek, the traditional homeland of the Dia Dja Wurrung people, where rich soils have formed on the alluvial sediments of the floodplain and water is in abundance. Our flock is founded from the ‘Peppin Blood Merino’, an Australian sheep breed known for their ability to produce fine, strong wool fibres. We have since built on these genetic foundations through careful selection to expand the animal’s ability to also produce high quality meat.
Our Sires are ‘what you see is what you get’ and have proven to us, in our own business, they know how to perform.
We have been breeding Outback Merino’s since 1980 and are transparent in our endeavour to use genetics within our farming business to maximise production and position ourselves at the front of an evolving market, proactively managing the genetics of our animals to ensure we are always on the front foot, protected from being locked out of market opportunities.
Breeding objective
We believe in keeping it simple, eliminating distraction and obsessing over finding the optimal ratio between growth and wool cut to maximise the efficiency and production of our animals.
Our core objective is to ensure our phenotypes are uncomplicated and genetically diverse, ensuring each animal is more productive, marketable and has greater potential to be a better breeder.
In terms of ‘breed type’ we focus on ensuring quality throughout the stud flock and focus on consistency and uniformity. This approach means we can use our genetics on a broad scale, as well as be adaptive, catering directly to individual client breeding needs.
We are confident our approach to raising an ethical, sustainable, and profitable Merino makes our animals a good fit for most Australian breeders.
“When we were looking for a change of direction for our merino flock we turned to Willera. Their sheep continue to meet our breeding objectives, have allowed us to transition to a non-muelsed flock and over the years we have found their progeny hold up well under the high rainfall conditions of southwest Victoria.”
- Edward Blackwell, Blackwell Pastoral (Stud customer)
‘Mules free’ Merinos
All of our Merino sires are ‘mules free’, an approach we feel is market relevant, better for the animal and better for the business bottom line. In our experience, a ‘mules free’ Merino does not have heighted disease risk in dry climates and does consistently produces high quality wool. Our ASBV’s proving time and time again, a non-muelsed Merino is highly productive, profitable and more ethical.
We support our clients to be able to manage ‘mules free’ and are only too happy to share our knowledge and experience with other graziers who are interested in moving in this direction, please contact Will or Simon for more detail.
Willera Poll Sire performance
The ASBV averages of our sires are well above industry averages and we specifically look at key production traits to ensure we are optimising our animals for joining/lambing.
Consistently Willera Sires perform above the 50th percentile band across key metrics of Yearling Weight (YWT), Yearling Fat Depth (YFAT), Adult Weight (AWT) and Weaning Weight (WWT).
Many of our Sire’s performing in the top 5% across all key traits.
2023 Drop - View Willera Sires performance
2022 Drop - View Willera Sires performance
2021 Drop - View Willera Sires performance
2020 Drop - View Willera Sires performance
"The Willera Outback Merino is durable and robust, with high conception, rearing ability and weaning rates and is proven to perform in a range of climates."
A Willera Merino ticks many boxes -
Uncomplicated genotype, but genetically diverse
Durable & Robust
High yielding carcasses
Long well marked wools
Our shearing team loves shearing our good combing, wrinkle free animals
Ethically grown meeting consumer demands
High conception, rearing ability, and weaning rates
Proven by ourselves to perform in a range of climate zones
Structurally sound
Efficient in terms of grass conversion to wool, meat and lambs
All our clients are offered additional post-sale assistance for commercial sheep classing, if this is of interest please phone Will or Simon.
