What would yoy do?

DJ98

My dilemma is as follows: Had a poor scan this year (mostly singles). So the way I see it now is that I have 3 options.
1. Buy in ewes scanned in-lamb (doubles/triplets)
2. Buy ewes with lambs at foot.
3. Buy pet lambs and foster them onto the singles.

Green farmer

id be more interested in finding out what factors contributed to the ewes scanning poorly , and fix these before bringing in more sheep.

DJ98

Howd ya go about that?

ganmo

Of those 3 I'd pick buying ewes scanned, twins if you can trips if they're lambing the same time as yours.
The poor scan can be down to ewe breeding or ewe condition pre mating, neither you can fix now

ganmo

Of those 3 I'd pick buying ewes scanned, twins if you can trips if they're lambing the same time as yours.
The poor scan can be down to ewe breeding or ewe condition pre mating, neither you can fix now

Green farmer

DJ98 wrote: »

Howd ya go about that?

Well, if you could figure out what's keeping the scanning % low and change it. I scanned a lot of singles here, and I am lookin at of those that did, trying to figure out are they ewes that are getting too old ? or are they from breeds that are naturally not as prolific ? Or when they do lamb are they from a ram that is throwing a lot of singles ? Or were the ewes not flushed enough ? Or as ganmo said not in good enough condition.

Cran

Find problem & fix, this year I prob buy store lambs. Wouldn't buy in ewes till found reason

rangler1

A very poor scan here in the second batch of ewes again this year, LLeyn ewes scanning .4 of a lamb less than the texels. The last three lleyn rams I bought must have been rubbish.....it'll take some years now to get back to where i was. I'm hearing now that Lleyns can be inconsistent.... grrrrr

Green farmer

rangler1 wrote: »

I'm hearing now that Lleyns can be inconsistent.... grrrrr

Im seeing similiar things here. Ive a llyen who thrown lambs that I couldn't finish and didn't go in lamb, hoping they'll come into their own next year as two year olds. I've also ewe hoggets the same age from a different llyen that are way bigger sheep and all went in lamb and scanned 1.7

orm0nd

DJ98 wrote: »

My dilemma is as follows: Had a poor scan this year (mostly singles). So the way I see it now is that I have 3 options.
1. Buy in ewes scanned in-lamb (doubles/triplets)
2. Buy ewes with lambs at foot.
3. Buy pet lambs and foster them onto the singles.

I'd buy ewes with lambs at foot, at least you'll have a fair idea of waht the lambs are going to turn in to, & more important how well the lambs are thriving on .ie ewe's milking ability,

rangler1 wrote: »

A very poor scan here in the second batch of ewes again this year, LLeyn ewes scanning .4 of a lamb less than the texels. The last three lleyn rams I bought must have been rubbish.....it'll take some years now to get back to where i was. I'm hearing now that Lleyns can be inconsistent.... grrrrr

Lleyns getting a quick exit here, not even keeping x bred ewe lambs off the
bitches here this year.

Username John

orm0nd wrote: »

I'd buy ewes with lambs at foot, at least you'll have a fair idea of waht the lambs are going to turn in to, & more important how well the lambs are thriving on .ie ewe's milking ability,

I'd second this - plus you're buying lambs, and not the potential of lambs (in case of problems, over / under fed, etc)

orm0nd wrote: »

Lleyns getting a quick exit here, not even keeping x bred ewe lambs off the
bitches here this year.

I have a Lleyn ram, happy with his lambs, but haven't kept lambs off him yet... was hoping to do so this season now...

rangler1

Green farmer wrote: »

Im seeing similiar things here. Ive a llyen who thrown lambs that I couldn't finish and didn't go in lamb, hoping they'll come into their own next year as two year olds. I've also ewe hoggets the same age from a different llyen that are way bigger sheep and all went in lamb and scanned 1.7

,

we've been averaging 1.8 - 2.1 since we started crossing in the lleyns in 2001, its just the progeny of the present batch of rams.....and to make it worse, 90% of the ewes in the flock next year will be out of them.....It'll take a good few years to breed them out of the flock now.....needless to say the rams were in the factory a few days after scanning.
Obviously there's prolific lines out there, but if they're not being star rated how can we have confidence in buying them. lleyns have been overpriced the last few years and it's leading to sheep being sold for breeding that maybe shouldn't be.
dread to say it, but will have to consider belclare and upskill my pet rearing abilities

Green farmer

Just goes to show, there's no magic breed of sheep out there, just pot luck.

eorna

Ewes scanned triplets are good value for money specially if you have fostering ewes.. You'd want to make sure they lamb at same time as yours and be a bit lucky...
Lambs at foot pricy and you probably wont b able to foster unless bought very young..( you have 'guaranteed' lambs though)
Pet lambs is good option but they have to be very young as well.. Mayb you can source some from a neighbour farm so is a matter of lamb born and sold straight away..
I'd go for 1 myself or 3 if you can source them right.
Store lambs later on in the year might b option 4( as somebody suggested)..

serfspup

OP having seen what kind of nightmares can be bought in with inlamb ewes(abortion,orf,parasites etc)
I would sit tight take your beating work out why the scanning is poor and fix that.
remember last november was brutal wet weather

had my worst scanning in 25 yrs! lleyns have not hit the mark here either have three going on four crops off one ram (about half the flock next year)
so like rangler it is going to take a while to breed it up.(closed flock)
has f'd up the five year plan (should be getting used of that now:rolleyes:)

as green farmer says it can be hit and miss.
but just goes to show that the old saying that the ram is half the flock is BOLLOCKS if you are breeding your own replacements he/they ARE WAY MORE THAN HALF

Ironiclly the handfull of vendeen and charollais crosses in the flock (off a variety of sires) retained on a whim rather than a specific breeding policy have all but one got twins in them and have always milked well.

Cran

rangler1 wrote: »

A very poor scan here in the second batch of ewes again this year, LLeyn ewes scanning .4 of a lamb less than the texels. The last three lleyn rams I bought must have been rubbish.....it'll take some years now to get back to where i was. I'm hearing now that Lleyns can be inconsistent.... grrrrr

Any specific lines or breeders, or is it a cross section of Lleyns the Rams came from?

rangler1

Cran wrote: »

Any specific lines or breeders, or is it a cross section of Lleyns the Rams came from?

Bought three off one breeder, local to me,, fourth one came from the north,
Wouldn't even know where to find the certs at this stage. won't be an issue any way, we'll have to be particular about maternal stars/rating from now on

Cran

rangler1 wrote: »

Bought three off one breeder, local to me,, fourth one came from the north,
Wouldn't even know where to find the certs at this stage. won't be an issue any way, we'll have to be particular about maternal stars/rating from now on

Agree I d be more particular about maternal than terminal tbh, it's more impact I think. Hoping to record Lleyns here focused on maternal but think might have to use signet Rams to start, and accuracies will be low to start as well.

rangler1

Cran wrote: »

Agree I d be more particular about maternal than terminal tbh, it's more impact I think. Hoping to record Lleyns here focused on maternal but think might have to use signet Rams to start, and accuracies will be low to start as well.

,

I'll follow the dairy example now, i'll increase ewe numbers to compensate, lambing should be a lot easier, which'll suit the age profile here, and keep costs to a minimum.

Cran

rangler1 wrote: »

,

I'll follow the dairy example now, i'll increase ewe numbers to compensate, lambing should be a lot easier, which'll suit the age profile here, and keep costs to a minimum.

What do you mean by dairy example, more use of stars?

rangler1

Cran wrote: »

What do you mean by dairy example, more use of stars?

No, but the dairy guys are increasing numbers to spread the fixed costs even though they're adding to the glut.
I used to keep the pedigree ewes and lambs in until march so the fifty ewes used to take up as much room as a hundred in lamb ewes, so i've accomadation for a lot more ewes now so will now increase to 600, at least until the prolificacy improves.
Less lambs and lack of triplets should make lambing easier

Cran

rangler1 wrote: »

No, but the dairy guys are increasing numbers to spread the fixed costs even though they're adding to the glut.
I used to keep the pedigree ewes and lambs in until march so the fifty ewes used to take up as much room as a hundred in lamb ewes, so i've accomadation for a lot more ewes now so will now increase to 600, at least until the prolificacy improves.
Less lambs and lack of triplets should make lambing easier

December born until March, some additional work. My poor Jamuary born French feckers are out since end Jan, different land I know but not as much this year.

rangler1

Cran wrote: »

December born until March, some additional work. My poor Jamuary born French feckers are out since end Jan, different land I know but not as much this year.

Our 50 ewes and their lambs would graze the whole farm if they were out from january, I found it easier to have them in, I'd have to give them meal anyway so it's just the straw thats extra.
Big difference here in the straw and meal usage this year as opposed to when they were here

stantheman1979

rangler1 wrote: »

I'm hearing now that Lleyns can be inconsistent.... grrrrr

Add your reply here. Everyone on here tells me the belclare have too many lambs. Every ewe here goes out with two lambs. To do that you need plenty of triplets to foster on. Single and dry ewes are no good to us

Sheep breeder

i would not buy in any ewes now, would try and figure out why the crop was poor and try and fix to increase lambing percent, mineral bolus, flush ewes better, change rams, etc spend money on fixing the problem.

Green farmer

rangler1 wrote: »

we'll have to be particular about maternal stars/rating from now on

Walking around my ewes this evening. I've a even split of ewes carrying twins and singles this year, which ain't good. Some of the singles caring ones looked to be ageing, so that explains that, some were a bit cheviot looking, so that also explains that, but a good few were young 2-3 year old first and second crop that should have be excuses. Be interesting to see the lambs that come out of them. Maybe point to a particular ram. Also thinking the wet summer last year did us no favours . The other head scratching thing is I weaned the lambs off them grand and early last summer , ( we had a good chat on here about it ) so the ewes were well rested.

Username John

Green farmer wrote: »

The other head scratching thing is I weaned the lambs off them grand and early last summer , ( we had a good chat on here about it ) so the ewes were well rested.

Funny how last year I kinda had the opposite - I weaned fairly on time. But I was very short on grass so the ewes were following the lambs on poor grass for a log while, and I thought they were thin-ish.
Then, i put them onto the best grass I had for a few weeks (maybe 6 or so) before the ram...
It seemed to work to a fair extent, as the scan rate on the ewes was above average this year...
Oh - I also have em growvite about 6weeks and then 2weeks again before the ram went in. Maybe that helped a lot too, I dunno...

fanadman1

Any body on here use the agri loyde twin lamb booster.
And if so is it any use ?
My own crop would of been ok tbh.
Polly ewes scaned at 1.8 where as the horned ewes scaned at 1.5(very happy about that tbh)
But if it could be improved i would always like to.

Green farmer

Username John wrote: »

Oh - I also have em growvite about 6weeks and then 2weeks again before the ram went in. Maybe that helped a lot too, I dunno...

It's meant to be good stuff alright. I just gave the ewes ordinary lick buckets here pre mating. Still think some of the Rams have some questions to answer . Anyone know as Rams were starting to age , could this reduce your percentages ? Or what age would they be gone past their best ?

Username John

Green farmer wrote: »

It's meant to be good stuff alright. I just gave the ewes ordinary lick buckets here pre mating. Still think some of the Rams have some questions to answer . Anyone know as Rams were starting to age , could this reduce your percentages ? Or what age would they be gone past their best ?

I thought twas the ewes really influenced it. I know rams age might come into it, but that this would have shown as empties rather than lower scanning...

But I could be totally wrong saying that