Innovis sheep breeds

neilo

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Montgomeryshire
Just looked it up on their website NZT NZR and East Friesian. How did you start out with highlanders ? for how long ? and do you like them ?

I sold my crossbred Texel flock in 2006, to step up the time I was putting into the dairy herd at home. Shat on by the old man, so looked to buy descendants of my old flock back in 2008 and that farmer happened to have used Hartlines over them, and had some Highlanders out of those Hartlines. I bought in 200 Hartlines x ewe lambs, and 60 Highlander x. Lambing them outside as ewe lambs, the Hartlines were good, but the Highlanders were better. I bought a Highlander ram to breed replacements that summer.
They do what they say on the tin, thriving with minimal inputs and giving reasonable output. Twinning rate, longevity and mothering ability is superb, meaning I had a negative depreciation cost in last year’s COP figures.
 
Pretty much I would imagine, but swap out the Finn blood for a different very prolific, milky breed (I forget which) iirc. Each marketing machine will obviously claim their’s is better of course.?



Its horses for courses, therefore better is relevant to where one farms, despite all trying to achieve a more productive sheep.

Highlanders produced by Rissington Genetics are half Finn, quarter Romney and quarter Texel. They were produced in this mix and stabilised to suit hard NZ North Island hill country where seasonal drought and Faecial Eczema disease (toxic fungal spores in pasture) severely damaged the current and usually the following years production too. The injection of Finn gave many more lambs and was less affected by ewe weight loss, but selection using performance recording reduced lamb wastage so the resulting composite delivered a level of overall performance a step up from the Romney of the day on this difficult country. Rissington morphed into a sheep and cattle breeding company using its own computer analysis and geneticist and the sheep side of the business later combined with the NZ Gov't owned Landcorp (now called Pamu Farms) merging their terminal and maternal sheep lines. This corporate breeder now uses SIL performance recording facilities and produces rams off several of their properties, mainly for their own use being NZ's largest farmers.

EasyDams have different origins. They originate in the deep south of NZ where the climate is a cool, moist and heavily influenced by maritime storms arriving up from the sub antarctic ocean. Southland is a very dependable grass growing region, more affected by cold and late springs than dry summer/autumns. It has a grass growth pattern very similar to much of the UK, but a month shorter winter than the Midlands, but cooler summers.
EasyDams are made up from 3 different family owned breeding endeavours to produce a more productive sheep by combining the desired traits from Romneys or Coopworths (half) and Texels (quarter) and East Friesian (quarter). Each flock still retains their own brand name, Greeline, Textra and Tefrom. All three have shared each others rams and are part of the highly progressive and influential Alpha Sheep genetics, a group of leading southern breeders pushing productivity by genetic improvement across a number of breeds. Southland is NZ's most productive lamb region producing the highest kilos of meat per hectare. Horses for courses.

Like Highlanders, the 3 southern composites can now be called pures, just as a Suffolk became pure after it was firstly a Norfolk Horn x Southdown. Once the flock exhibits all the desired traits and not the undesired traits from the combination, a new breed can then identified. Because the 3 southern brand names in the EasyDam make-up are of similar breed proportions, type and desired traits for a cool moist environment, the rebranding as EasyDams is a natural progression outside of Southland NZ.
What most UK farmers fail to realise is there is no scrapie in NZ, so genotyping for resistance only occurs for exporting live breeding animals. Some breeds and flocks have nil type one animals. The best flock tested had 18% of ARR carriers, not ARR ARR (type one). To sample out of only one flock would severely limit genetic diversity, not a good place to be starting off with inbreeding being the only way to expand. Hence the sourcing from a larger pool.

Other "Composites" are being produced in NZ where their breeders are trying to get around local environmental constraints and in selecting for marketing advantages in meat eating experience.

So its horses for courses, but first know your course so you can invest in the most suitable "horse".
 

hillman

Member
Location
Wicklow Ireland
Its horses for courses, therefore better is relevant to where one farms, despite all trying to achieve a more productive sheep.

Highlanders produced by Rissington Genetics are half Finn, quarter Romney and quarter Texel. They were produced in this mix and stabilised to suit hard NZ North Island hill country where seasonal drought and Faecial Eczema disease (toxic fungal spores in pasture) severely damaged the current and usually the following years production too. The injection of Finn gave many more lambs and was less affected by ewe weight loss, but selection using performance recording reduced lamb wastage so the resulting composite delivered a level of overall performance a step up from the Romney of the day on this difficult country. Rissington morphed into a sheep and cattle breeding company using its own computer analysis and geneticist and the sheep side of the business later combined with the NZ Gov't owned Landcorp (now called Pamu Farms) merging their terminal and maternal sheep lines. This corporate breeder now uses SIL performance recording facilities and produces rams off several of their properties, mainly for their own use being NZ's largest farmers.

EasyDams have different origins. They originate in the deep south of NZ where the climate is a cool, moist and heavily influenced by maritime storms arriving up from the sub antarctic ocean. Southland is a very dependable grass growing region, more affected by cold and late springs than dry summer/autumns. It has a grass growth pattern very similar to much of the UK, but a month shorter winter than the Midlands, but cooler summers.
EasyDams are made up from 3 different family owned breeding endeavours to produce a more productive sheep by combining the desired traits from Romneys or Coopworths (half) and Texels (quarter) and East Friesian (quarter). Each flock still retains their own brand name, Greeline, Textra and Tefrom. All three have shared each others rams and are part of the highly progressive and influential Alpha Sheep genetics, a group of leading southern breeders pushing productivity by genetic improvement across a number of breeds. Southland is NZ's most productive lamb region producing the highest kilos of meat per hectare. Horses for courses.

Like Highlanders, the 3 southern composites can now be called pures, just as a Suffolk became pure after it was firstly a Norfolk Horn x Southdown. Once the flock exhibits all the desired traits and not the undesired traits from the combination, a new breed can then identified. Because the 3 southern brand names in the EasyDam make-up are of similar breed proportions, type and desired traits for a cool moist environment, the rebranding as EasyDams is a natural progression outside of Southland NZ.
What most UK farmers fail to realise is there is no scrapie in NZ, so genotyping for resistance only occurs for exporting live breeding animals. Some breeds and flocks have nil type one animals. The best flock tested had 18% of ARR carriers, not ARR ARR (type one). To sample out of only one flock would severely limit genetic diversity, not a good place to be starting off with inbreeding being the only way to expand. Hence the sourcing from a larger pool.

Other "Composites" are being produced in NZ where their breeders are trying to get around local environmental constraints and in selecting for marketing advantages in meat eating experience.

So its horses for courses, but first know your course so you can invest in the most suitable "horse".
So is Easydams one of the 3 rams you mentioned or is a cross of the 3 ?
 

Andy84

Member
We had an Aberfield on Swales for one year. Second year he didn't tup many and then died of pizzle rot. We were disappointed at the time but now think.it was a blessing in disguise as disappointed in the cross female.

what didn’t you like about the cross females?
 

Andy84

Member
Fertility is the big one. We have mix of mules and various mule cross females and on the same regime Aberfield cross always scan a good 20% less.
They also seem a bit short. Much prefer NZ Texel cross or a few Highlanders we have. We did not replace Aberfield when he died..

have you any pictures of your higlander x Swales and NZ texel X Swale?
 

easyram1

Member
Location
North Shropshire
have you any pictures of your higlander x Swales and NZ texel X Swale?
Picture late evening on N Y
086 (2).JPG
orks Moors
 
Its horses for courses, therefore better is relevant to where one farms, despite all trying to achieve a more productive sheep.

Highlanders produced by Rissington Genetics are half Finn, quarter Romney and quarter Texel. They were produced in this mix and stabilised to suit hard NZ North Island hill country where seasonal drought and Faecial Eczema disease (toxic fungal spores in pasture) severely damaged the current and usually the following years production too. The injection of Finn gave many more lambs and was less affected by ewe weight loss, but selection using performance recording reduced lamb wastage so the resulting composite delivered a level of overall performance a step up from the Romney of the day on this difficult country. Rissington morphed into a sheep and cattle breeding company using its own computer analysis and geneticist and the sheep side of the business later combined with the NZ Gov't owned Landcorp (now called Pamu Farms) merging their terminal and maternal sheep lines. This corporate breeder now uses SIL performance recording facilities and produces rams off several of their properties, mainly for their own use being NZ's largest farmers.

EasyDams have different origins. They originate in the deep south of NZ where the climate is a cool, moist and heavily influenced by maritime storms arriving up from the sub antarctic ocean. Southland is a very dependable grass growing region, more affected by cold and late springs than dry summer/autumns. It has a grass growth pattern very similar to much of the UK, but a month shorter winter than the Midlands, but cooler summers.
EasyDams are made up from 3 different family owned breeding endeavours to produce a more productive sheep by combining the desired traits from Romneys or Coopworths (half) and Texels (quarter) and East Friesian (quarter). Each flock still retains their own brand name, Greeline, Textra and Tefrom. All three have shared each others rams and are part of the highly progressive and influential Alpha Sheep genetics, a group of leading southern breeders pushing productivity by genetic improvement across a number of breeds. Southland is NZ's most productive lamb region producing the highest kilos of meat per hectare. Horses for courses.

Like Highlanders, the 3 southern composites can now be called pures, just as a Suffolk became pure after it was firstly a Norfolk Horn x Southdown. Once the flock exhibits all the desired traits and not the undesired traits from the combination, a new breed can then identified. Because the 3 southern brand names in the EasyDam make-up are of similar breed proportions, type and desired traits for a cool moist environment, the rebranding as EasyDams is a natural progression outside of Southland NZ.
What most UK farmers fail to realise is there is no scrapie in NZ, so genotyping for resistance only occurs for exporting live breeding animals. Some breeds and flocks have nil type one animals. The best flock tested had 18% of ARR carriers, not ARR ARR (type one). To sample out of only one flock would severely limit genetic diversity, not a good place to be starting off with inbreeding being the only way to expand. Hence the sourcing from a larger pool.

Other "Composites" are being produced in NZ where their breeders are trying to get around local environmental constraints and in selecting for marketing advantages in meat eating experience.

So its horses for courses, but first know your course so you can invest in the most suitable "horse".

With the recent increased interest and development in shedders in the UK, is this something New Zealanders are pursuing at all?
 
With the recent increased interest and development in shedders in the UK, is this something New Zealanders are pursuing at all?


There are a few commercial flocks in NZ of mainly Dorper or Wiltshire blood. But shedders are mainly seen on lifestyle properties where flocks are small and management often poor.
There are some breeders producing "ethical" sheep (short tail, disease resistant and fleece margins peeling back so annual fleece is only higher value wool) which is more attractive to the NZ commercial farmer.

Lowering wool micron is seen as the way forward by NZ sheep farmers.
 
They do what they say on the tin, thriving with minimal inputs and giving reasonable output. Twinning rate, longevity and mothering ability is superb, meaning I had a negative depreciation cost in last year’s COP figures.
[/QUOTE]

Do you lamb your highlanders as ewe lambs ? and can you get the culls to come to reasonable money ?
 

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