Spring lamb prices

IH784man

adam14 wrote: »

And how much does it cost to feed them a day

I'm not arguing with you over keeping lambs waiting for a higher price now,any of mine that are fit are going tommorow night,I'd expect a drop shortly

paddysdream

If your lambs are getting up to 22.5 killout then its very marginal to keep them.Yes 10 cent a kilo is 2.25 per head but how long will a ten cent rise take ?.2 weeks?
A lamb on ad lib at 45/46 kgs could/would easily be eating 2kgs a day.Thats 50 cent a day at 250 a ton.
Putting on weight that wont be paid for will cost 7 euro for the fortnight.At 1kg a day thats still 3.50 per head.Even allowing that they were lighter and needed the 14 days to hit 22.5 its marginal at times to wait.
Depends really on the lambs(weight,thrive and amount eating) plus rate of price rise (or fall !)and the need for money(most important factor here anyways)

tomwaterford

adam14 wrote: »

And how much does it cost to feed them a day

If your feeding a kilo of nuts a day @240 a ton...is 32c a day per sheep



At a 6:1 conversion,this is 1.92 meal to e4.90 of meat?
Unless your selling coke,you'll hard push to find something more profitable?

Willfarman

Losing a lamb in the meantime weakens the resolve for holding fit or near fit lambs!

Green farmer

tomwaterford wrote: »

At a 6:1 conversion,this is 1.92 meal to e4.90 of meat?
Unless your selling coke,you'll hard push to find something more profitable?

One thing that always confuses me is the conversion rate. The 6-1, is that weight gain on the live weight or deadweight ? Does 6kg of meal give you a 1kg live weight gain , which would be .5kg dead weight gain, or does the 6kg give you a 2kg live weight gain to be 1kg carcass gain ?

Big difference, but something I'm not sure on, if anyone knows the answer?

tomwaterford

Green farmer wrote: »

One thing that always confuses me is the conversion rate. The 6-1, is that weight gain on the live weight or deadweight ? Does 6kg of meal give you a 1kg live weight gain , which would be .5kg dead weight gain, or does the 6kg give you a 2kg live weight gain to be 1kg carcass gain ?

Big difference, but something I'm not sure on, if anyone knows the answer?

I'm. Nearly sure it's deadweight as figure

early_riser

Lambs booked in for thursday morning anyway.. On ad lib nuts so not much point in keeping fit lambs holding out for another 10c, with the cold weather at the min thrive seems to be slowed down a bit here aswell

Willfarman

No way 6 kilos of meal gives you 1 kg carcass unless summer weather and quality grass with other it. Adlib is around 9 to1.

charolais0153

Willfarman wrote: »

No way 6 kilos of meal gives you 1 kg carcass unless summer weather and quality grass with other it. Adlib is around 9 to1.

6 to 1 liveweight id say

paddysdream

Willfarman wrote: »

No way 6 kilos of meal gives you 1 kg carcass unless summer weather and quality grass with other it. Adlib is around 9 to1.

Always made it up as roughly ten to one as a rule of thumb for ease of calculation.

Lambs killing well here at the moment.Would want to be I suppose looking at the meal bill.Killed some early last week (mixture of ram and ewe lambs) and averaged 22.8 (ranged from 19.9 to 24.8 with most hitting around 23).Came into 111.66 after deductions.
They were 45 kgs plus live but nothing bar 1 near 50kgs.
Went with another lot at the weekend.A bit lighter but still averaged almost 22 kgs.They were a smaller lamb that was not going to carry much more weight(mainly small butty ram lambs that seen hardship during the Summer).On meal a while so thrive and conversation rate begining to slow.
About 130 or so left as of today,mixture of mainly ewe lambs with a few ram lambs and a handful of stragglers.

Green farmer

paddysdream wrote: »

Always made it up as roughly ten to one as a rule of thumb for ease of calculation.

So, 25kg bag of meal at €7 works out 28 cent a kilo to buy, x10 conversion, = €2.80 a kilo. At the moment €5, So €2.80 for the mill and €2.20 for the farmer, to cover everything else. I always had it in my mind a 50/50 split. Shows the importance of how much you pay for the meal and the importance of getting lambs off earlier in year from grass.
Funny enough the lambs I did best from this year were light lambs I sold at €85 a head for the Muslim festival in the summer. More or less straight off the ewes, with little cost and didn't interfere with the ewes grazing for the autumn months. Makes you wonder, wouldn't it !!

adam14

tomwaterford wrote: »

If your feeding a kilo of nuts a day @240 a ton...is 32c a day per sheep



At a 6:1 conversion,this is 1.92 meal to e4.90 of meat?
Unless your selling coke,you'll hard push to find something more profitable?

If that's the conversion rate everyone would be at. There is a very limited return, if holding out for an extra 10 or 20 cent when lambs are say 45-48 kg. At this time of year unless you have catch crops you are taking gains from other areas like using grass for ewes in spring, straw if indoors, risk of one dying, silage, extra work that you are not paid for etc

Dickie10

what are 46 kg lambs making in mart?? i have 7 ewe lambs reasonable fat cover nice butcher lamb. dont want to feed meal because they wont kill out to more than 19kg in factory. these will make €95 in factory. what would i get in a mart?

Green farmer

any quotes lads ? Was quoted €4.95 to 22kg.

jd06

Nekarsulm wrote:

happy enough, they were born about the 12th Feb onwards, got no meal except whatever they got for a few days in individual pens.To the field about the fourth day or so. Strangely the lambs at 44 kg looked far bigger than mine, looking at them in the pen afterwards, you would have said mine weren't more than 35, but scales said different.

Dickie10 wrote:

what are 46 kg lambs making in mart?? i have 7 ewe lambs reasonable fat cover nice butcher lamb. dont want to feed meal because they wont kill out to more than 19kg in factory. these will make €95 in factory. what would i get in a mart?

46 kg 99 euro 2 weeks ago and they had no meal not too fleshy either, big frame

Dickie10

have decided against bring them tomorrow to delvin, not a great mart anyway, too many smart lads hanging around it. decided to go with the ones 50kg+ and start meal feeding the rest they will kill out better in a few weeks with meal in them

IH784man

Dickie10 wrote: »

have decided against bring them tomorrow to delvin, not a great mart anyway, too many smart lads hanging around it. decided to go with the ones 50kg+ and start meal feeding the rest they will kill out better in a few weeks with meal in them

Are you bringing the 50kg lambs to the mart

Dickie10

no icm navan prob monday

paddysdream

Green farmer wrote: »

any quotes lads ? Was quoted €4.95 to 22kg.

5 euro since last week in both Kildare and ICM.KIldare on 22.5 whilst ICM were on 22 limit till last week I think as had lambs in Kildare that ICM would only go to 22 kgs for.May have changed this week as most seem to be moving up the weights over the last couple of weeks.On heavish lambs the extra half kilo is much better than 10 cents extra to only 22.

Sami23

Sold lambs in Mart today. 52kgs €110

sea12

Sami23 wrote: »

Sold lambs in Mart today. 52kgs €110

Much meal gone into them?

Sami23

sea12 wrote: »

Much meal gone into them?

Not a massive amount. Maby a bag each maximum

kk.man

Sami23 wrote: »

sea12 wrote: »

Much meal gone into them?

Not a massive amount. Maby a bag each maximum

Feeding rates are low for sheep despite this people believe it's costing them huge sums to finish stock. I know it's an open question depending on weighs etc but €5 per head would go along way on meal at this time of year.

Sami23

kk.man wrote: »

Feeding rates are low for sheep despite this people believe it's costing them huge sums to finish stock. I know it's an open question depending on weighs etc but €5 per head would go along way on meal at this time of year.

I was paying 7.30 a bag for Lamb Finisher

adam14

kk.man wrote: »

Feeding rates are low for sheep despite this people believe it's costing them huge sums to finish stock. I know it's an open question depending on weighs etc but €5 per head would go along way on meal at this time of year.

40 days feeding half kg a head at 250 a tonne.

Green farmer

kk.man wrote: »

Feeding rates are low for sheep despite this people believe it's costing them huge sums to finish stock. I know it's an open question depending on weighs etc but €5 per head would go along way on meal at this time of year.

I don't know, I'm finishing my own on a small scale here, but don't know if I'm making much on it. The margins are too tight and theirs a lot of hidden costs like lost grass for ewes. Think the only real profitable way is for large scale lads growing their own crops that can finish them at a fraction of what I can. Either on beet or barley or something home grown.

wrangler

Green farmer wrote: »

I don't know, I'm finishing my own on a small scale here, but don't know if I'm making much on it. The margins are too tight and theirs a lot of hidden costs like lost grass for ewes. Think the only real profitable way is for large scale lads growing their own crops that can finish them at a fraction of what I can. Either on beet or barley or something home grown.

If it's any consolation, a lot of sheep farmers are maintaining that this is the worst year ever for lamb thrive....even worse than last year.
See similar in Twitter as well, one farmer saying he has 430 lambs going this week which'll bring him to 30% of his lambs gone.
Athenry is not much better, feeding plenty of meal too.

Green farmer

wrangler wrote: »

If it's any consolation, a lot of sheep farmers are maintaining that this is the worst year ever for lamb thrive....even worse than last year.
See similar in Twitter as well, one farmer saying he has 430 lambs going this week which'll bring him to 30% of his lambs gone.
Athenry is not much better, feeding plenty of meal too.

Yes, it is consolation, makes me feel I ain't doing so bad. Down to the last 30% here. Sold alot at low weights this year, but as least their gone. No two years the same, so here's looking forward to a better year next year !!!

razor8

our group is after postponing collection due to lack of numbers tomorrow morning, numbers must be scarce

wrangler

Green farmer wrote: »

Yes, it is consolation, makes me feel I ain't doing so bad. Down to the last 30% here. Sold alot at low weights this year, but as least their gone. No two years the same, so here's looking forward to a better year next year !!!

27 left here, hopefully going this week, along with the last of the culls. meal use averaged €5/lamb since end of August, some got very little and those 27 probably have over €10 eaten.They're all ewe lambs lambs but I Don't think it's economically worth it to be trying to get April born ewelambs lambs to 22kgs, they really are slow