The heat stress has been associated with detrimental effects of productive performance in broilers. Selenium supplementation is a viable option to reduce the effect of heat stress on oxidative status. However, its response level is influenced by dosage and source of selenium supplementation.

Research leading to significant change in agricultural practice almost always involves collaboration between teams of researchers and multiple end-users as well as sharing resources across multiple organisations. Although benefits and efficiencies are easily recognised, effective multi-institutional teamwork is often difficult to achieve. The present paper draws on experience from the Sheep CRC, over a period of nearly 20 years, where collaboration among an increasing number of participants contributed to many significant changes in the Australian sheep industry.

Ten of the most important disease and defects are estimated to cost the Australian small-stock industries AU$110 million per annum. Current disease and defect feedback provided to lamb producers is limited in informing corrective management changes on farm. In response to this, an arthritis trim-scoring system was developed, which estimates carcass losses and producer revenue loss encountered at processing. Such a system can be used by processors to provide more informative and accurate feedback to producers, enabling cost-effective management changes.

An online national survey of Australian sheep producers was undertaken to benchmark Australian sheep parasite control practices in 2018. The aims of the survey were to document wool growers’ current parasite control practices and attitudes, to measure the change in producer parasite control practices from those in the previous two surveys and to provide a benchmark against which to measure future parasite control practices and attitudes.

Automated feeding units allow the recording of individual feeding behaviour of group group-housed sheep and provide data for feed efficiency. Investigation of the changes in feeding behaviour in response to daily feed allowance showed that the number of non-feeding events were similar across treatments, but eating rate was reduced in sheep fed below maintenance requirements. Our observations suggest that sheep learn and adapt to automated feeding systems and this may allow automated supplementation under extensive situations.

Due to its anticoagulant properties, heparin is routinely used to retain cannula patency. However, limited work exists that has evaluated the effect of heparin on plasma non-esterified fatty acid (NEFA) response in lambs, which might be measured during repeated blood sampling for metabolic studies. The present study demonstrated that heparin increases plasma NEFA in lambs and indicated that heparin should be avoided where frequent blood samples are required within intervals less than 1 h.

Ecchymosis is a condition requiring trimming from lamb carcases, incurring labour costs and yield losses. The cause of ecchymosis is currently not known, but the prevalence was found to be 14% in 12 286 lambs scored from 82 properties at a South Australian abattoir. Prevalence was strongly associated with time in lairage and a complex interaction between weight variables.

Six methods were used to calculate carcass price (AU$/kg). Measurement of yield accounted for substantial variation in prices calculated from yield and eating quality. This demonstrates that an actual measurement of yield is crucial to guide processing decisions to maximise carcass value and feed market signals back to beef producers.

Selection using visual muscle score has been proposed to increase carcass leanness (i.e. meat yield) without compromising eating quality. The aim of the present study was to examine the impact that selection for divergent muscle score has on live animal, commercial carcass and carcass tissue weights using computed tomography, including MSA index-predicted eating quality.

Breeding sheep with lower methane production is becoming available to farmers; however, on-farm methods to rank sheep are required to get breeding values for industry-relevant rams. The main finding was that rumen-fermentation end products, propionate proportion and volatile fatty acid ratios were suitable for ranking sheep methane output, suggesting their potential as an indicator trait for screening sheep on-farm.

In automatic milking systems with voluntary cow movement, a cow’s milking time is dictated by its desire to be milked. A consistent milking order was observed, with groups at the beginning and end of the milking order being more consistent than cows in the middle of the order. Earlier milked cows had higher milk production than later cows suggesting that management strategies to provide access to fresh pasture for later milked cows are worthy of investigation.

Capacity to predict dressing percentage, carcass characteristics and meat yield enables value-based marketing. Predictive value of live body condition scoring and carcass measurements for dressing percentage, fat class and meat yield of goats that vary widely in liveweight, body condition, carcass weight, age, sex, fleece characteristics and genotype were assessed. The research is discussed in the context of improving live-animal assessment and carcass grading, of the AUS-MEAT goatmeat language, and advanced measurement technologies for production and marketing of goat meat.

There is increasing interest from beef producers to be able to select animals that are superior for eating quality. Currently, there is limited information for commercial producers finishing their animals on pasture. It would appear that gains in eating quality through genetic selection are lower when cattle are finished on pasture than they are for feedlot-finished cattle. This means that commercial producers are not likely to be receiving the full benefits of buying genetically superior eating-quality sires unless they are paid a premium by the finishing or wholesale meat sectors where the benefits are captured.

Net reproduction rate defined as number of lambs weaned for joined ewes reflects conception, litter size and the ability of ewes to rear lambs born to weaning age, which are treated as separate traits for genetic evaluation, along with maternal behaviour and body condition scores. Breeding values for these traits were estimated using a multi-trait model and genomic information with single-step methodology. Where sufficient data were available for cross-validation, good predictive capacity was demonstrated using forward cross-validation.

Beef industry productivity and profitability would be enhanced by improved efficiency at pasture. It is not known how animals genetically divergent for efficiency due to differing estimated breeding values for residual feed intake determined using feedlot measurements (RFI-f-EBVs) perform on severely drought-affected, low-quality pasture. The results of the present study suggest that the more efficient Low-RFI-f-EBV heifers maintain liveweight somewhat better than do their less efficient High-RFI-f-EBV counterparts when pasture availability and quality seriously limit growth.