About Us
“It’s not the price you pay but the performance you get at Wheetelande”
Situated at Farrell Flat, in the wheat/sheep belt of the mid north of South Australia, Bob & Idrienne Neill’s Wheetelande White Suffolk stud is a little different from most.
Firstly, their objective is to breed big, rapid growth White Suffolks, having adopted a slogan; ‘where size and quality does matter’. The Neills believe the 2 issues that have the greatest impact on commercial producers’ profitability are rapid growth and size. ‘Rapid growth’ simply means more kilos in less time, usually with no more feed – an obvious economic plus. ‘Big’ isn’t necessarily better, but in combination with rapid growth, commercial lamb producers are able to extract maximum market flexibility, and therefore profitability.
The Neills believe seedstock breeding is a science; not just general animal husbandry. In today’s lamb industry, top rams can have a ‘one year advantage’ of several hundreds of dollars over average or inferior ones. Bob & Idrienne Neill aim to be producing and marketing the former!
Wheetelande rams have a good balance of growth, lean and muscle figures, rather than having a particularly good figure in just one of the traits. Continued improvement is something the Wheetelande principals are always aiming to achieve.
Thus the typical Wheetelande White Suffolk ram is one that is bigger than average, has clean white points, an easy care Suffolk body shape, is mobile and comes from a high fertility background. It is supported by a good balance of Lambplan performance figures with exceptional growth in particular and will generally be bought by a producer who appreciates the extra dollars it can make for them!
Wheetelande White Suffolk stud holds a production sale on their property on the first Tuesday in October annually. At this sale they offer their top 100 high quality White Suffolk rams.
The Neills believe they are producing rams that will return prime lamb producers good profit levels from year to year and producers who continue to regularly support their sale receive these benefits.
As one good client was overheard to say:
“It’s not the price I pay that is important;
it’s the performance I get from these genetics”.