Lyall’s love of Polwarths was born from stories told to him by his grandfather about “these big meaty sheep that cut heaps of wool.” When the opportunity arose to lease a block of land, Lyall purchase Polwarth sheep and soon after formed a Polwarth stud. The stud, Bel-Antha is run on three small properties in the Mount Pleasant, Cromer and Mount Crawford areas of South Australia.
Lyall’s family has been farming in the Mount Pleasant area for over 150 years which is now in their sixth generation of farming entities. Lyall, his wife Mary and youngest daughter Kayla, operate half of the original Starkey family farm of around 600 acres which once ran Merino sheep and a small milking herd of Holstein dairy cattle.
The Bel-Antha Polwarth stud was established by Lyall in 1983, independent of the Starkey family farm. However, Lyall’s family had had an association with Polwarths as far back as the late 1920’s when Lyall’s maternal grandfather, the late JT Gladman, ran Polwarths at Lockhart and Griffith, NSW. JT Gladman sourced his rams from ‘Stony Park East’ stud, Jindera, NSW operated by the Jelbart family, until his retirement just after World War II. He was also one of 20 farmers to first grow rice as a trial at Griffith in the Riverina.
Lyall classing a lamb’s fleece
Lyall’s decision to breed Polwarth sheep was based purely on their dual-purpose attributes that suited his very cold wet winters in a high rainfall area. An emphasis has always been on breeding well-nourished, pure soft handling, white 22-23 micron wools. One of Lyall’s more recent breeding goals has been increasing body size and capitalising on the pure Polwarth trait of a lean carcass which suits today’s health-conscious consumer.
The Starkey’s aim to shear every 8 months because of the quick growing staple length which reaches 85-90mm in that time. They also find ease of management of the sheep an advantage. As the premature wool price is extremely competitive, shearing every 8 months can be an economic advantage. Prices for Starkey’s wool fetches around $10/kg and the extra wool cut achieved justifies a change in shearing timing. The family have also had an increase in lambing percentages which they believe is associated with their shearing pattern.
“More wool, more lambs, more dollars = a bank managers dream.”
Starkey’s keep the young rams and elite stud ewes on the home block in a 28” rainfall. The balance of select stud ewes are run along and adjacent to the River Torrens, also in a 28” rainfall and on the third property in the Mt Crawford Pine Forrest which has a 34” rainfall. They also lease around 250 acres, about 10km from home where the balance of stud ewes and ewe hoggets are run in a 24” rainfall.
The Starkey’s ram clientele has ranged from high rainfall to marginal cropping and pastoral country. Unfortunately, there has been a decline in ram sales over the last 10-15 years with clients retiring or passing away, especially in the Adelaide Hills. Many of these properties now run cattle or horses or have become lifestyle blocks and not running sheep at all.
Even though Polwarth numbers in Australia have dropped in the last 10-15 years, the Starkey’s have noticed a revival in the breed with new breeders seeing the economic potential of ‘two cuts of the cake,” reinforcing the family’s logo: Polwarths - can’t be beat for Wool and Meat!
(Editors note: this article appeared in a 2017 newsletter and has been reprinted with Kayla Starkey’s permission)
