Kerry Hill

tractorporn

Hi everyone, just looking for a bit of info/opinion on the Kerry Hill sheep, the mother saw some at a show and has me heart broke to buy a few hoggets!

A bit of research and I can find breed descriptions etc but what I'd like to know is on the ground stuff. Are they easy lambed? How are there feet? Are they good mothers? Whats a suitable terminal cross? Are they only suitable for the hill? Were on decent enough lowland.

Anyway all thoughts appreciated

TIA

ganmo

I've never heard of anything positive about them other than their appearance

DJ98

A friend is big into them. He breeds them with Suffolk texel and scotch ewes all lowland. Claims they are great sheep, lambs them all outside says they are extremely hardy and easy lambed!

serfspup

I have kerry hill crosses they have been great sheep very easy care, smart (as in clever) sheep.Not that hard fenced compared to cheviots.They are wild .but you very rarely have to catch one.
pure breds are small very wild and good ones are hard to get.lots of sh!t available very small gene pool here.
Omagh show usually has a good selection exibited(a great show to go to anyway sat 2 july)
my crossbreds are out of texel ewes the wethers finish fine and I have crossed the ewes with texel(to short),charollais(to bare),vendeen(very good),hampshire(very good),kerry hill(small & wild),cheviot(very variable),blue leicester(ok jury still out) bleu du maine(were nutcases),Lleyn (to small).

If you have sheep and lamb hoggets get a KH ram and breed a few xbreds
the lambs are easy born and lively

3/4 kerry ewe with BFL lambs

tractorporn

serfspup wrote:

If you have sheep and lamb hoggets get a KH ram and breed a few xbreds the lambs are easy born and lively

Cheers for that info. Hadn't really thought about getting a ram to breed with but now it's been suggested it makes great sense. Have you seen any KHxBelcare sheep most of our ewes would be from Belcare stock? As Ganmo says it was the appearance that drew Mam to them a ram and a few ewes could keep her happy.

orm0nd

bought a bunch of ewe lambs off a dealer years ago & they turned out to be fantastic sheep, healthy, great mothers & zero feet problems

asked him to source more a couple of years later & they were the same only fault was however this batch seemed stuck on having single lambs where as the first were far more profilic

serfspup

get as wide a kerry hill ram as u can and put him on the longest belclares u wont be disappointed

tractorporn

Well I said I'd update how I went with the sheep. I went to look at a couple of batches of kerry hill ewe hoggets and I use the term look lightly, out in the field we couldn't get near them they were extremely skittish. Have looked at one ram lamb and he was the same. Im sorry to say it's put me off the breed cos we don't need any more wild stock round here.