General sheep thread

wrangler

Green farmer wrote: »

Any good sheep events on this summer ?

I wouldn't mind seeing this, but I'm going to the Highland Show on thursday,
Would Beaufort be far from you.

https://www.teagasc.ie/news--events/national-events/events/open-day---tomas-oleary-.php

Green farmer

wrangler wrote: »

I wouldn't mind seeing this, but I'm going to the Highland Show on thursday,
Would Beaufort be far from you.

https://www.teagasc.ie/news--events/national-events/events/open-day---tomas-oleary-.php

About 1 hr and1/2 away. Unlikely I’d make it, pity teagasc aren’t bothered doing athenry this year. Like seeing all the different sheep breeds and race handling / hurdles crowds in the one spot.

Hard Knocks

wrangler wrote: »

I wouldn't mind seeing this, but I'm going to the Highland Show on thursday,
Would Beaufort be far from you.

https://www.teagasc.ie/news--events/national-events/events/open-day---tomas-oleary-.php

Are you going for just the 1 day?
Neighbour went a few years back & enjoyed it

charolais0153

Green farmer wrote: »

About 1 hr and1/2 away. Unlikely I’d make it, pity teagasc aren’t bothered doing athenry this year. Like seeing all the different sheep breeds and race handling / hurdles crowds in the one spot.

They should be at ploughing / tullamore show too

razor8

wrangler wrote: »

I wouldn't mind seeing this, but I'm going to the Highland Show on thursday,
Would Beaufort be far from you.

https://www.teagasc.ie/news--events/national-events/events/open-day---tomas-oleary-.php

Is the highland show any bigger than balmoral? Love to go sometime

wrangler

razor8 wrote: »

Is the highland show any bigger than balmoral? Love to go sometime

Yea, much bigger, beside the airport so we're going at seven in the morning and coming home in the evening, flights are only about 45 mins

razor8

That’s good to know. Might pencil it in 2020 ðŸ‘

Lambman

Yea Wrangler it's a torture this time a year and the year that's in it. I can't say a day I'll be there till anyone. People asking will I try somebody else I say work away everybody's in the same boat.

stantheman1979

Can anyone recommend a good marking fluid. I put a very generous (across the shoulder about 6-8 inches wide)amount on ewe lambs I wanted to keep at 2days old. Can’t even see it now

Dickie10

i used duramark on their shoulders and its still there top them up when there in

arctictree

stantheman1979 wrote: »

Can anyone recommend a good marking fluid. I put a very generous (across the shoulder about 6-8 inches wide)amount on ewe lambs I wanted to keep at 2days old. Can’t even see it now

I don't think it's actually possible. Think of the amount of new wool on a 16 week old lamb compared to a 2 day old.

orm0nd

arctictree wrote: »

I don't think it's actually possible. Think of the amount of new wool on a 16 week old lamb compared to a 2 day old.

Very little wool on most lambs 16 weeks old here, most will be killed at that stage.

Used marksman sprays here and find them good, think the secret is applying a good amount slowly and going over a couple of times.

ganmo

stantheman1979 wrote: »

Can anyone recommend a good marking fluid. I put a very generous (across the shoulder about 6-8 inches wide)amount on ewe lambs I wanted to keep at 2days old. Can’t even see it now

We use siro mark branding fluid at the first dose, the mark stays till they're shorn the year after

charolais0153

ganmo wrote: »

We use siro mark branding fluid at the first dose, the mark stays till they're shorn the year after

It’ll last but isn’t user friendly by any stretch of the imagination

ganmo

ya, many a pair of trousers have been branded with it for life too

Hard Knocks

Does anyone use the management disks for Mullinahone Sheep tags.
I gather you write with a permanent pen, but does the ink last?

roosky

Hard Knocks wrote: »

Does anyone use the management disks for Mullinahone Sheep tags.
I gather you write with a permanent pen, but does the ink last?

I used them to mark ewe lambs from different years didn't write on them i just used different colors

From my experience, permanent marker and tags don't work, better to get what you want printed on them, let it be year of birth or breed or what ever

serfspup

stantheman1979 wrote: »

Can anyone recommend a good marking fluid. I put a very generous (across the shoulder about 6-8 inches wide)amount on ewe lambs I wanted to keep at 2days old. Can’t even see it now

20190611_101113 (2).jpg

never fades

Buford T. Justice XIX

There's a link to the Sheep Grassland Farmer of the year walk on last night here in Kerry.
https://twitter.com/teagasc/status/1141646972488753152?s=19
Interesting talk, he started off by halving his biggest fields, then halved them again and again and now subdivides the paddocks in two with 3 strands of poly wire. Water at both ends of the paddock, 320 ewes and contract rears 90 heifers from October to November the following year.

Green farmer

Buford T. Justice VI wrote: »

There's a link to the Sheep Grassland Farmer of the year walk on last night here in Kerry.
https://twitter.com/teagasc/status/1141646972488753152?s=19
Interesting talk, he started off by halving his biggest fields, then halved them again and again and now subdivides the paddocks in two with 3 strands of poly wire. Water at both ends of the paddock, 320 ewes and contract rears 90 heifers from October to November the following year.

What size batches of ewes does he run ? Have 200 ewes here atm, but find the group big and awkward to round up. My paddocks are between 5-6 acres in size but thinking of subdividing further.

Buford T. Justice XIX

Green farmer wrote: »

What size batches of ewes does he run ? Have 200 ewes here atm, but find the group big and awkward to round up. My paddocks are between 5-6 acres in size but thinking of subdividing further.

He had them in 3 batches last night, all rearing twins. The ewe lambs and their lambs are in one group with a creep feeder. These are the only ewes that received supplement after lambing and are very well treated.

The other two groups that we saw had big numbers, I wouldn't even hazard a guess how many were in each group. There may have been ewes on the home farm too but it never came up in the discussion.

The paddock size mentioned last night was 2 acres/100 ewes, 3 days to graze and 21 days to come back in again. He was grazing covers of 1200kgs so grass was barely pushing out the third leaf when going in to graze. Any surplus was taken as high quality bales. He's growing 65kgs/day and demand is 69kgs but that demand will drop after weaning.

There hasn't been any mixing of cattle and sheep so far this year but he's going weaning the end of this week but the weaned ewes will be grazed behind whatever groups need the grass cleaned out, lambs or cattle.

He reckons more paddocks is the job, he's really found more grass growing since he's limed and subdivided his grazing ground and there's probably more to come as his P indexes are still low, his soils really lock up any P applied.

Incidentally, he was growing 14tDM/Ha last year. Progress in steps, fencing, lime, fertility all done in stages.

Buford T. Justice XIX

Buford T. Justice VI wrote: »

He had them in 3 batches last night, all rearing twins. The ewe lambs and their lambs are in one group with a creep feeder. These are the only ewes that received supplement after lambing and are very well treated.

The other two groups that we saw had big numbers, I wouldn't even hazard a guess how many were in each group. There may have been ewes on the home farm too but it never came up in the discussion.

The paddock size mentioned last night was 2 acres/100 ewes, 3 days to graze and 21 days to come back in again. He was grazing covers of 1200kgs so grass was barely pushing out the third leaf when going in to graze. Any surplus was taken as high quality bales. He's growing 65kgs/day and demand is 69kgs but that demand will drop after weaning.

There hasn't been any mixing of cattle and sheep so far this year but he's going weaning the end of this week but the weaned ewes will be grazed behind whatever groups need the grass cleaned out, lambs or cattle.

He reckons more paddocks is the job, he's really found more grass growing since he's limed and subdivided his grazing ground and there's probably more to come as his P indexes are still low, his soils really lock up any P applied.

Incidentally, he was growing 14tDM/Ha last year. Progress in steps, fencing, lime, fertility all done in stages.

Just to add to the above, he lambed 80 ewe lambs in one batch so the other two batches could easily have had 120 in each.

The take away point, for me anyway, was to do a soil test this year. And if you do nothing else, spread the lime recommended next. It'll pay you back in the following grazing season with the release of N, P and K to boost grass growth. It's the cheapest fertiliser available.

Siamsa Sessions

Had a quick look at the lamb output numbers and they’re very impressive. Was there any mention of the type of ewe he has?

Lambman

What's lads dipping with this year? Heard you can't get cyberguard this year? Will be dipping all ewes over the next week when I am pulling the lambs for weaning. Thinking off just using the hygeia summer dip this time as it's purely for flystrike control as I'll be dipping later on in the year aswell.

Young95

Right advice needed recently had a Bord bia audit all went well until the flock registered came out. Going bck to last year I had huge lamb losses die to the bad spring I also kept a lot of replacements back n that so my sales were way back due to loses and replacements kept. He then asked me bout where were the deceased lambs knackery receipts and I kinda laughed and said that I buried any young lambs that die because there not tagged etc but now time hey won’t pass me without getting theses Knackery receipts I told them that the financial loss having to pay to get a day old lamb taking away is crazy n most farmers who lose young lambs r ****ed into the ditch but no having none of it �� so ya advice on what to do our r these pen pushers going to far ? Oh

_blaaz

Young95 wrote: »

Right advice needed recently had a Bord bia audit all went well until the flock registered came out. Going bck to last year I had huge lamb losses die to the bad spring I also kept a lot of replacements back n that so my sales were way back due to loses and replacements kept. He then asked me bout where were the deceased lambs knackery receipts and I kinda laughed and said that I buried any young lambs that die because there not tagged etc but now time hey won’t pass me without getting theses Knackery receipts I told them that the financial loss having to pay to get a day old lamb taking away is crazy n most farmers who lose young lambs r ****ed into the ditch but no having none of it �� so ya advice on what to do our r these pen pushers going to far ? Oh

Id write off bord bia for this year tbh (unless you can argue they were less than 9 months and not required tagging?)


In future perhaps say you had a rake of abortions/dog attack and slipped lambs post it???

kk.man

Young95 wrote: »

Right advice needed recently had a Bord bia audit all went well until the flock registered came out. Going bck to last year I had huge lamb losses die to the bad spring I also kept a lot of replacements back n that so my sales were way back due to loses and replacements kept. He then asked me bout where were the deceased lambs knackery receipts and I kinda laughed and said that I buried any young lambs that die because there not tagged etc but now time hey won’t pass me without getting theses Knackery receipts I told them that the financial loss having to pay to get a day old lamb taking away is crazy n most farmers who lose young lambs r ****ed into the ditch but no having none of it �� so ya advice on what to do our r these pen pushers going to far ? Oh

How did he know you had dead young lambs if u had not tagged them?

Buford T. Justice XIX

Siamsa Sessions wrote: »

Had a quick look at the lamb output numbers and they’re very impressive. Was there any mention of the type of ewe he has?

They seemed to be suffolk cross and a white faced breed. No mention of breeds at all, now that you've brought it up. The rams were on the home farm, I'm guessing.

Young95

kk.man wrote: »

How did he know you had dead young lambs if u had not tagged them?

Because I had 85ewes only sold 40 lambs and kept 40 replacements so he was like you most of had more lambs than that for 85 ewes n then it went on for there

Young95

_blaaz wrote: »

Id write off bord bia for this year tbh (unless you can argue they were less than 9 months and not required tagging?)


In future perhaps say you had a rake of abortions/dog attack and slipped lambs post it???

They were less than 9 months old tho that’s the thing