I'm pretty sure the girl I spoke to at MV mentioned that it was a pooled sample. The interesting thing about the MV sample is that you just pick the poo up with a glove, turn the glove inside out on your hand and tie a knot in it. I quite like the simplicity of that - and that is probably going to appeal to bigger sheep farmers to try and get them to do more FECs for a more targeted approach to reduce resistance developing.
However, we have one ram lamb at the moment who is clearly carrying the burden "for the team". He's the only one with a very wet mucky bum and a lot of fly interest but no maggots. I think we got him just in time. He's had the full wash cut and blow dry treatment this morning and I am keeping him in for a fresh sample to send to Westgate as an individual.
Sounds like there is room for both the pooled approach (MV) and the individual approach (vet, Westgate etc).