Mulesing - removing skin around the tail to prevent flystrike - is one of the most controversial farming practices globally. Alternatives that protect sheep without this painful procedure are advancing.
Mulesing causes severe acute pain - it is performed without anaesthesia on conscious animals. The wound takes weeks to heal and causes chronic pain during healing. The welfare justification is that unprotected Merino sheep face even worse suffering from flystrike - maggots literally consuming living flesh. However, this presents a false binary: breeding programmes that produce plain-bodied sheep with reduced flystrike susceptibility, improved monitoring and targeted treatment, and non-mulesing flystrike prevention approaches offer routes to eliminating mulesing without abandoning flystrike protection. Consumer demand for mulesing-free certified wool drives producer adoption of these alternatives.