Sheep Ireland’s Elite €uro-Star Multi-Breed Ram sale will take place on Saturday, August 27th 2022 at 11:30 am in Tullamore Mart.
See Provisional Catalogue here
There are 439 animals entered in the provisional catalogue making it the largest sale we have ever hosted.
Entry Criteria
As usual, there will be entry criteria for each ram entering this sale.
- €uro-Star Index – All rams must be five Stars for either the Replacement or Terminal index at the time of catalogue printing. These can be checked using your Sheep Ireland online €uroStar report for the most up to date genetic evaluation results
- Data Quality Index (DQI) – Breeders wishing to enter sheep in the sale must have a flock DQI of 70% or higher on the day of the final catalogue being generated. Your DQI score is available on your online account on www.sheep.ie.
- Flock Linkage Status – Flocks that wish to enter the sale must be genetically linked in 2022. Unlinked flocks will not be allowed to enter the sale. You can check you flock linkage status by visiting your €uro-Star profile through your online account.
- Ram Inspection – All rams must be physically correct, similar to any breed society sale. Sheep Ireland will carry out a thorough ram inspection on all rams upon entry to the sale. Any sheep deemed to be physically incorrect will be rejected immediately.
- Genotyped – All rams entered in the sale must be genotyped and have a genomic evaluation via the Sheep Ireland genomic service.
- Sire Verified – All rams must be sire verified. All stock rams were genotyped for 2022 so this should not be an issue for the majority of rams. If there is a sire mismatch and a sire is removed, the animal must have a new genotyped sire assigned to be eligible for the sale.
- Dam Assigned – Rams do not need to be dam verified however, they must have a dam assigned, meaning if a ram has its dam removed as a result of genotyping and another dam is not assigned via genomics, the ram is not eligible for entry to the sale. Flocks that have dam verified all of their entries will be awarded one additional entry that must also be parentage verified. This rewards flocks that have already invested in genomics in their flock and encourage more flocks to begin genotyping their females.
Number of rams eligible to be entered
Larger flocks contribute more to the national breed improvement program with more data that requires time, effort, and resources to collect. To better reflect this, we have introduced three flock size bands (as shown below). The size of the flock is determined by the number of pedigree ewes that lambed down to a ram of the same breed.
| No. of Pedigree ewes lambed | If all lambs are sire verified | If all lambs are parentage verified |
| 1-29 | 3 | 4 |
| 30-49 | 4 | 5 |
| 50+ | 5 | 6 |
Sale order
The sale will be run on a breed-by-breed basis. The sale will have a split ballot. Two rings will be in operation on the day, and the order that breeds enter the ring and the ring they go through are determined once all the entries have been received.
Deadline for Entries
The deadline for sale entries is Monday August 8th with promotion of the provisional sales catalogue from Wednesday, August 17th.
ALL ENTRIES MUST BE MADE VIA EMAIL TO [email protected] IN THE FOLLOWING FORMAT:
- Breeder Name:
- Flock Designator:
- Willing to transport rams (Y/N) (See note below)
- Ram Breed
- Ram NSIS Number/Pedigree ID
- Ram Comment (max 200 characters)
Substitutes
We will be accepting subs until 1 pm on Monday, August 22nd by emailing [email protected] and seeking confirmation of receipt or calling 0238820451. No substitutes will be accepted after this deadline. The final sale catalogue will be based on the genomic evaluation carried out on Tuesday, August 23rd. All rams must meet the sale entry criteria based on this evaluation run.
Fees
No entry fee will be required for the sale, however, there will be a 2.5% sellers commission charged on all animals sold.
Non-attendance on the day of the sale
Any breeder that enters rams into the sale and subsequently can’t attend the sale should contact Sheep Ireland before the subs deadline of Monday 22nd to allow us to withdraw animals from the official sales catalogue. Where rams are catalogued for sale and breeders do not present rams on the day, breeders will be refused entry to the sale in 2023.
Pictures & Videos
Each year we receive pictures and videos from breeders which we use to promote the sale and it is also an excellent way to advertise your ram(s) before the sale. If you are interested in sending us in pictures or videos, we may put it up on social media with your name and the details of the ram to promote this sale. Some of the pictures sent in from breeders from 2021 were viewed thousands of times on Facebook before the sale. If interested, please forward pictures to [email protected] titled Ram Pic or WhatsApp them along with the ram’s ID to (086 792 5679).
Transporting Rams to new owners
This sale will also be online, with the potential for online bidding. To facilitate this, we would ask that any breeder who is attending the sale and would be willing to transport rams back to their farm (or locality) for pick up by the new owner from their area to say so when entering rams. This could result in more rams being sold and therefore making it a better sale for all. It will be stressed to the buyer that the responsibility and risk will go to them from the drop of the hammer, and the person transporting the ram(s) cannot be held accountable for disease, injury or death of a ram. More information will be circulated to those that sign up to the service.
If you have any questions or queries on the sale, please contact us on 023-8820451 or e-mail us at [email protected]