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Finalist of Most Improved LambPlus Flock 2022 – William J. Hutchinson, Suffolks, Chapelizod

William J. Hutchinson is one of three finalists for this year’s Most Improved LambPlus Flock. The Chapelizod Suffolk  flock was established over 29 years ago and is located in Kells, Co. Kilkenny. William has been performance recording with LambPlus since the programme began in 2009 and lambed down 57 purebred Suffolk ewes in 2022.

While the nomination for the award of Most Improved LambPlus flock is for William’s Suffolk flock, he also run’s a flock of 52 breeding Texel ewes, 57 breeding Ile de France ewes and a flock of Easy Cares ewes which all lamb outdoors and are tagged at birth. Tagging at birth is an integral part of the structure of Williams breeding plan as this allows for a sophisticated system of performance recording across a large number of sheep of various breeds all the while mostly lambing outdoors. A huge effort has been made by William over several years to enhance the quality, completeness and timeliness of the performance recording of his flock and this effort is evident from his excellent DQI of 77%. William has maintained his high flock DQI over the past number of years while performance recording large numbers of sheep which is no easy task and is a testament to the level of value he places on using performance recording to increase the genetic merit of his flock.

William pays particular attention to avoiding inbreeding or similar bloodlines when searching for breeding rams for his ewes. He regularly uses the inbreeding checker application through the Sheep Ireland website to cross-check bloodlines before introducing new breeding into his flock of ewes. This is most important when striving for the genetic improvement of a flock. One of William’s main focuses when selecting breeding rams for his Suffolks is sourcing rams with high growth rates by analysing the Days to Slaughter index while always keeping the maternal traits at the forefront of his mind also. When sourcing breeding rams he said;

“I try to buy the highest index rams out of a large flock that is forage fed only”

Out of all the Suffolk lambs William has produced this year, all except one are currently 5Stars across the Replacement and Terminal Index.

Genotyping all breeding rams, hogget rams and a selection of breeding females used in the Suffolk flock, William has made a considerable impact on the accuracies of his breeding index, with his average Replacement accuracy at 51% and average Terminal index accuracy at 53%.

The Chapelizod Suffolk flock have produced some top-quality Suffolk rams over the years such as HLT2122549, a hogget ram that is in the Top 1% of the breed in Replacement index and Top 2% of the breed in the Terminal index. The sire is Bentley Kolisi has been widely used in the Chapelizod Suffolk flock over the last 3 years and is a double 5-star ram who is in the Top 2% of the breed for Replacement index with an accuracy of 86% and is also in the top 2% of the breed in his Terminal index with a significant accuracy of 91%. Bentley Kolisi is also in the Top 1% of the breed in his Days to Slaughter index at -14.7 days with an impressive accuracy of 95%.

The overall winner of the Most Improved LambPlus flock will be announced at the Sheep Ireland Breeding Conference & Farm Walk on the 12th July. The winner will receive a cash prize of €500, an engraved trophy and bragging rights for the year ahead. The two other finalists will receive a cash prize of €250 and a framed award. FBD kindly sponsors the LambPlus awards. Flocks were selected based on a number of criteria including the genetic merit of the flock based on the Replacement & Terminal Index, the DQI of the flock and the Accuracy of the breeding values within the flock. These awards are to acknowledge the effort and contribution that these breeders are making to the National Sheep Industry.