The History of Valais Blacknose Sheep in Australia

The History of Valais Blacknose Sheep in Australia goes back to 2017 when Belinda Cardinal and Tony Urek began what became a long and arduous journey to bring ‘the cutest sheep in the world’ to Australia. Purchasing their first stock in the UK and applying for permits and approvals in early 2018. The first tanks of frozen embryos and semen arrived in October 2020 with the first F1 (50%) lambs born on a Ballarat farm in March 2021.

The very first pure Valais Blacknose lambs in Australia were born a month later in April 2021, at Belinda and Tony’s Omazel stud in Victoria.

In 2022 the UK government moved the goalposts, and it seemed that further imports would be out of the question. However, Belinda spent a year working with the Australian and UK government agencies and we are very happy to say she successfully got things back on track.

Since then, many other breeders have been able to import Valais Blacknose genetics into Australia without that same degree of difficulty.  So, it is true to say that Belinda and Tony, through their hard work and persistence, truly opened the door for this breed to come to Australia.

The Future Looks Bright

As of early 2025 there are close to 200 purebred Valais Blacknose sheep registered with Valais Blacknose Australia Ltd. and close to 350 sheep registered on the Valais Blacknose Australia Breed up registry.

Valais Blacknose Sheep are now being shown and exhibited at major agricultural shows in Victoria, New South Wales, and the ACT.

Even more exciting is that a number of our members are now exporting genetics from Australian Bred Valais Blacknose Sheep to the US.

So although the history of Valais Blacknose Sheep in Australia may be relatively short,  I think its fair to say our future is going to be huge… and very very cute.