Best ram to put with Suffolk x lleyn

[Farmer Phill]

I only have about 50 ewes this year I had them with a Suffolk ram really good lambs but couldn’t keep them from getting worms

 

[neilo]

I only have about 50 ewes this year I had them with a Suffolk ram really good lambs but couldn’t keep them from getting worms

Did you do FEC testing to see if they were ‘wormy’, or where they just dirty (‘black head:black arse’ syndrome)?

Fair play to you running Suffolk x ewes though, and even more so for battling with 3/4 Suffolk lambs.?

CHAROLLAIS or Texel is your answer though, to get better lambs and to cut your workload at lambing time.

 

[Farmer Phill]

They were just dirty I’ve tried 3 different doses and each time after about two weeks they just get dirty again also I lamb early to try get a lamb ready for Easter and I heard texel and charollais are slower growen

 

[neilo]

They were just dirty I’ve tried 3 different doses and each time after about two weeks they just get dirty again also I lamb early to try get a lamb ready for Easter and I heard texel and charollais are slower growen

Suffolk’s are well known for their tendency to have dirty arses, and not necessarily anything to do with worms. I know a few breeders that swear by giving them copper to firm them up, such is their lack of ability to absorb enough of it from their diet.

If you’re after chasing the Easter market, forget my mention of Texels. Charollais over a Suffolk X ewe is a very common combination for that job.

 

[Agrivator]

I only have about 50 ewes this year I had them with a Suffolk ram really good lambs but couldn’t keep them from getting worms

How many acres of grass do you have. And how would you describe its growing capacity. Is it comparable to arable land, or more like poor rough grazing.

 

[spin cycle]

beltex/texel cross

 

[yellowbelly]

I lamb early to try get a lamb ready for Easter and I heard texel and charollais are slower growen

Charolais cross lambs are, on average, 10 days quicker to 40kg than their Texel cross counterparts here in our Feb lambing ewes.

These went to Thirsk yesterday. Averaged 278.54p/kg.
One in foreground is a twin, 84 days old..

^ Twin, 88days old
Can't give you the market weights as, due to the current rules, they had to be drawn by the market staff and the paperwork has not got here yet but nothing went unless it was 40kg plus on our scales.
These are out of Texel x Mule ewes.

 

[Farmer Phill]

Charolais cross lambs are, on average, 10 days quicker to 40kg than their Texel cross counterparts here in our Feb lambing ewes.

These went to Thirsk yesterday. Averaged 278.54p/kg.
One in foreground is a twin, 84 days old..

^ Twin, 88days old
Can't give you the market weights as, due to the current rules, they had to be drawn by the market staff and the paperwork has not got here yet but nothing went unless it was 40kg plus on our scales.
These are out of Texel x Mule ewes.

N

Charolais cross lambs are, on average, 10 days quicker to 40kg than their Texel cross counterparts here in our Feb lambing ewes.

These went to Thirsk yesterday. Averaged 278.54p/kg.
One in foreground is a twin, 84 days old..

^ Twin, 88days old
Can't give you the market weights as, due to the current rules, they had to be drawn by the market staff and the paperwork has not got here yet but nothing went unless it was 40kg plus on our scales.
These are out of Texel x Mule ewes.

Charolais cross lambs are, on average, 10 days quicker to 40kg than their Texel cross counterparts here in our Feb lambing ewes.

These went to Thirsk yesterday. Averaged 278.54p/kg.
One in foreground is a twin, 84 days old..

^ Twin, 88days old
Can't give you the market weights as, due to the current rules, they had to be drawn by the market staff and the paperwork has not got here yet but nothing went unless it was 40kg plus on our scales.
These are out of Texel x Mule ewes.

When we’re your lambs born and now much meal did they get

 

[yellowbelly]

When we’re your lambs born and now much meal did they get

As per post #7, 84 and 88 days old - so born 15th & 19th Feb.

Here's an extract from this week's weighing file (I've just picked out 2 lambs so it's easier to read).....

I think if you 'click' on it, it'll make it big enough to read. The red writing at the bottom explains what the columns are.

You'll see the DLWG is 440gms and 560gms. That's an average, per lamb, of 500 grams a day since they were last weighed (which was 23rd April).That's about as good as it gets (FFS, don't tell @neilo or the price of tups will go up )- not done the averages yet, but it'll be nearer 350-375gms/day for the whole mob as there's some Texel crosses in there too, as well as lambs which won't perform as well.

There's 98 lambs left in that mob and they've had access to home mix creep feed since the word 'go'. They've only really been taking it an any quantity for the last 3 weeks (grass is burning off here and the ewes' milk will be dropping off anyway too).
Currently they'll be eating, roughly, 60kg/day (0.6kg/hd/day) of a home mix that costs us £177/tonne, so £0.11/hd/day. Those 2 lambs in the screenshot, therefore, have a FCR of 1.2 : 1.(i.e. they are eating 1.2kg of creep to make 1kg of bodyweight)

Yesterday's average price was 278.54p/kg, so it makes perfect sense to swap 22p worth of creep for 278.54p of meat.

Like I said before those two lambs are 'as good as it gets' but if you do the maths on DLWG of 350gms and FCR of say 3 : 1 it still stacks up.

The trick is getting all those lambs away before the price drops and they've eaten too much (over 40kg the FCR drops rapidly and therefore the cost of feed rises just as rapidly).

Creeping lambs needs the right genetics and the right market price - 'the perfect storm'. Sadly, we only have control of one of those factors, so you need a bit of luck too.

If you're going to give lambs hard feed, IMHO, it makes far more sense to give them it when they can convert it at 2 or 3 to 1 rather than later on when FCR's can be 6,7,8 to 1 or worse.

 

[Boydvalley]

As per post #7, 84 and 88 days old - so born 15th & 19th Feb.

Here's an extract from this week's weighing file (I've just picked out 2 lambs so it's easier to read).....

I think if you 'click' on it, it'll make it big enough to read. The red writing at the bottom explains what the columns are.

You'll see the DLWG is 440gms and 560gms. That's an average, per lamb, of 500 grams a day since they were last weighed (which was 23rd April).That's about as good as it gets (FFS, don't tell @neilo or the price of tups will go up )- not done the averages yet, but it'll be nearer 350-375gms/day for the whole mob as there's some Texel crosses in there too, as well as lambs which won't perform as well.

There's 98 lambs left in that mob and they've had access to home mix creep feed since the word 'go'. They've only really been taking it an any quantity for the last 3 weeks (grass is burning off here and the ewes' milk will be dropping off anyway too).
Currently they'll be eating, roughly, 60kg/day (0.6kg/hd/day) of a home mix that costs us £177/tonne, so £0.11/hd/day. Those 2 lambs in the screenshot, therefore, have a FCR of 1.2 : 1.(i.e. they are eating 1.2kg of creep to make 1kg of bodyweight)

Yesterday's average price was 278.54p/kg, so it makes perfect sense to swap 22p worth of creep for 278.54p of meat.

Like I said before those two lambs are 'as good as it gets' but if you do the maths on DLWG of 350gms and FCR of say 3 : 1 it still stacks up.

The trick is getting all those lambs away before the price drops and they've eaten too much (over 40kg the FCR drops rapidly and therefore the cost of feed rises just as rapidly).

Creeping lambs needs the right genetics and the right market price - 'the perfect storm'. Sadly, we only have control of one of those factors, so you need a bit of luck too.

If you're going to give lambs hard feed, IMHO, it makes far more sense to give them it when they can convert it at 2 or 3 to 1 rather than later on when FCR's can be 6,7,8 to 1 or worse.

Thank you for putting up these figures. Hoping to record properly this year now I’m at last kitted out to do it quickly. A couple of questions if you don’t mind.

Do you bother with a birth weight. If you do is there a correlation with growth rate.

How late a lambing date do you think creeping pays.

what is in your home mix if you don’t mind.

 

[yellowbelly]

Do you bother with a birth weight. If you do is there a correlation with growth rate.

Don't record birth weights but, anecdotally, I'd say yes. Still record some stuff in the lambing shed long hand and it's noticeable that lambs noted as 'big' in the notes do seem to finish quicker.

How late a lambing date do you think creeping pays.

Bit like how long is a piece of string?
It depends how long the springer price holds up. When lambs start coming off grass, creep fed lambs will still hold up a bit in price for a while in live markets (as long as the buyers know they've been fed) as they kill out better.
That's why it's important to get them gone quickly.
Traditionally I like ours gone before the Lincolnshire Show (about 18th/20th June) so, I guess they'd need to be born by mid March.

what is in your home mix if you don’t mind.

We keep it simple here - pretty much the same mix for everything.
Ewes get an 18% home mix (660kg whole barley/340kg protein balancer pellets). Use the same mix for the lamb creeps.
When we get to this time of year, we drop the protein to 16% by upping the barley and decreasing the balancer pellets.

 

[Boydvalley]

Thanks @yellowbelly for taking the time to reply