ecollins63 | Bearwood Lleyn Sheep

Lambing About To Start

Lambing starts at the beginning of March with 350 ewes due to lamb in 4 weeks; 50 Lleyn ewe lambs will lamb in the 1st half of April. All ewes are housed and will lamb indoors and then turned out to grass with their lambs soon after they have given birth. The next fortnight is the “quiet before the storm!”

All lambs are weighed at birth and ewes given a score as to whether they were assisted while having their lambs. Over the past 5 years I only have had a difficult lambing in about 1 in every 80 ewes, so the majority give birth on their own. Any ewes that are assisted while having their lambs are identified and culled later in the year. The aim is not to assist ewes while they lamb and only go in as a last resort. By selecting ewes on “ease of lambing”, I have reduced the number of assisted births considerably since I formed the Lleyn flock here 17 years ago.

All lambs will be electronically tagged at birth and their tag number, birth weight and ewes tag number recorded on a handheld computer in the lambing shed. All this information will be downloaded onto my laptop every evening. It is essential that I have accurate breeding records for every animal, for future planning for myself and also customers who are looking for specific bloodlines when purchasing breeding animals.

There is a camera in the sheep shed that I can access on my Iphone, Ipad and laptop. I only have a lambing assistant during the day, so at night I can scan the shed remotely from the house every hour and only go out as necessary. I have been using a camera for over 5 years and find that the ewes are far more settled at night as I am not disturbing them every hour, plus I get more short spells of sleep. The body soon becomes accustomed to power naps of 40 minutes, however, sleep deprivation over a period of time becomes more difficult as you get older!!

Weather is critical for lamb survival rate at lambing time. Good weather means grass growth and ewes producing good milk. This means lambs grow quickly and more importantly, are healthy. Bad weather means that ewes need to be fed more to produce milk and lambs do not do well if they are permanently wet and cold. Lets hope for a good Spring.

Bearwood Stock Ram Abracadabra Making Headlines

Neil and Debbie McGowan had a another successful sale of Lleyn and Texel rams at their “7th Working Genes Ram Sale” on 4th September.

There was keen competition for sons of their hombred ram Balintore. Balintore’s sire is ABRACADABRA (619:1100993); a stock ram at Bearwood. He was hired by Neil and Debbie as a ram lamb and I bought him privately off his breeder, Marcus Bullock as a 2 year old.

What a good decision this was, as yearlings by Balintore sold for 3200 gns (top and record price), 2400 (2nd top price), 1600 gns and 1500 gns.

I have very nice ram lambs by ABRACADABRA with good performance figures behind them which will be sold as yearlings next year and also semen stored at Innovis. This is a new bloodline that is producing high performing sheep.

Please contact me if you require more information.

Research Project – Worm Resistance In Sheep

The Bearwood Lleyn flock is part of a research project that is identifying sheep that are more resistant to common British round worms. Professor Mike Stear from the University of Glasgow has developed a saliva test, which alongside a Faecal Egg Count (FEC) can determine lambs that a genetically more resistant to worms than others. A small group of Lleyn breeders have obtained funding to get a proportion of their 2014 lamb crop tested. The test involves putting the lambs under a worm burden and then taking a saliva swab and dung sample. Independent sheep consultant, Catherine Nakielny is collecting the swabs and FEC samples during the next 4 weeks and Professor Stear will analyze the data collected and have the results by the end of the autumn. Sam Boon of Signet Breeding Services is overseeing the research project and hopes to produce an Estimated Breeding Value (EBV) in the future.

This is an exciting project as worm resistance to common British round worms is becoming a major problem within the UK sheep flock. Breeding sheep that are genetically resistant to worms will help the commercial sheep producer increase his returns. Lambs will finish quicker with less worm treatments.

Results of this research project will be posted here as soon as they become available.

Bearwood Trooper

high indexed lleyn ram, recorded lleyn ram, signet recorded lleyn ram — Bearwood Trooper

In the latest National Lleyn Breeding Evaluation (5th July 2014) Bearwood Trooper stands 6th Top Stock Sire for the Maternal Index and 7th Top Stock Sire for the Carcase Index. This top performing ram who has a strong following of breeders coming back year after year to purchase semen or one of his sons sadly died at the beginning of the year.

I have a small amount of semen available plus yearlings and ram lambs for sale by Trooper. Please contact me if you require more information.

Lleyn And Blue Texel Ewe Lambs For Sale

I will have around 250 Lleyn ewe lambs available this year and a small number of Blue Texel ewe lambs. The lambs will be weaned by the middle of July and will be ready to leave the farm at the beginning of August. Many of the Lleyn ewe lambs purchased are put to the tup in the autumn. All lambs have performance figures and can be registered if required.

More and more customers come and buy ewe lambs off the farm; they can look at the breeding ewes and stock rams and see the farming system at Bearwood. They can also see the sale animals in their “working clothes” and not overfed like so many animals that go through the sale ring. The ewe lambs are reared off grass and are not fed creep; they are left to grow naturally as I am keen to produce stock that utilize grass efficiently. If my order book is filled before sale entry deadline then I will not be selling anything through the sale ring.

Lleyn And Blue Texel Yearling Rams For Sale

I will have 20 registered and 12 unregistered yearling Lleyn rams and 5 registered Blue Texel yearling rams available this year. All these rams have performance figures for maternal and carcase traits and the majority of them have figures in the Top 10% of the latest Breed Evaluation.

More and more customers come and buy rams off the farm; they can look at the breeding ewes and stock rams and see the farming system at Bearwood. They can also see the sale animals in their “working clothes” and not overfed like so many animals that go through the sale ring. These animals need to be fit to work immediately in the autumn. The yearling rams have access to Lifeline Ramcare and are out at grass. My aim is to produce rams that can utilize grass efficiently. If my order book is filled before sale entry deadline then I will not be selling anything through the sale ring.

Ewes Scanned and Housed

The ewes were scanned to see how many lambs they are going to have in March 2014. This year has been a good year on the sheep; there has been plentiful grass through the autumn and early winter and when they were housed at scanning, just before Christmas they looked in better condition than they have done for the past few years. Consequently they scanned well, to have just under 2 lambs per ewe, which is an ideal number of lambs for the system at Bearwood.

I was able to make good haylage during the summer and this will be analyzed next week. The amount of concentrate fed to the ewes will be determined by the quality of the haylage and I am hoping that concentrate costs can be cut this year due to good quality forage.

Semen Availability 2014

There is still semen available from 5 year old stock ram BEARWOOD TROOPER who has maternal figures in the top 5% and carcase figures in the top 10% of the Lleyn breed. Customers come back year after year to purchase straws of TROOPER’s semen as they are very happy with the lambs that are sired by him.

In December I am taking 3 rams to Innovis to get semen collected and frozen and straws will be available for the 2014 breeding season.

Lleyn Ram - 599:1202851 — Lleyn Ram – 599:1202851

2 Lleyn rams, ABRACADABRA (619:1100993) and BIONIC (599:1202851) both have maternal and carcase figures in the top 1% of the Lleyn breed and are carriers of the Myomax gene. ABRACADABRA is a great, great grand son of the famous Lleyn ram 172:T184 and BIONIC is a son of the top performing sire BRONALLT BIG DADDY.

The 3rd is the Blue Texel ram lamb, WARRIOR (BBD/13/00925) who was placed first in a highly competitive ram lamb class at the Royal Welsh Show 2013. I purchased this ram lamb at the Beili Blues flock production sale in Carlisle. WARRIOR has pure Dutch breeding so would be ideal for breeders who want to introduce a new bloodline to their flock.

Blue Texel Ram Lamb - BBD/13/00925 — Blue Texel Ram Lamb – BBD/13/00925

New Stock Rams Purchased

During the summer I visited a couple of Lleyn breeders to look at their rams for sale. I was keen to view the rams in their working clothes and before they were being fed for the sales. I was fortunate to be able to buy two rams privately off the farm. It is difficult to find rams that you like that also have good performance figures behind them.

The first ram I purchased was a yearling ram from Dylan Jones of Lluest Wen, Comins Coch, Machynlleth, Powys. This ram is a Bronallt Big Daddy (50:061106) son and is a full brother to 599:100725 who I purchased off Dylan 2 years ago but sadly he died last winter. 599:100725 is the 5th top rated Lleyn stock ram in the latest National Lleyn Breed Evaluation and this yearling 599:1202851 has figures in in the Top 1% for Maternal and Top 5% for Carcase.

The second ram I purchased was a two year old from Marcus Bullock, Bank Farm, Abberley, Worcester, who used him last year on selected ewes. This ram, 619:1100993 is by a Jim Goldie ram (1312:061072) and it’s bloodline on the sire side goes back to the famous 172:T184. This ram has performance figures in the Top 1% for Maternal and Carcase and is also a Myomax Gold gene carrier.

I also needed a Blue Texel ram to put onto my home bred yearling Blue Texel ewes. I managed to purchase a ram lamb (BBD/13/00925) at the Beili Blues production sale at Carlisle. This ram has new pure Dutch breeding on both Sire and Dam sides and was the 1st prize winner of the Blue Texel ram lamb class at this years Royal Welsh Show.

Blue Texel x Lleyn Lambs

I put my Blue Texel Tups to some Lleyn ewes last Autum and have been very pleased with the lambs that have been produced; all with good skins and great carcases. Many of the males have already been sold fat at Hereford market where they made premium prices.

I have kept the ewe lambs and if they are not sold this Autumn they will be sold as yearlings next year. Again the ewe lambs have great skins and good length and shape.