Sheep

The key products of the Western Australian sheep industry are wool, sheepmeat (lamb and mutton) and live sheep. At around 12.4 million sheep, the WA flock turns off between 4.5 and 6 million sheep and lambs for meat and live export as well as 65 million kilograms of greasy wool (primarily for export markets) annually.

The Merino is the most common breed of sheep in WA, making up 80% of the state's flock. The remainder are ‘British breeds’ or so-called maternal breeds, meat specific breeds such as Dorpers and some breeds for specialty meat and fibre markets.

The Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development's current focus is on increasing lamb supply, improving the productivity, welfare and sustainability of sheep production and developing and extending targeted information products and services to generate practice change. In an effort to increase the marking rate of lambs, the department, in collaboration with industry, has developed the More Sheep initiative.

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Articles

  • Damara rams

    Control of lice on haired and fleece-shedding sheep

    26 November 2013

    Body lice (Bovicola ovis) infestation can occur on fleece-shedding and haired sheep, causing irritation and rubbing. Some exotic diseases also cause skin irritation to sheep. Before treati

  • Brown Besier, Jill Lyon and Darren Michael from the DAFWA team producing the Barber’s Pole vaccine in the laboratory

    Development and production of Barbervax vaccine against barber's pole worm in sheep

    25 November 2013

    In collaboration with the Moredun Research Institute (United Kingdom), the world’s first sheep worm vaccine has been produced at the Albany parasitology laboratories.

  • Picture of a group of Merino Sheep

    Wool industry facts

    8 October 2013

    Western Australia has aproximately 12.4 million sheep run by over 4000 sheep producers. They are mostly located in the agricultural region of the state producing high quality, fine Merino wool.

  • SheepLinks - Objective Carcase Measurement Feedback

    7 July 2022

    Objective Carcase Measurement (OCM) Feedback is a four-year (2022- 2025) project under the SheepLinks program, to assist WA producers with understanding carcase feedback, improving carcase quality,

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    Sheep feeding and nutrition

    9 December 2013

    Managing good nutrition of sheep in the Mediterranean climate of south-west Western Australia requires constant monitoring and planning.

  • A white alpaca has a brass tag in its ear. The tag is an approved identifier which is legally recognised.

    Approved identifiers for livestock

    15 January 2014

    All livestock in Western Australia must be correctly identified according to species.

  • Example screens from the iPad app 'Sheep Condition Score'.

    Tools, calculators and resources for sheep and grazing management

    15 November 2013

    These tools, calculators and resources are designed to help producers manage their ewe flock more effectively and make better management decisions about feed budgeting and grazing.

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    SheepLinks - FutureSheep

    15 June 2022

    FutureSheep is a three-year project (2021-2024) under the SheepLinks program, to assist Western Australian (WA) sheep enterprises in the medium and low rainfall zones adapt to the impacts of projec

  • Position of the hand on the sheeps back for condition scoring sheep. The thumb should be placed on the backbone and the fingers feeling the short ribs.

    Condition scoring of sheep

    29 October 2013

    Condition scoring sheep is an easy and accurate method of estimating the condition or 'nutritional well being' of your sheep flock.

  • Lucilia cuprina - the main species of blowfly that initiates about 90% of all strikes is the Australian sheep blowfly

    Managing non-mulesed sheep

    5 December 2013

    The Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development (DPIRD) has been involved in a variety of research projects to help producers manage non mulesed sheep.

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