Mulesing of Australian Merino lambs with the ‘skin wrinkle’ phenotypes, provides effective life-long protection against the risk of ‘breech strike’ caused by Lucilia cuprina, the sheep blowfly. It is estimated that at least 2million sheep would die annually of flystrike if mulesing were banned. Although the breeding of wool sheep that are less susceptible to flystrike continues, in the period until wrinkle-free breech sheep no longer need to be mulesed, it is advocated that mulesing should continue in areas where it is considered necessary. The welfare concerns of mulesing have been significantly ameliorated with the availability and widespread uptake of the farmer applied spray-on topical anaesthesia (TA) formulation (Tri-Solfen®, Bayer Animal Health, Australia) that is administered in the immediate post-operative period. Introduced in late 2005 on APVMA permit for sale through veterinarians, this product has been recently registered (late 2011). It has been estimated that 70% of mulesed lambs in 2011 received treatment with TA (A Giffard, pers. comm.). READ MORE