Sheep genetic search tool coming

Sheep farmers will soon be able to identify the genetic merit of rams from the comfort of their office. SIL gave famers a glimpse of eSearch's potential last month. It is an internet-based search tool similar to that already available in the beef cattle industry reports Country-wide. Now entering its final test phase, the eSearch development will provide sheep farmers better and faster access to genetic information. It is expected to be rolled out later this year and will also provide new ways to define the genetic merit of animals that fit with the differing commercial objectives of sheep farmers. Farmers using eSearch will be able to customise their selection criteria. The search engine will identify those animals on the SIL-ACE database that will add to the net profit of their business. A searchable database of SIL-ACE evaluations will be updated every two months. The development has been made possible by the establishment in 2002 of the Alliance Central Progeny Test (CPT), making it possible to compare the genetic merit of animals across flocks and between breeds. The number of flocks and animals in the across-flock, across-breed genetic evaluation has doubled since the first SIL-ACE reports in 2004. There are now more than 330 stud sheep flocks and more than 3.2 million animals on SIL-ACE, making it the largest genetic evaluation of sheep in the world. eSearch is one of several planks in Meat &Wool's strategy to provide farmers with better access to the right information. For the past four months farmers have been able to use the SIL website to identify those flocks, recording, testing and selecting for resilience to internal parasites, resistance to internal parasites and facial eczema tolerance using licensed measurement systems.