Can you trust in-paddock weight data? When Bendrose Station’s Optiweigh Unit showed lambs had already reached target weights, Steve McCall wasn’t convinced. A yard-weight check settled the question, revealing just how closely the real-time data matched reality and helping improve drafting and marketing decisions.
- WHL BENDROSE
- TWIZEL (NZ)
- OPTIWEIGH SHEEP
Steve McCall, Bendrose Station, Twizel, purchased an Optiweigh Unit in April 2026. The strategy was to use real-time data to keep an eye on 1980 mixed second cross lambs in a lucerne fattening paddock. The lambs are grown out and sent to the works at 45kg.
He bought the mob into the yards on the April 20 and, by eye, drafted the tops out of the mob (anything above 40kg). This draft was then weighed, and anything at target weight was sent to the works.
When the Optiweigh went out with the lambs on April 22, they immediately recorded weights. The mob average showed 44.2 kg with 500+ weight records a day being recorded (this mob does not have EID’s so estimate 10-15% of the mob is weighing and contributing to the sample).
TRUSTING THE DATA
10 days later, Steve (highly sceptical of the data Optiweigh was reporting) conducted a visual check of the mob.
Despite the Optiweigh showing a mob average of 45.0kg, his visual check did not correlate with the data (see screenshot of the dashboard below).
CROSS CHECKING WITH YARD WEIGHTS
With the scheduled 2 week draft looming, still highly sceptical, he yarded the mob and weighed a sample of 101. The result … a mob average of 45.13kg (see yard weight results below).
TAKEAWAYS
In paddock data allows the WHL Ltd team to make more informed decisions about booking lambs into the works.
They have an accurate picture of how many of the mob have hit target weight, without having to take them off feed, and walk them to the yards.
It means they can secure forward contracts with the information, and means more efficient use of time in the yards as they can select drafting weights better.
