ABOUT US

WHY CHOOSE COLLINSVILLE?

COLLINSVILLE RAMS ARE PROFITABLE

The vast scale of our enterprise also means we are often in a position to deliver you rams long after others have exhausted their seasonal supply. This has resulted in a stud that is geared towards serving the interests of both mixed and pastoral farmers—breeding for low maintenance, large framed and heavy cutting sheep that work hard and last the distance.

Collinsville stud is built on over 100 years of breeding success but we don’t rely on our heritage. Today, we’re focused on rigorous, modern, innovative, and carefully calculated breeding methods.

Our Objective

Collinsville’s unwavering focus is to breed profitable Australian Merino Sheep. Our sheep are large framed with excellent growth and fertility rates and carcass attributes. They’re renowned for producing heavy-cutting, white and soft handling fleeces coupled with excellent conformation and constitution.

HOW DO WE DO IT?

At Collinsville we use both objective scientific measurement and visual selection to class and define our flock. All sheep within the stud receive an electronic ear tag, enabling us to accurately measure growth rates, fleece weight, wool quality and accurately record pedigree information on the sire and dam side. From this, we select progeny that have outstanding early growth coupled with heavy cutting and excellent quality fleeces. Unlike other studs which solely use electronic data to class and select progeny, we also place an emphasis on excellent visual conformation and constitution. This ensures we are retaining sheep with structural correctness, while retaining an excellent carcass quality comparable to a meat breed.

This visual assessment is also applied to wool quality—we only breed from sheep with white, nourished and soft-handling wools. This is why Collinsville’s rams are better.

In addition, our large flock size of 7000 registered stud ewes leads to a very high selection pressure, based on the above criteria. Due to our size and scale we keep the “very best” of our progeny thus ensuring rapid genetic gain. We use only the top 1% of our rams for future stud breeding and over 60% of our ram lambs are sold for meat.

Another way we preserve the superior Collinsville genetics is to pregnancy scan every ewe for singles and multiples within the stud and our pastoral operation. This occurs on an annual basis after joining, enabling us to identify non-performing genetics within our flock and thereby increase fertility.

PASTORAL FARMERS

Collinsville has a solution for Pastoral Farmers wanting to :

  • Make more profit
  • Increase fleece weights
  • Improve wool quality and yield
  • Increase ram survivability
  • Increase fertility
  • Reduce fly strike 

LESS HASSLE AND MORE PROFIT

Our plain-bodied white wooled nourished sheep are less susceptible to flystrike, while maintaining a high-yielding heavy cutting fleece of 20.5 micron. Raised on hard land, these animals have had no choice but to thrive in unfavourable conditions. Our long history on the tough country of mid-north SA means any sheep not able to walk great distances for water has simply been eliminated from the gene pool. As a result, Collinsville sheep are superior, large-framed specimens with a high fertility rate and heavy cut.

LESS MAINTENANCE, CONSISTENT QUALITY

Our inner country sheep are bred to produce a free growing and heavy fleece as well as a better carcass. We breed plain-bodied Merinos with the aim of eliminating flystrike, while maintaining a heavy fleece of quality 20.5 wool. The fact that our rams are in high demand as semen sires (both across Australia and internationally) is proof of our high-fertility rate and consistent quality.

MIXED FARMERS

Collinsville also has superior, long term solutions for Mixed Farmers who want to :

  • Make more profit
  • Increase fleece weight while also increasing wool quality and yield
  • Increase fertility
  • Reduce fly strike 
  • Do less work

MEET THE TEAM

George Millington
Principal
george@collinsville.com.au
0417 879 218

George Millington

Principal

Georges lives at the Kadlunga property based at Mintaro with his wife Sophie and two children Rupert and Alice. The family moved to the mid north in 2010 after the purchase of the Cappeedee property from the Murray family. This was a return to home for Sophie who was born and raised on a farm only 50 Kms to the North West.

George is involved in the day to day running of Collinsville across all three properties at Hallett, Collinsville Station and Kadlunga. He harbours a passion for livestock and to continue to build on the history of Collinsville. Prior to moving to the mid north of SA George has been involved in Coffee industry via Monjava Coffee, which he owned, ran and subsequently sold to San Remo Pasta. He is also now involved in the logistics industry via a majority ownership in APD parcel delivery in Adelaide.

George firmly believes in the bright future of the merino industry and eagerly anticipates Collinsville’s continued involvement in it.

Tim Dalla
General Manager
tim@collinsville.com.au
0488 773 329

TIM DALLA

GENERAL Manager

Tim, his wife Jade and children Harrison, Lily and William reside on the Collinsville property located at Hallett.

A South Australian stud Merino enthusiast, Tim, 39, is the Stud Manager at Collinsville, a position he has held for the past ten years. As head of the stud’s breeding program, Tim focuses heavily on producing the big, plain bodied sheep with excellent constitution and quality, medium wools that have made Collinsville a household name across Australia.

Tim’s passion for stud Merino sheep was ignited as a youngster, growing-up on Orrie Cowie Merino stud, and working alongside his grandfather Vic Murdoch. After graduating from Narrogin Agricultural College in 1999, Tim spent two years jackarooing at Uardry Merino stud under the guidance of manager Chris Bowman. Then from 2002 Tim spent nearly six years as Livestock Manager at the Charinga and Banavie Merino studs under the watchful eye of Roger Polkinghorne.

Tim has judged at numerous shows throughout Australia and overseas.

Tony Brooks
Stud Consultant
tony@brooksmerino.com.au
0408 859 261

Tony Brooks

Stud consultant

Tony Brooks has worked in the Stud Merino industry for more than 45 years. He has gained a wealth of knowledge from working and managing various studs, including Willogoleche Stud with assistance from Tom Padbury, and classing all the pastoral properties of HC Nitschke and Sons for 16 years.

After the sale of Willogoleche, Tony became the stud manager of North Bungaree, then managed the Hazeldean and East Bungaree Studs for the Litchfield family. Tony, and his brother Mark, took the opportunity to purchase the whole East Bungaree Stud in 2005.

In 2020, Tony and Mark sold East Bungaree in its entirety to Collinsville Stud Merinos. Tony continues to work as the East Bungaree Stud Consultant, involved in the selection and breeding of the stud bloodlines.

Tony has a passion for breeding big, robust merinos that can thrive and survive in many diverse conditions across Australia. He also runs his own consultancy service, Brooks Merino Services, which offers a strong commitment to client services, including sheep classing for both commercial and stud sheep, assistance in ram selection decisions and flock management advisory programs with existing and new clients. 

Michael Elmes
Collinsville Stud Consultant
mjelmes@bigpond.com
0429 847 552 

Michael Elmes

Collinsville Stud Consultant

Experienced sheep classer and Merino breeding consultant, Michael Elmes is the stud consultant for Collinsville Stud Merinos.

Micheal works with Collinsville to provide a very experienced outside objective opinion of the breeding program and selection process. 

Michael grew up near Hughenden and he started his career as a jackaroo on the Uardry stud, Hay, in 1978.  

Michael’s success as a sheep classer has been noted with many of his clients featuring in Merino ewe competitions. During the 2016 Lake Cargelligo competition every one of his flocks won a prize, taking first, second and third.  

Michael’s early mentor can be traced back to include the late Ian Munro, sheep classer at Boonoke, Conargo, the late Alec Morrison, CEO FS Falkiner and Sons, Boonoke, Conargo and John Kelly, manager of “Maneroo”, Longreach, where Michael was overseer from 1983-84. 

Rory Catlin
Collinsville Station Manager

Rory CATLIN

Collinsville Station Manager

Rory Catlin is a familiar face at the Collinsville operation, returning to the role of Station Manager in 2020. During his time with the stud in the early 2000s, Rory played a major role in implementing their AI program. 

Committed to all areas of livestock management, Rory is well seasoned to the sheep industry. Outside his time at Collinsville, he has accumulated a wealth of experience in station hand and station management roles. This includes his time spent as Manager of Kia-Ora Station, near Burra, for the progressive McBride Family.

Rory also remains dedicated to his learning development, with training in the Soft Rolling Skin (SRS) philosophy, estimated breeding value, and stock grazing holistic management.