Flinn win is yards ahead

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Design, manufacture and construction of Sheep yards and Shearing Sheds is the world of award-winning Flinn Design.

The company won the Henty Machinery Field Days' Machine of the Year 2024 for its Ram-to-Ewe, an automated catching pen.

The innovative Ram-to-Ewe ‘Instinct’ catching pen will be fitted for the first time anywhere in the world into a shearing shed in the Tasmanian Midlands.

Regarded as one of the most innovative companies in the industry, they have been quietly going about their business for years and love nothing more than talking about design.

Mr Flinn says “ Sheep Yards are Sexy! Watching a mob of sheep move through a well designed set of yards is a beautiful sight. Being part of the flow, contributing to the draw and escape of the mob by applying and releasing pressure—whether by lifting your hat or leaning towards a passing mob— is truly a thing of beauty.”

“So that is the sexy part, natural draw. The sheep are doing what comes naturally.” 

Mr Flinn goes onto say “when considering your next sheep yard or shearing shed go through the process one step at a time and always put yourself in the hooves of the sheep, shoes of the penner upper or your favourite sheep dog. You can pick a design out of a catalogue, and it will work better than what you’ve got (gate swinging is a good start), but if you want to build the best yards or shed, use animal instinct. Sheep can’t ignore it, they crave it, drawn by it and ultimately is as ethical as you can get, because any sheep that is driven by instinct is in their happy place.”

Flinn Design also provides several options for shearing sheds including 12 monthly maintenance prior to shearing, existing shed upgrades, extensions and complete project management. 

“That’s the irony, the ability to design the future of the industry already exists. We cannot simply rebuild old designs using new materials nor can we use outdated materials to create new designs.

We have a responsibility to ourselves, to future generations and quite simply we have to counter act the bullshit negative dribble that farmers are bombarded with every day. Australian farmers have always been leaders in animal ethics. we have always been the pioneers in creating passive flow, passive guidance, and instinct-driven shearing sheds and yards”

Flinn Design principal Simon Flinn said one of the key benefits of the Ram-to-Ewe was that it could be retrofitted to older shearing sheds at a fraction of the cost of a new shed, but finished with this statement,

“They were invented over 400 years ago. Put in decent bloody toilets”