General sheep thread

MayoAreMagic

Siamsa Sessions wrote: »

Would agree with that. Have some Llyen-x ewes here that wouldn’t be the biggest and Charollais rams do the business

Any lambing difficulty?

Kevhog1988

i thought ye guys would like my sons 9th bday cake

IMG-20200623-WA0001 by Kevin Hogan, on Flickr


We got him the black lamb he was after too

Lano Lynn

Young95 wrote: »

Looking to buy a new ram soon . My ewe type is predominantly llynn ewes and arnt the biggest ewes either .but are very prolific. Want a terminal ram to produce a factory lamb. End of March lambing flock with outdoor lambing taking place . What breed of ram have yous found the best on llynn ewes to produce factory lambs ? Have used beltex before but lambs are too short from the llynn side also .

hampshire or vendeen ,charollais to bare

NZ suffolk? sell sharp ewe lambs for breeding?

Dickie10

you very rarely have to intervene with llynns, backends like angus cows

orm0nd

from twitter. 1 of the best I've seen

https://twitter.com/IrelandsFarmers/status/1275517204214116352

Hard Knocks

Young95 wrote: »

Have a Charollais here at moment but lambs can be abit bald at birth . Great to get up and suck tho !

Try the Char-Tex cross bred PB Charolais x PB Texel
Fantastic lambs, very Terminal

Dickie10

Dickie10 wrote: »

i see an estate in England getting rid of the last of the ewes and lambs on thier lands , anecdotely im seeing and hearing a lot of sheep farms in England culling flocks heavily. Has to be good news for irish farmers you would imagine. Its obviously for the no deal Brexit coming down the track in October. there will be no market for British lamb on the continent.

Is it difficult to bring in sheep from.abroad/even NI as any from sheepdog trials etc i seen are seriously quality animals

And may be in position to go up numbers a bit over next year or 2, so looking at sourcing best i can

Dickie10

not hard for ICM they bring them in a few days a week espically in winter and spring when lamb numbers are low. buy lambs in carlisle mart drive to stranraer over to larne and down to navan.

Green farmer

Young95 wrote: »

Have a Charollais here at moment but lambs can be abit bald at birth . Great to get up and suck tho !

Used the type of charly with good cover and a hairy face across the lleyns this year and got cracking lambs. Lambed outside in april they had really low losses.

razor8

orm0nd wrote: »

from twitter. 1 of the best I've seen

https://twitter.com/IrelandsFarmers/status/1275517204214116352

Still a 3 man job tho?? Most jobs done here are done on my own

Asus1

First time rearing a few lambs.These were born in april they are getting huge and will also eat meal.Ewe is fed up of them now would it be ok to wean them.

Asus1

First time rearing a few lambs.These were born in april they are getting huge and will also eat meal.Ewe is fed up of them now would it be ok to wean them.

Young95

Got fecal egg count results back from lab today for lambs . 350g egg count for worms and 100 for nemadirus . Vets advice is to dose straight away . I thought they don’t recommend dosing till it’s 500g worm egg count ?

wrangler

Young95 wrote: »

Got fecal egg count results back from lab today for lambs . 350g egg count for worms and 100 for nemadirus . Vets advice is to dose straight away . I thought they don’t recommend dosing till it’s 500g worm egg count ?

We always dose if nematodirus is there even if its only one, 100 is very high.
If you see nematodirus eggs there's a lot of harm done
What age are they, were they dosed before

Asus1

First time rearing lambs.These 2 born in March are huge animals and mother is kinda sick of them.Could I wean them yet.They will tear into any ration or nuts put in front of them.Ive 2 that were born in February and their bigger again.

Buford T. Justice XIX

Asus1 wrote: »

First time rearing lambs.These 2 born in March are huge animals and mother is kinda sick of them.Could I wean them yet.They will tear into any ration or nuts put in front of them.Ive 2 that were born in February and their bigger again.

Once lambs hit 13 or 14 weeks old, they will be getting very little milk from the ewe and can be weaned. Those two look well able to be weaned but the shine can go off them a bit once they're weaned if you're going selling them soon.

Asus1

Buford T. Justice VI wrote: »

Once lambs hit 13 or 14 weeks old, they will be getting very little milk from the ewe and can be weaned. Those two look well able to be weaned but the shine can go off them a bit once they're weaned if you're going selling them soon.

Nope not selling them,the 4 will be put in the freezers of the extended family as we all love a bit of lamb and as the land is a bit wet most years ive decided to keep a few sheep to graze parts of it and in return i hope to get quality meat.By the way how old or young is the average lamb slaughtered.Cheers.

Young95

wrangler wrote: »

We always dose if nematodirus is there even if its only one, 100 is very high.
If you see nematodirus eggs there's a lot of harm done
What age are they, were they dosed before

End of March born . Havnt been dosed yet atal . No dirty back ends . I thought nematodirus doesn’t effect them once they reach a certain age ?

Westernrock

wrangler wrote: »

We always dose if nematodirus is there even if its only one, 100 is very high.
If you see nematodirus eggs there's a lot of harm done
What age are they, were they dosed before

100epg is 2eggs on a standard McMaster count so to say it’s very high isn’t technically correct but yes usually advise is to dose if present. However most lambs are probably past main nematodirus risk now. It causes severe watery scour before eggs are even seen in the faeces so it is unlikely that lambs with a low count at this stage of the year will develop clinical signs.

Young95

Westernrock wrote: »

100epg is 2eggs on a standard McMaster count so to say it’s very high isn’t technically correct but yes usually advise is to dose if present. However most lambs are probably past main nematodirus risk now. It causes severe watery scour before eggs are even seen in the faeces so it is unlikely that lambs with a low count at this stage of the year will develop clinical signs.

That’s what I was thinking. All there dung is fine as in not loose or watery

Siamsa Sessions

Asus1 wrote: »

Nope not selling them,the 4 will be put in the freezers of the extended family as we all love a bit of lamb and as the land is a bit wet most years ive decided to keep a few sheep to graze parts of it and in return i hope to get quality meat.By the way how old or young is the average lamb slaughtered.Cheers.

Get whatever butcher is going to kill/process the lambs out and he will tell you when they're fit. Those two look well fit for the butcher - probably close to 45kg, which is plenty big enough.

If you only have a few and you're killing them for your own freezer, I'd say leave them with the ewe til they're that size and don't wean them at all. That is, pull them straight off the ewe and load them into the trailer.

Re age: it depends on the breed and feeding. Those look good square lambs, so with a bit of feed, March-born lambs should be 45kg in July. Single suckled lambs should be ready a little earlier, but it depends on a number of other factors such as weather, lameness, worm burden, etc.

Asus1

Siamsa Sessions wrote: »

Get whatever butcher is going to kill/process the lambs out and he will tell you when they're fit. Those two look well fit for the butcher - probably close to 45kg, which is plenty big enough.

If you only have a few and you're killing them for your own freezer, I'd say leave them with the ewe til they're that size and don't wean them at all. That is, pull them straight off the ewe and load them into the trailer.

Re age: it depends on the breed and feeding. Those look good square lambs, so with a bit of feed, March-born lambs should be 45kg in July. Single suckled lambs should be ready a little earlier, but it depends on a number of other factors such as weather, lameness, worm burden, etc.

Cheers for that.Yeah hope to get the butcher out and let him have a gander at them and leave the final say with him.We got a whole lamb off a neighbour last year but it was nearly a year old and holy god the amount of fat that came off it when cooking any cuts of it was awful even with the fat trimmed.

wrangler

Westernrock wrote: »

100epg is 2eggs on a standard McMaster count so to say it’s very high isn’t technically correct but yes usually advise is to dose if present. However most lambs are probably past main nematodirus risk now. It causes severe watery scour before eggs are even seen in the faeces so it is unlikely that lambs with a low count at this stage of the year will develop clinical signs.

They're under 12 weeks so they're still at risk.
Also there's data now to say they can hit any time of the year and cause intestinal damage.
We test for farmers here and have had numerous farmers lose lambs diagnosed in the lab with nematodirus. they dosed with Cydectin and thinking that they got six weeks cover ignored the lambs after dosing, they'd get six weeks for stomach worms alright but only about 48 hrs on nematodirus.
With our experience here we don't ignore nematodirus them at any age

Westernrock

wrangler wrote: »

They're under 12 weeks so they're still at risk.
Also there's data now to say they can hit any time of the year and cause intestinal damage.
We test for farmers here and have had numerous farmers lose lambs diagnosed in the lab with nematodirus. they dosed with Cydectin and thinking that they got six weeks cover ignored the lambs after dosing, they'd get six weeks for stomach worms alright but only about 48 hrs on nematodirus.
With our experience here we don't ignore nematodirus them at any age

They’re still at risk if there is a high challenge, infection in low numbers rarely causes clinical disease.
That’s my point exactly if nemotodarius was an issue you will see clinical signs or dead lambs before eggs on a faecal sample. If they are exposed to a high challenge of larvae these are what do the damage in the small intestine not the adults which produce eggs, so if you wait for eggs it’s too late. Therefore it’s more important to dose according to weather conditions and lamb age. The peak hatch has long passed now and lambs with low levels of adult worms now have obviously survived that challenge.
Would you dose ewes with nemotodarius eggs?

Siamsa Sessions

Asus1 wrote: »

Cheers for that.Yeah hope to get the butcher out and let him have a gander at them and leave the final say with him.We got a whole lamb off a neighbour last year but it was nearly a year old and holy god the amount of fat that came off it when cooking any cuts of it was awful even with the fat trimmed.

No comparison between that hogget and a 4-month old spring lamb. Enjoy!

Asus1

Siamsa Sessions wrote: »

No comparison between that hogget and a 4-month old spring lamb. Enjoy!

By the way is €120 to slaughter,butcher and hang for 10 days (I think) then pack into chops,legs etc a fair price for 4 lambs,I thought it was fair enough but others might disagree.

Hard Knocks

Asus1 wrote: »

By the way is €120 to slaughter,butcher and hang for 10 days (I think) then pack into chops,legs etc a fair price for 4 lambs,I thought it was fair enough but others might disagree.

Yes €30 each is the run of it

Green farmer

Hard Knocks wrote: »

Yes €30 each is the run of it

Ya , local butcher charged €30 a lamb here as well

Buford T. Justice XIX

Westernrock wrote: »

They’re still at risk if there is a high challenge, infection in low numbers rarely causes clinical disease.
That’s my point exactly if nemotodarius was an issue you will see clinical signs or dead lambs before eggs on a faecal sample. If they are exposed to a high challenge of larvae these are what do the damage in the small intestine not the adults which produce eggs, so if you wait for eggs it’s too late. Therefore it’s more important to dose according to weather conditions and lamb age. The peak hatch has long passed now and lambs with low levels of adult worms now have obviously survived that challenge.
Would you dose ewes with nemotodarius eggs?

Just listening to a podcast on dosing sheep, might interest you as they talk about dosing for nematodirus and dosing ewes.
https://twitter.com/teagasc/status/1276190940118552576?s=19

Young95

Buford T. Justice VI wrote: »

Just listening to a podcast on dosing sheep, might interest you as they talk about dosing for nematodirus and dosing ewes.
https://twitter.com/teagasc/status/1276190940118552576?s=19

Ya I wasn’t far off so thinking 500g . I’m gona dose them tomorrow anyways