Successful adoption of new guidelines for the nutritional management of ewes is dependent on the development of appropriate tools and information

Abstract

Abstract. Low rates of adoption of innovations in sheep management have been blamed on the poor targeting of messages, low relative advantage of the innovation, a focus on awareness-raising activities rather than adoption activities, poor 'packaging' of information and few effective tools to aid decision making. Lifetimewool, a national project that developed management guidelines for Merino ewes specific to regions and different times of lambing, used a 'review and improve' process to identify areas of interest, level of knowledge and the skills required by different sectors of the audience to adopt the new recommendations for ewe management. To match these needs and to effectively communicate information from Lifetimewool, a combination of simple and complex tools were produced which were practical, effective, regionally specific and credible. All of the products were designed as a 'family' in terms of design and content, allowing a recognition by the producer that they complemented each other and led producers through logical steps for making decisions on managing and feeding ewes. The average awareness of all tools by consultants and extensionists was almost 90% and average usage rates were above 50%. However, the usage rates varied dramatically between tools and users, for example, 46% of consultants used the feed budget tables compared with 76% of extensionists for a similar awareness. Of 1353 producers surveyed more than 55% were aware of the Lifetimewool tools and average usage within this group was 19% and related to the length of time the tool had been available. An estimated 14 000 producers were aware of tools produced by Lifetimewool. The uptake and use of these tools by the target audiences support our hypothesis that tools of differing complexities are required to cater for individual needs.

Review of sheep body condition score in relation to production characteristics

“…The BCS that is associated with the highest productivity varies depending on physiological state (nonpregnant vs. pregnant vs. lactating), the number of offspring a ewe is bearing and rearing, the age of the animal, its sex, its breed (genotype), the production system, and the level and quality of the feed on offer. Below, we have attempted to outline briefly what might be considered a suitable BCS range for a ewe across the production cycle based on the data reviewed here and those of previous publications (Russel 1984a(Russel , b, 1985Cannas 2002;Curnow et al 2011;Hocking-Edwards et al 2011), although, as stated above, this will likely depend on a number of variables.…”

On-farm factors affecting physical quality of Merino wool. 1. Nutrition, reproduction, health and management

“…McGregor (2011b) reviews these issues in terms of the causes and potential methods to reduce their impact on wool productivity. Condition score sheet 90 66 92 46 38 8 Condition score models 97 56 98 54 37 7 Ewe management handbook 83 63 90 41 25 5 Feed budget tables 98 76 92 46 25 6 Lifetimewool website 97 56 87 37 20 2 Feed-on-offer photo gallery 93 54 91 49 18 3 Condition score profile 75 41 80 24 --Decision support tool 71 10 72 5 --Average of reported values 88 53 88 38 27 5 Source: Products ordered based on the awareness of producers (derived from Curnow et al, 2011). a Of all wool producers.…”

Evaluation of the impact of Lifetimewool on sheep producers

“…This was essential to achieve the adoption target of 3000 producers who would change practice as a direct result of the project within 3 years. Curnow et al (2011) outlined how the Lifetimewool activities and tools were developed to meet the specific needs of the 'early adopters' and 'early majority' market segments. This paper looks at how effective the Lifetimewool project was at meeting its adoption objective using this approach, discusses the adoption process in terms of the diffusion of innovation models as outlined by Rogers (1983) and Moore (2006) and the factors affecting it and how this may be relevant to other projects pursuing change in livestock management practices.…”