Newborn lambs break the silence of a frosty dawn at Pelican Sheep Station. They move about on fragile legs, bleating to their mothers.
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Phil Sykes, whose family has farmed in the Tirrannaville district south of Goulburn since 1827, sees plunging temperatures extract a toll.
"I haven't seen so many merinos losing so many twins. Some don't get off the ground quick enough. The dorsets (cross-breds) are bigger and have that fight to get up and live,'' Mr Sykes said.
Only the hardiest make it when overnight temperatures plummet to minus 9 degrees. Mr Sykes avoids driving on the frost before 8.30am because the wheels can damage the frozen grass.
A Japanese importer has just left Pelican on a due-diligence tour that included Goulburn processors Southern Meats before settling an export deal. Russia's ban on Australian produce in retaliation to sanctions imposed over the crisis in Ukraine may exclude lamb so the market, while down at present, looks promising.
But there is no escaping extreme weather and successive days of minus 5 and minus 6 degrees and one morning of minus 9.4 degrees.
"When we get these thumping big frosts, we are screaming for rain,'' Mr Sykes said.
"Good rain is developing in Queensland and coming down from the north in the right direction. We usually pick up four to five millimetres, whereas in the higher areas around Yass, Gurrundah, Crookwell, they'll get a bit of snow, they pick up 20 millimetres.
"It's so dry with the frosts, we've just got to hope for a break.''
Mr Sykes runs 4000 sheep and 150 cattle on 970 hectares, joining ewes with rams in February, and later scanning them for conception rates.
"We aim for 90 to 92 per cent multiple births. Two hundred ewes had triplets last year, this year we'll get 100 sets of triplets, about 85 per cent.''
The pregnant ewes are drafted into smaller mobs determined by how many lambs they are carrying. The more lambs, the more feed their mothers receive. Older sheep are placed with first-time mothers to settle them during six weeks of lambing, and smaller mobs avoid miss-mothering.
"We would have 2000 lambs on the ground now and are expecting 800 to 900 in the next two weeks,'' Mr Sykes said.
Canola, wheat and oat-grazing crops fatten last year's lambs as well as nourish their parents. Second-cross lambs have weighed in at hefty 31.97 kilograms dressed for export, probably to Japan.
Japanese businessman Imai Yutaka's diverse interests range from growing tomatoes to feeding All Nippon Airways' passengers, to a restaurant overlooking Shibetsu, where he met Goulburn's mayor Geoff Kettle in July.
"When we were over there on our sister city visit, I met Mr Imai completely by accident, actually, when we went to his restaurant for dinner. We got talking and he wants to import from Goulburn,'' Cr Kettle said.
That led to Mr Yutaka inspecting the sheep station, ahead of a $340,000 deal that will replace importing lamb from Victoria.
"Southern Meats already exports to Japan weekly. They send containers to Sapporo and to Tokyo, which suits Mr Imai. He can import either through Tokyo or through Sapporo,'' Cr Kettle said.