Sheep Ireland were delighted to be invited to speak with the Wicklow Cheviot Sheep Breeders group this week (Tuesday 1st March) in Hollywood town center, Hollywood, Co. Wicklow.
David Coen of Sheep Ireland began by explaining the developments of the Sheep Ireland database over the last number of years. Continued updates of the website make it as user friendly as possible and the development of the Sheep Ireland App has led to more and more data being collected.
“Sheep Ireland have made big strides in their management screens and lambplus services.” The introduction of “quick, efficient and genotype collection” has allowed for Hill breeds to quickly develop a lot of information on their breeds.
David discussed the Hill ram criteria for the proposed Sheep Improvement Scheme. which is due to take place in 2023. Members were showing great interest in getting their rams genotyped. Some Wicklow breeders have already taken their own initiative and have already their own rams genotyped. There experience was encouraging to their fellow breeders.
One stating that its a “Very simple easy process”. This group can use genomics to DNA verify the sires of all the lambs brought to the sale with 100% accuracy.
Each genotyped animal will also receive an inbreeding percentage known as an “Inbreeding coefficient” which looks at the animals DNA and defines similarities in the DNA strands. So we can determine through DNA if a ram is inbred or not without having any previous ancestry recorded.