Weekly Update: 08/04/16

LambPlus Ram Sale Reminder

The date for the LambPlus multibreed ram sale is set for Saturday 20th August in Tullamore mart, Co. Offaly. This sale has been a very successful one for performance recording breeders in recent years and hopefully 2016 will be no different.

Data Recording Reminders

LambPlus breeders are reminded to continue recording the necessary weights for their lambs. The 40 day weight can be collected from lambs from 20 to 60 days of age. After this point the weight falls into the next weight bracket which we call ‘Weaning Weight or 100 Day Weight’. Lambs do not need to be weaned to collect this weaning weight. The weaning weight is any weight collected by a breeder from lambs aged between 60 and 120 days. Some breeders choose to record multiple weights for their lambs and this is absolutely fine. The evaluation however will use the weight closest to our target lamb age – 40 days for the 40 day weight and 100 days for the weaning/100 day weight.

First Genetic Evaluation Run

For the past number of weeks Sheep Ireland have been running test genetic evaluation runs for 2016. The deadline for the entry of 2016 lambing data in the last day of April, so until this deadline passes, we will not be publishing an evaluation on our website. In terms of data entry the number of lambs entered on the database is running 30% ahead of where we were at this point last year. This is a major improvement on data recording and will bode well for breeders Data Quality Index (DQI).

Upcoming Meeting with Breed Society Representatives

The last meeting between Sheep Ireland and breed society representatives took place on 15th December. It is now time to meet again and all breed society representatives will be contacted in the next few days with details of this meeting which will take place before the end of the month. Should any LambPlus breeder have any issue they would like raised at this meeting, please make contact with the secretary or chairperson of your relevant breed society and they can bring forward the issue for discussion at the meeting. These biannual meetings are proving to be extremely useful and are helping to facility progress on a number of fronts.