Ashley Dene Visit

This paper presents a summary of Ashley Dene resources and explains how such resources make Ashley Dene suitable as a research farm. It also discusses the rationale and justification for the use of the B+LNZ CPT Trial and provides an annual calendar of significant management operations at Ashley Dene.

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Ashley Dene Visit
Name
Institutional Affiliation

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ASHLEY DENE VISIT
Introduction
This paper aims at presenting a summary of Ashley Dene resources and explains how
such resources makes Ashely Dene suitable as a research farm. Also, the rationale and
justification for the use of the B+LNZ CPT Trial will be presented alongside key management
factors. Lastly, the annual calendar of significant management operations of Ashley Dene is
discussed.
1. Resources Summary and Suitability to Role as Research Farm
Summary of Resources
Ashley Dene has a whole 355ha in 3 blocks. The biggest block is the main block with
205ha with lightest soils. Cemetery block is 100 hectares with main sheep yard, woolshed, and
cattle yard. The smaller home-block is fifty hectares.
Soil: Nearly eighty percent of the entire area has light, stony, and drought-susceptible
type of soil. It covers the main block alongside a more significant portion of cemetery block. The
remaining soil in cemetery block alongside home-block is made up of both Willowby and
Lowcliffe soils. The classification of soil is as follows: Twenty hectares of Ashley Dene deep is
drained ascetically well while seventy-five hectares is Lismore stony silt loam that is marginally
disproportionately-drained soil. Forty hectares is Lowcliffe Moderate deep is not a perfectly
drained-soil, and thirty hectares is Lowcliffe stony is not a perfectly-drained soil.
Sheep: Ashley Dene has various types of sheep as a useful resource towards its role as a
research farm as seen below:

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Suitability of Resources:
The resources of Ashley Dene are suitable for its work as a research farm following the
shift of its role from the commercial farm in 2000 (first quarter) to a Pastoral System Research
farm. The shift corresponded to development alongside subsequent conversation of the novel
Lincoln University Dairy Farm (IUDF) situated on the land beforehand designated as the Lincoln
University Research Farm. The land (three blocks) in Ashley Dene became more suitable to the
research projects linked to research flocks, and this explains why the research projects were later
(March 2000), transferred to the Ashley Dene.
The main block was suitable for the development of significant irrigation resource in the
main block due to the higher availability of land space (200 hectare). This explains why the
Lincoln University Council approved the development project in the year 2011. This irrigation
sits on 190 hectares of the 200 hectares in the main block and has been useful in the dairy farm
operation with the researching dairy farming as the primary objective within the present

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environmental restrictions. This supports the main block’s suitability to support the development
of irrigation block which in turn help in researching dairy farming.
Ashley Dene resources are also suitable in its role of a research farm because it has
supported it to be a research property for externally, internally and even commercially-funded
research. This has made Ashley Dene push through its primary objective of facilitating the
research prosecution to the highest standards professionally at the least net cost.
Moreover, the Dryland component resource supports the growth of Lucerne (thirty
percent), permanent pasture (fifty percent), winter feed (fifteen percent) and a small summer
crop amount (five percent) all of which have supported the feeding of the animals to remain
healthy for the continuity of the research.
The sheep is also a resource that supports the role of Ashley Dene a research farm. The
sheep are many and of a variety of types. This helps to do various kinds of research to advise the
farmers accordingly on what kind they need to breed.
2. Annual Calendar of Major Management Operations
In the year 2002; ACPT (Alliance Central Progeny Test) was created at the Woodland
with substantial capital investment coming from Alliance Group with AgResearch, AbacusBio
alongside SIL collaboration. Rams (terminal-sire alongside dual purpose) was subsequently
obtained from the industry and then mated to ewes (Coopworth-cross or Coopworth. Growth
assessment of lambs was done in 2002 and re-done in 2003 with another site being added in
Ashley Dene.
In the year 2004, the extension of the program was performed to incorporate maternal
traits for dual purpose rams’ daughters and was subsequently mated to adequate ewes thereby
generating female progeny for retention for maternal traits’ assessment. Assessment of surplus

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females alongside all male ramps was performed for carcass merit and growth and Meat & Wool
New Zealand provided the investment in the female progeny’s work.
In the year 2005, the 3rd site stood created at Poukawa with On-Farm Research alongside
important addition of Poukawa Elite Lamb Programme’s live-weight data to the analysis. Mating
and measurements have since been done beginning 2005 utilizing the same protocols in all the 3
sites. Beginning in 2012, sires have been used at all 3 sites where feasible by Al, to boost the
genetic links between sites.
In the year 2013, the establishment of two hill country sites was done to probe whether
sire rankings altered based on the environment of evaluation. The very dual purpose sires already
evaluated on lowland sites were utilized on hill sites, and measurements of the maternal
performance were done through their 4-tooth lambing. B+LNZ remains the primary investor in
CPT between 2005 and 2013. The establishment of B+LNZ Genetics in the year 2014 saw the
CPT programme being part of the programme and is currently called B+LNZ Genetics Central
Progeny Test (Johnson et al., 2015).
3. Rationale and Justification for B+LNZ CPT Trial
Progeny test is useful in proving the ram’s genetics because it helps sufficiently compare
how the progeny of a ram performs comparative to other’s under similar circumstances. It
permits the comparison of rams’ crossways the many flocks by using certain rams across flocks
to establish genetic linkage between flocks (Jopson, McEwan, Logan & Muir, 2009). Moreover,
progeny test is also justified to be done at a central location like Ashley Dene where it is called
central progeny test because it helps facilitate the rams’ comparison which would never usually
be made in the industry, and illustrating or even trailing the utilization of new or costly methods
of measurement (Prieur et al., 2017).

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Rationale
The primary rationale for Ashley Dene’s B+LNZ Genetics Progeny Test includes the
following. It helps effectively identify high-performing rams’ sources through the extension and
reinforcement of the contrasts crossways breeding cohorts and flocks (Payne et al., 2009).
Moreover, the test is also done to sufficiently develop the desired genetic parameters for as well
as industry comprehension of, the new traits (Greyling, 2017). Also, the test has helped foster the
associations between the breeding cohorts of lambs and effectively offer a desired genetic
resource for the valued add-on projects to the sheep’s farmers alongside the allied industries
(Santos et al., 2017).
Justification
The justification of this test is that it was never designed for comparing breeds but for
comparing ram. This has helped to conclusively identify the top genetics irrespective of the
breed (Demertzis, Iliadis, Avramidis & El-Kassaby, 2017). Thus, it has helped solve the problem
associated with breed comparison which required testing of several randomly chosen rams a
breed with less progeny per ram (Zhao et al., 2018). Thus, unlike breed comparison, the Central
Progeny Test has managed to evaluate more than 300 rams without random selection but with
large numbers of progeny a ram, from as several breeds as feasible (Nayeri et al., 2016). This has
tremendously enhanced the linkage within the sheep industry in New Zealand (Brito et al.,
2017).
Moreover, Central Progeny Test is justified since the genetic links between sheep-
breeding groups established via this test have been utilized in large scale evaluation was
undertaken crossways flocks and crossway breeds and such assessments have confirmed that

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Central Progeny Test data avail vital genetic links desired or the SIL-ACE evaluation (Black &
Ryan-Salter, 2016).
Management Key Factors
The fundamental concerns pertinent to its management can be summarized in the table below:
The above table shows the factors as the start of mating, the beginning of lambing,
docking, weaning, first draft, second draft, and third draft as the critical factors involved in the
Central Progeny Test management at Ashely Dene.
Conclusion
The Ashley Dene has such resources as land, sheep flock, irrigation and Lucerne and
pasture that makes it a suitable place for research farm. The rationale and justification for the
B+LNZ CPT Trial have been shown alongside the key management factor for Ashley Dene.
Also, the list of annual events pertinent to Ashley Dene management is presented.

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References
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lucerne pasture under summer dry conditions. New Zealand Grassland Association.
Brito, L. F., McEwan, J. C., Miller, S. P., Pickering, N. K., Bain, W. E., Dodds, K. G., ... &
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Demertzis, K., Iliadis, L., Avramidis, S., & El-Kassaby, Y. A. (2017). Machine learning use in
predicting interior spruce wood density utilizing progeny test information. Neural
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