Sheep

The Hampshire Down Premier Sale 2023 in Shrewsbury had a record number of sheep entered from performance recorded flocks, providing buyers with a fantastic opportunity to use EBVs to guide purchasing decisions.

The Rossiter family claimed over champion female with lot 212, Huish Florence sired by an Australian import ram. This was the highest index female within the sale and ranked within the top 5% of the breed for Terminal Sire Index and Maternal Index. This September born ewe lamb then went on to achieve highest price female at the sale, selling for 1200gns to Jeremy Durrant’s Hydes flock.

The Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board is to make new breeding values for abattoir traits an integral part of the National Terminal Sire Evaluation through its Signet Breeding Services, following significant analysis of abattoir data. This new approach coincides with the release of the latest RamCompare results at a webinar on 11 May 2023 (book online).  

Catch up here - https://youtu.be/QW1OoJPK-_c

Friday 14th April saw the first ram sale of 2023 at Exeter Livestock Centre on behalf of the Centurion Group of Dorset Breeders. An entry of 56 Signet recorded sheep, which sold to buyers from across the UK.

Signets Sheepbreeder and Beefbreeder performance recording service allows breeders and buyers to identify those animals with the best genetics and make informed decisions. While providing breeders with tools to assist with the marketing of stock for sale at home and market sales.

Join Signet Breeding Services for the annual results update from the RamCompare project’s UK progeny test, with updated results from the year seven data collection.

For the first time results will be released online as 38,500 abattoir records from 400 RamCompare sires are incorporated into the National Terminal Sire Evaluation. SRUC’s new breeding index will be launched as the project steps up a gear and makes abattoir derived breeding values more widely available.

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. In 2023 AHDB are placing an additional criteria on breeders that wish to receive funding for CT scanning, which is that CT scanned lambs that are performance recorded with Signet must be genotyped (using a 50K genotype).

The Gortleigh Dorset flock was established by Gill and Richard Trace in 1986 on a 330 acre farm in North-West Devon. The breed was chosen for its ability to lamb naturally out of season, its versatility, adaptability and docility.

The Gortleigh flock has always been pro-actively managed using Estimated Breeding Values (EBV’s) and has been a member of the Centurion Dorset breeders group since 1997.

At a recent meeting, commercial farmers with Dorset sheep were discussing how important it was to select a ram that has been born as a twin.

In Autumn 2022 ten performance recorded hill flocks measured their lambs, assessing both individual FECs (for Strongyles and Nematodirus) and an immune response to worm challenge that is measured via blood samples, referred to as IgA. Measures were taken by farmers and vet and then assessed by Techion (for FEC) and Biobest (for IgA).