News

18,000 Sussex cattle records have been added to Signet’s National Sussex Cattle Breeding Evaluation, the inclusion of this data will strengthen genetic linkage between herds and enhance our assessment of less well recorded animals.

Breed for CH4NGE: is a three-year initiative funded through DEFRA’s Farming Innovation Programme. The goal is to breed productive, efficient maternal sheep with a naturally low carbon footprint.

Tickets are now on sale for the 2024 Sheep Breeders Round Table (SBRT) conference taking place  on the 15-17^th November 2024 at the central location of the Radisson Blu Hotel East Midlands, Derby, DE74 2TZ. The conference Breeding sheep for a greener future will cover specific sheep breeding topics within the wider role of genetics, the essential building blocks for the future of the UK sheep industry.

A collaborative research team has been awarded a £1.1million grant to tackle the devastating impact of Maedi-visna (MV), a chronic infectious disease affecting sheep and goats.

Latest breed reports from the RamCompare project the UK’s commercial progeny test for terminal sires. To date we have slaughter data included from 468 rams from 17 different breeds, collecting data from over 44,000 lambs in one of the largest trials of its kind.

In Wales, HCC have supported Signet’s genetic improvement programme for many years; with the Hill Ram Scheme being a major success in introducing genomic technology into national sheep breeding programmes. However for the coming year, budgetary changes mean that HCC are unable to fund:-

• Routine support for Signet’s genetic evaluations for breeders in Wales
• CT scanning (or the genotyping of CT scanned animals) for breeders in Wales

For over 50 years, Poll Dorset and Dorset Horn sheep breeders have measured the performance of lambs on their farms with the aim of enhancing their value at the abattoir.

RamCompare is on the look-out for new farms to recruit across England and Wales. The project collects data from birth to slaughter from commercial UK farms. RamCompare host farms provide a minimum of 300 ewes which are mated to performance recorded terminal sires. All flock data is collected using electronic identification (EID) and all commercial lambs are reared as one management group within a fast-finishing system.

The Charollais breed has always been an early adopter of research and breeders have been extremely supportive of our work. Over 100 different Charollais sires have been tested to date by RamCompare producing over 19,000 Charollais sired lambs.

AHDB are keen to support performance recording flocks based in England that wish to use SRUC’s CT scanning service. AHDB will provide a support payment to SRUC of £55/lamb to support CT scanning services. Breeders can chose to take their lambs to Edinburgh or go to one of the mobile venues set up by SRUC.