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Sheep Handlers

When the wool prices crashed in 1969/70 many farmers tried to cut costs by inventing various types of sheep handlers as an aid for crutching sheep.  Notable in South Australia were the Gun Crutcher developed by Henry Young at Keith, and the Murdoch Sheep Handler developed by Mr Vic Murdoch of ‘Orrie Cowie’, Warroka.

In Western Australia a group of farmers around Darkan, under the stimulus of consultant Bob Hall, invented a series of Sheep Handlers:-  The Lubcke Cradle developed by Bob Lubcke, formerly of SA.  The Harrington Cradle developed by the Harrington Brothers, The Woodroffe Cradle developed by Mr les Woodroffe of Darkan.

My nephew, Robert Jefferies of Duranillin and formerly from SA, built a series of Lubcke Cradles into a portable trailer with two or three cradles in series.  His son James and a friend did crutching by contract and they could comfortably crutch 100 sheep per hour and crutched some 60,000 sheep per year.

Where farmers set them up correctly, out of a shed or yards, these cradles worked very efficiently and saved farmers much time and cost in crutching sheep as part of a Blowfly Control Program and in reducing stains in the wool at shearing time.

(Source: Brian Jefferies)