buying sheep

leoch

Thinking of getting sheep for the first time as have a good bit of grass I normally have heifers on it but they are to dear wat would you recommend to buy maybe 40 or so and what weight and breed

Bleating Lamb

Depends on how long you want to have to have them for and how good your land is:)......to be able to finish them off grass alone you need decent land.
Suffolk,Texel etc will finish in about a month to 6/7 weeks if you buy them at around 38kg with good start of flesh on their back....
Likes of Cheviot or hill lambs will carry a lot of weight but are far harder fed,you could have them for 8 to 12 weeks at least before they start to flesh up well.
And like anything you pay for what you get,better confirmation lambs cost a few euro more a head than similiar sized same breed with same feeding on them.

leoch

Some of the land good some average could keep them for 3\4 months if need to

IH784man

How many acres

leoch

Eabout 35 acres and a few cows and calfs running about too

ganmo

There seems to be 2 ways of doing store lambs

Buying 40+kg pricey enough but moved on quick for a few quid
Or buying 30+kg and keeping until around Christmas. The price graph is fairly regular every year

RobinBanks

Hi. Reseeded 9 acres recently and wanted to get sheep in to graze it. Ask a few friends if they wanted grass but not really interested. Seems everyone has to much grass. I have sheep wire around most of it and was thinking of buying a few myself and sticking them in. Don't really want to let cattle in as its heavy enough land in spots.

Can anyone give me any advice on breed of sheep to buy, age/weight to buy at and how long to keep. Never had sheep here so if someone tells me to stay away from them then I will do that.

IH784man

RobinBanks wrote: »

Hi. Reseeded 9 acres recently and wanted to get sheep in to graze it. Ask a few friends if they wanted grass but not really interested. Seems everyone has to much grass. I have sheep wire around most of it and was thinking of buying a few myself and sticking them in. Don't really want to let cattle in as its heavy enough land in spots.

Can anyone give me any advice on breed of sheep to buy, age/weight to buy at and how long to keep. Never had sheep here so if someone tells me to stay away from them then I will do that.

Split it up in paddocks and rotate around,do you want to lamb ewes later on in the year or buy bigger lambs around and kill them

bold_defender

Leoch, did you ever buy any lambs? How you getting on with them?

I'm going to buy some store lambs to eat about 20 acres of aftergrass, reasonable land. I might not get them for another fortnight as I might spray of weeds in aftergrass first.

How may lambs would I be looking at getting? Considering it will be middle of sept by then so grass growth will be tailing off. Its split in 6 fields so I can rotate.