About

In 1986, Peter Westblade had 3300 stud ewes inspected and registered as Poll Merino’s, which began the stud Pastora New Era Merinos. Sadly Peter passed away in 2008 and his son Tim and daughter-in-law Rachel have taken over as stud principals, running the stud as Pastora Poll Merinos.

Tim has lived and worked on the farm in the Lockhart district all his life and has been involved in the sheep industry since leaving school, doing a few years shearing before returning to the family farm on a full-time basis. Tim bought his own property in 1996 and worked alongside his father with whom he had a fantastic working/personal relationship for many years building a strong business. He currently classes many Pastora clients’ flocks.

Tim married Rachel, originally from Sydney, in 2001. They have five children, assuring the Pastora name is continued into the future.

Pastora employs two full-time staff.

Craig Wilson has been Pastora’s stud consultant since 2001. He brings to the business extensive knowledge regarding benchmarking through wether trials and sire evaluations. This data and information gives him the information about what profit drivers are important in the Pastora stud. Craig also classes many of Pastora’s commercial client flocks.

John Driscoll and Pat Drew class 75 Pastora client flocks. Both are intrinsically involved in decision making at Pastora. This is important, as their consultation with Pastora clients and the information gleaned from what clients require will assist the Pastora bloodline to become progressively profitable into the future.

John and wife Traci live at The Rock in southern NSW. He has been a farmer all his life and started classing in 1984. He worked closely with Peter Westblade and now classes full-time.

Pat lives with his family in Bethungra NSW, where they run a mixed sheep and cropping enterprise. Pat has entered numerous wether trials in the past 15 years and his success in these trials has built his reputation as a quality sheep classer.

Craig, John, Pat and Tim are available to assist with classing and ram selection. Pastora endeavours to develop strong relationships with new and existing clients to understand what it is that they require from their sheep and how their farm is operated.