Spring lamb prices

Duke92

Do many people have sheep left
I’ve 150 left this time last year I had 270
And had until the 20 of March

Dinzee Conlee

Duke92 wrote: »

Do many people have sheep left
I’ve 150 left this time last year I had 270
And had until the 20 of March

What kinda system do you run Duke?

Do you buy stores or lamb your own that bit later and run them over the winter?

Duke92

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

What kinda system do you run Duke?

Do you buy stores or lamb your own that bit later and run them over the winter?

Buy stores in oct nov around 3.50

Dinzee Conlee

Duke92 wrote: »

Buy stores in oct nov around 3.50

3.50? Oh, do you mean 350 lambs?

How do you feed / fatten em?

Just being curious

Buy a small few myself, used to run em on and sell them as hog in Aug / Sept... But keen to hear how lads buying stores to sell as fat lambs do it...

memorystick

Sold lambs to a butcher in the yard today. Chevy and Suffolk. €120. Bought for €74 in November. They wouldn't have eaten a bag of meal. Happy enough for well fleshed middling stock.

wrangler

memorystick wrote: »

Sold lambs to a butcher in the yard today. Chevy and Suffolk. €120. Bought for €74 in November. They wouldn't have eaten a bag of meal. Happy enough for well fleshed middling stock.

If you didn't feed much meal they must have been spread over a good farm, probably one that hasn't seen much sheep all year because lambs don't thrive usually like that around here wihout meal

memorystick

Sold lambs to a butcher in the yard today. Chevy and Suffolk. €120. Bought for €74 in November. They wouldn't have eaten a bag of meal. Happy enough for well fleshed middling stock.

Green farmer

I sold fat lambs into the factory last week. All graded U. Pity it was all out of a bag though. Pretty much mades me a busy fool.

Dinzee Conlee

wrangler wrote: »

If you didn't feed much meal they must have been spread over a good farm, probably one that hasn't seen much sheep all year because lambs don't thrive usually like that around here wihout meal

Would see the same here...
But then this year was a savage year for late grass...

When did they get the meal memory - just a bit at the end or did you meal a small bit all over winter?

memorystick

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

Would see the same here...
But then this year was a savage year for late grass...

When did they get the meal memory - just a bit at the end or did you meal a small bit all over winter?

A taste just a few times a week as I work and might not see them daily but fairly regular for the last 3 weeks. Very happy with them. Will €2700 last November turn into €4000 before costs in March?

memorystick

Green farmer wrote: »

I sold fat lambs into the factory last week. All graded U. Pity it was all out of a bag though. Pretty much mades me a busy fool.

How much meal did they eat? 2 bags?

Dinzee Conlee

memorystick wrote: »

A taste just a few times a week as I work and might not see them daily but fairly regular for the last 3 weeks. Very happy with them. Will €2700 last November turn into €4000 before costs in March?

Oh - did you have them on beet tops as well Memory?
Did they have access to grass as well as the beet tops?

wrangler

Duke92 wrote: »

Buy stores in oct nov around 3.50

memorystick wrote: »

A taste just a few times a week as I work and might not see them daily but fairly regular for the last 3 weeks. Very happy with them. Will €2700 last November turn into €4000 before costs in March?

Is it 35 lambs or 350 lambs you have, or what do the figures mean

Green farmer

memorystick wrote: »

How much meal did they eat? 2 bags?

I’ll have to sit down and go the figures once their all gone, but more then I’d have liked. Had to grow them up to 15kg live weight, so didn’t come cheap. Have another batch that had some grass but won’t be ready for another month or so, should do better on those. But anything fed from bag, the figures will be are very tight.

Dinzee Conlee

Green farmer wrote: »

I’ll have to sit down and go the figures once their all gone, but more then I’d have liked. Had to grow them up to 15kg live weight, so didn’t come cheap. Have another batch that had some grass but won’t be ready for another month or so, should do better on those. But anything fed from bag, the figures will be are very tight.

Well, if they had a lot of ration, plus they graded U, so I assume their kill out % was high, so you don’t have to take them to very high weights...

I know it’s not much consolation... out of interest, what % did they kill out?

memorystick

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

Oh - did you have them on beet tops as well Memory?
Did they have access to grass as well as the beet tops?

They had access to tops but there were cattle on them. They barely grazed them as the ground was wet.

memorystick

wrangler wrote: »

Is it 35 lambs or 350 lambs you have, or what do the figures mean

I bought €2700 worth of lambs.

Dinzee Conlee

memorystick wrote: »

They had access to tops but there were cattle on them. They barely grazed them as the ground was wet.

Ok...

So how much ration over what length of time did they get?
And what weight did they put on?

Just out of interest, to see how they came on...

memorystick

wrangler wrote: »

Is it 35 lambs or 350 lambs you have, or what do the figures mean

I bought €2700 worth of lambs.

wrangler

memorystick wrote: »

I bought €2700 worth of lambs.

Was confused by post 2944, you'd need about 300 acres for 350 lambs to thrive without meal over the winter

memorystick

wrangler wrote: »

Was confused by post 2944, you'd need about 300 acres for 350 lambs to thrive without meal over the winter

I should be able to run at least 2 lambs per acre for the winter with a pinch of meal.

Green farmer

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

Well, if they had a lot of ration, plus they graded U, so I assume their kill out % was high, so you don’t have to take them to very high weights...

I know it’s not much consolation... out of interest, what % did they kill out?

I think around 46%

Dinzee Conlee

Green farmer wrote: »

I think around 46%

I would have thought they’d kill a bit better, if they were on ad-lib ration... it still means you have to take em to 50kgs to kill out at 23kg...

The difference (or bother I suppose really) between getting a lamb to 46 and 50 is massive I think...

Green farmer

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

I would have thought they’d kill a bit better, if they were on ad-lib ration... it still means you have to take em to 50kgs to kill out at 23kg...

The difference (or bother I suppose really) between getting a lamb to 46 and 50 is massive I think...

Ya, they were entire rams, so you have to knock off abit for the balls. The heaviest was 50kg and he k.o’d at 22.9kg. They also loose a few kg in the trailer as well, but ya, you’d have to be near 50kg in the field to get to the 23kg.

memorystick

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

Ok...

So how much ration over what length of time did they get?
And what weight did they put on?

Just out of interest, to see how they came on...

The lambs I sold weighed 33 and 35 kegs at the end of November when I bought them. I'd give them 8kgs of meal every second or third day if I'd see them just to keep them quiet. For the last 3 weeks they got 1 bag of good ration per day between 36. I think it's a good way of doing it. In the short days I mightn't see them every day as I work. Would have had to get them in a good few times because of feet. I didn't mind as it was nothing serious. It's a nice simple way to farm if you had fencing and a handling yard. Better than feeding heifers at a huge loss. You'd feed a lot of lambs with €1000 of meal as compared to cattle. And less invested.

Duke92

memorystick wrote: »

I bought €2700 worth of lambs.

I’ve 350 lambs
And last year didn’t really matter how many lambs you had to the acre they still needed a lot of meal

memorystick

Duke92 wrote: »

I’ve 350 lambs
And last year didn’t really matter how many lambs you had to the acre they still needed a lot of meal

There’s no 2 years the same. We could be drowned this summer.

MD1983

any prices for this week lads? uncle got 5.40 to 23.5kg last week

razor8

MD1983 wrote: »

any prices for this week lads? uncle got 5.40 to 23.5kg last week

Don’t believe there is any improvement on that this week

Green farmer

Think their starting the Easter kill next week, so hopefully things will start improving from there on out.