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<blockquote data-quote="Global ovine" data-source="post: 6969537" data-attributes="member: 493"><p>Its horses for courses, therefore better is relevant to where one farms, despite all trying to achieve a more productive sheep.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>So its horses for courses, but first know your course so you can invest in the most suitable "horse".</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Global ovine, post: 6969537, member: 493"] 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". [/QUOTE]
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