TUCKER’s DORPER
We are the third generation of Tuckers to farm sheep in the Grampians region. Our family began farming when John Tucker was awarded the right to a soldier settlement block on his return from service in the Second World War. When the price of wool crashed in the early 2000s we shifted from a primarily Merino wool growing operation, to more of a broad acre cropping focused farming model. Dorper’s caught our eye in 2010 and we bought our first ewes the following year.
The Dorper is a hardy South African sheep breed that was developed to grow a high quality carcass under a range of climatic conditions. They have a reputation for rapid weight gain, excellent carcass conformation and even fat distribution. The trait of shedding their wool annually is a characteristic differentiating them from other sheep breeds.
Dorper’s have always exceeded our expectations both in quality and production, and in 2019 we made the decision to expand our Dorper enterprise to achieve a mixed farming business comprising of meat sheep and broadacre cropping. As part of this shift we also changed direction with our management strategy, and are currently in the process of implementing a wholly regenerative farm management system.
The backbone of this system is a strict rotational grazing model, whereby sheep are regularly moved onto fresh pasture, and the grazed pasture allowed to rest for long periods of time. This has numerous health and production benefits for the livestock, but also has the effect of dramatically increasing the biodiversity of both plants and soil organisms, and the general well being of the whole nutrient cycle.
To us animal welfare is paramount. To run a successful meat sheep enterprise requires happy, healthy people and animals, and one of the keys to this is obviously maintaining very high animal welfare standards. We have a close connection to our animals and this means high standards of animal welfare is something that comes naturally to us.
Our animals always have access to clean water, ample feed, shade, shelter from wind and rain (in the form of trees across our landscape) and lambing ewes are regularly monitored.
Our sheep handling facilities are well maintained and we always do our utmost to minimise stress on the sheep when we do handle them.
