The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: Womble on October 27, 2015, 06:04:41 pm
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A discussion inspired by the thread on lamb prices.......
We all know that Operating Profit ( :roflanim:) = Sales minus Operating Costs.
So, putting capital costs aside for a moment, what strategies have you used over the years that have successfully reduced your operating costs, and thus boosted your profits? Why did you do it, and what were the impacts (both positive and negative)?
I'm thinking of things like:
- Changed to a breed that needs less hard feed
- Moved tupping later so that there's better grass available when the lambs are born
- Started fertilising the grass so that it yields more
- Bought feed in bulk, or from a cheaper source
- Clubbed together with other smallholders to buy lotions and potions
- Helped a local farmer with his shearing, so got my own done for free
- Learned to do my own FECs so I can now keep a closer eye on them and hence use less wormer
etc etc..... :thumbsup: I once again look forward to shamelessly hitching a ride from all your hard won experience!! ;D
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great thread Womble .... I look forward to replies. Just one comment so from me .... later lambing may meet grass better but will lambs be ready soon enough? (assuming non commercial breeds/ crosses here of course)
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Mine only get hard feed in the six weeks to lambing although they do have a molassed bucket from mid October (as part of the lambing preparation) until the grass is in.
Scanning has helped a bit since I can feed singles less but I don't gat many singles so the saving is pretty minimal in truth.
I now calculate how much feed I need - it's about a tonne and if you buy a tonne from Harbro it's about £2 a bag cheaper than buying it a few bags at a time. Harbro also do a "buy ten licky buckets, get one free" so I bought ten last month. I can use them for the cattle as well though.
Do your own marketing and sell your own lamb direct.
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Just one comment so from me .... later lambing may meet grass better but will lambs be ready soon enough?
Indeed - that's why I added "and what were the impacts, both positive and negative" - I'm learning that in smallholding context is everything, and there is no such thing as a free lunch! :)
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Became a vet to get cheaper vet bills!
Seriously I wanted to become a vet and smallholder/farmer and started in both almost simultaneously.
But yes, we have Hebrideans that eat much less, we lamb later so pretty much no hard feed required - all meat sold as hogget so no worries about finishing late, helped a local farmer with shearing who taught us to shear so did them all ourselves with his machine this year. And definitely FEC to keep wormer use to a minimum. All our meat is marketed direct (very small scale at the mo, hopefully moving to larger farm soon to step up scale) at a premium price.
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I'd say the biggest ways to reduce inputs into sheep are -
Better sheep - Less problems and faffing needed, reduces labour input, reduces medical bills, reduces feed needed, improves lambing percentage / weaning percentage etc etc.
Better pasture management - A greater number of sheep can be carried on the same acreage, increasing profit per acre and profit per ewe, ewes and lambs require less (no) hard feed, lambs are finished are away quicker.
No (less) hard feed - If you get the above right, you may be able to totally eliminate hard feed, which would be a big saving.
Having said all of this, the most important thing is knowing your costs, because unless you know those inside out. . . . you can't change anything meaningful!
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Do everyone favours were at all possible then when your In need off one you can cash in the favour learn who will return the favour an who will not also :thumbsup:
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A prolific breed (mainly twins) I had 200% lambing percentage this year.
A good doing breed that needs little feed and keeps condition well.
Early lambing with Milky mums = large / multiple lambs who finish on grass, no creep
Producing very good quality meat and charging accordingly -selling direct
Buying high quality hay in large round bales of field if poss (sometimes the previous years if its good enough)
Covered hay feeders - less waste and no rain damage. Also seems to ration consumption
Buying carrots or fodderbeet by the tonne
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Hi there we use a good sheep mix from Grays Farm feeds.http://www.grayfeedservices.co.uk/sheep-feeds.php (http://www.grayfeedservices.co.uk/sheep-feeds.php)
i buy in bulk from them. i try make a pallet up with chicken feed sheep mix and pig feed. excellent feeds and much better prices than Harbro. :chook: :pig: :sheep:
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Buffy - what breed of sheep do you have?
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Ryelands
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200% is a great lambing % from Ryelands .... are they all older?
Another thought on this and sheep costs
........... breed from ewe lambs ..... feed for less time before production and thus income ...
however lower lambing %
Also how many females do you change each year? ( Culls --vs new ewes) this can impact on costs but also on outcomes.
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Agree with middleton of lonmay with feed from grays. We used to spend far too much at a local feed supplier and was always put off with buying in bulk due to storage. However, grays can either deliver in bulk bags but we go for 20/25kg bags and store them just off the ground on a sort of table arrangement to deter mice. We have more than halved our feed costs. We buy calf mix, sheep mix, layers pellets and sugar beet pellets plus sheep and cattle licks.
in the past we have sold direct to the public - both live and dead but now we just raise lambs for selling at the mart. In the past we have had reasonable prices but this year might be a bit different.
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I would certainly buy like that if I could find a suitable local supplier down here. We do have a mill near by and they make their own feed which is cheaper than the country store but I would love to be able to get hold of Rosemary supplier at £2 a bag!
In terms of lessens learned Womble then mine would be,
Do a job right the first time and only have to do it once. Quick fixes and bodge jobs always come back to haunt you. I dont consider empty feed sacks and baler band as effective DIY materials ( Sorry all you John Seamour fans)
You get out what you put in. That goes for feed and fodder too so I never use poor quality feed or hay. It also goes for investing time and effort.
Understand the value of what you have and what you do. So many people seem to know the cost of everything and the value of nothing. The cheapest, quickest, easiest route isnt always the best one. .
And lastly but perhaps the hardest lesson I had to learn is that wearing oversized dungarees and placing my glasses on my head is never going to give me the sex appeal of Felicity kendal.
Re the Ryelands- yes I find them very good sheep for my set up on all sorts of levels though there are lots of other good breeds out there. Its about choosing a breed that suits your situation and again I feel that its about choosing good breeding stock. I find so many smallholders wanting to take a share of the market that the big commercial farmers occupy when even the farmers themselves are struggling despite their inherited infrastructure assets, subsidies and economies of scale.
I dont think it matters what breed you pick its about working to the strengths of that breed, understanding the market and establishing your offer. If it works for someone to borrow a bit of land for the summer, buy 100 stores and sell them on for slaughter making £10 a head in profit then thats exactly what they should do. I dont have enough grazing for that but a modest flock of high quality sheep from large meat lines means I can generate income through breeding lambs for sale or for meat.
I wish I had a quid for the number of times that people had told me that I cant make any money out of something though....Then I would be making a huge profit!
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Record all your costs carefully. Know your cost of production per lamb or per ewe. Only knowing your costs in detail can help you reduce them.
Performance record your sheep - in whatever ways you can. This will help you clearly identify those sheep that do well and those that don't. Get rid of the ones that don't perform. I'm lambing 2-3 weeks later next year in the hope to get better grass available post-lambing; better grass=better milk. I've been recording 60 day lamb weights (adjusted for age or ewe, sex of lamb, singles/twins etc) for three years now so I can use that to see if I get any benefit from lambing later.
Buy quality feed/hay. Don't waste your time and effort on cheap cr*p. Buy bulk if you can but that isn't always possible for those of use with small numbers. Look out for offers though.
Use good pasture management / rotation.
Good planning, year round. This will help you prevent problems before they happen. This should include a health plan, a field use plan, tupping/lambing plan, and feeding plans.
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I would certainly buy like that if I could find a suitable local supplier down here. We do have a mill near by and they make their own feed which is cheaper than the country store but I would love to be able to get hold of Rosemary supplier at £2 a bag!
If you read my post properly, I said it was £2 a bag cheaper if you bought a tonne.
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Ah I see Rosemary. No I didn't read it properly. I thought it was bl@@dy good value.
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Although buy direct from the farmer and you might get close to £2!
I just bought a 1/2 ton bag of bruised barley for £60 - that's equivalent £3 per 25kg bag or £2.40 per 20kg bag. I did have to pick it up myself and I know it is not a complete feed and you have to be careful feeding it.
Feed turnips can often be bought direct from a farmer for only a few (I would guess 20-30) pounds per ton.
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I've always wanted a pair of dungarees ... ;D
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Once barley has been bruised, cracked or rolled it starts degrading so has a limited shelf life compared to the whole grain. If it is going to take you several months to get through it then it is a false economy.
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We buy a milled barley and wheat mix direct from the farm (makes up to 1/3 of the weight of feed for our senior pigs, depending on status) but it's milled weekly and we buy only 10 bags at a time.
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I do the same as Scots Dumpy
buy in 20 or 25 kilo bags. get a mixed pallet. we store our bags in the big half to fish bins there ace for keeping bags away from mice ect.
I never noticed they sold lick though. does everyone use mineral licks all year round? :thinking:
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turn it on its head!!!
make more from your sheep rather than cutting costs?
We shear ourselves, not pretty but does the job, sell fleeces privately to enthusiastic spinners, buy feed direct from farmers in ton or 1/2 ton bags when we can and mill ourselves as we need it, usually a wheelie bin at a time.
We lamb later but thats down to weather conditions up here so grass should be coming through (except this year!!) in time.
We only use licks pre-lambing and for a few weeks post lambing
all meat is sold direct to local hotel and look how lovely they make my lamb chops look ;D
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Those chops look great!
However. . . . . at the end of the day, keeping any number of sheep beyond a small handful, means that direct sales is not necessarily a practical way of selling your lambs (as great as it is!).
Therefore they end up in market or going to an abattoir where the price is set. . . . . so it is only the cost of production that can be altered to increase profits.
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Footvax your sheep - worth the cost and then some. We did ours once in 2007, keep a closed flock anyway and haven't seen footrot or scald once since then. The saving in shepherd's time, cost of foot spray or antibiotics and no check in growth due to being in pain or discomfort is topped by the happiness at not seeing any limping sheep in the field - can't put a price on that one.
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[size=78%]I lamb in spring to keep feed costs down (and hard work) but it's swings and roundabouts - the prime lambs will be ready for market when the prices are at their lowest. If you have lambs ready for market earlier in the year you will have the inconvenience of housing them over winter and extra feed [/size]costs[size=78%].[/size]
[size=78%]This year I kept a number of lambs over winter and sold them as hoggets in March - I got the best price I've ever had even from those who were marked as 'lacking flesh' (these were crosses from [/size]non-commercials such as Gotlands). I'm doing the same with this year's lambs as the prices are currently the lowest Ive seen, it's hardly worth taking them in, but I am lucky to have a reasonable amount of grazing to sustain them.
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Choose breeds that thrive off grass and grass alone - its the cheapest feed.
Buy last years hay, - usually cheap in march april.
Paddock rotate to save the grass - maximise what you can produce yourself.
Remember the highest priced lamb in the market is not always the most profitable - a £60 lamb off grass alone from a breed such as easycare / Hebridean x's finished in under 12 months is still more profitable than the 70 lamb that was done in 4 months, but needed creep and its mother needed ewe nuts and feed in winter.
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Remember the highest priced lamb in the market is not always the most profitable - a £60 lamb off grass alone from a breed such as easycare / Hebridean x's finished in under 12 months is still more profitable than the 70 lamb that was done in 4 months, but needed creep and its mother needed ewe nuts and feed in winter.
In general I agree with you - but it isn't always so. It depends if the faster-finishing lamb can hit the market at its peak, and perhaps even without ever having needed any meds or other interventions.
Our best top-grading lambs finish in 12-14 weeks and should hit the market at a high point. So a 42kg lamb, d/w 18-20kgs, should fetch £80+. It'll have had no meds, and eaten a little cake - perhaps 1/4 to 1/2lb/head/day in the last few weeks; they don't really get on eating cake properly until around 8 weeks old. Total costs per lamb maybe as much as £2. Yes the mum will have been getting cake to keep her milk up early in the season; she may have eaten 1/2 to 1lb/head/day for the 14 weeks. Maybe £5-10 costs on her depending on the year. We don't cake much at all pre-lambing, just enough to keep them stable.
All those weeks that the no-cake ewes and lambs are growing 'for free' on grass... you'll have costs for medications for ewe and lamb (wormers, flukicides, flystrike prevention, occasional antibiotics perhaps), shearing the ewe - and less grass to make hay, so more bought in for the winter. And the longer the lambs live the more likely they are to die ::), so you've losses too.
It's always a big picture in farming ;)
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MF - You could probably achieve the same through harsh culling? But you are right. . . . limping lambs are not a nice sight!
Remy - That's what a lot of folk do, and you DO get a better price, but ultimately the biggest indicator to profit for most sheep farms is days to slaughter, a fast finishing lamb that gets away asap will increase over all profit (one reason is you can over winter more ewes).
Sally - With regard to your early lambs etc, it does depend on there being a price spike for the early spring trade, which this year didn't really happen. So your extra cash is on a 'hope' if that makes sense. . . . you are putting an input in, hoping there will be a greater out put. . . . however its not also the case. Also generally lambing earlier, means indoor lambing (for many) which adds an extra cost (i.e labour).
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Sally - With regard to your early lambs etc, it does depend on there being a price spike for the early spring trade, which this year didn't really happen. So your extra cash is on a 'hope' if that makes sense. . . . you are putting an input in, hoping there will be a greater out put. . . . however its not also the case. Also generally lambing earlier, means indoor lambing (for many) which adds an extra cost (i.e labour).
We don't lamb indoors.
There was no spike of increased prices earlier this year, true - but prices fell away, as they usually do, from mid-July onwards. So we still did better with the earlier lambs.
'Early' for us is end May/early June. We lamb outdoors and we're in Cumbria ;)
Even if there's no price benefit pre-July, we're still quids in due all the ongoing costs we avoid - meds and other treatments for lambs and their mums - and the use of that grass for other purposes, as I enumerated in my initial post.
ETA I am not recommending this for everyone, just saying the oft-parroted 'less feed equals more profit' is a one-dimensional view of a multi-dimensional situation. Also, BH has been doing this for nearly half a century - and his experience shows!
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, BH has been doing this for nearly half a century - and his experience shows!
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He is an expert in his field
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What a brilliant thread for a newbie - Thank you :thumbsup:
Can I sort of jump in and piggyback in and ask if there is anything you could/should/would have done differently at the start to set you up in a better position?
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I tend to seperate all young off at weaning and keep them seperate, and any retianed lambs are kept with the flock. The lambs tend to go on fresh pasture / hay aftermath or rented 2-year ley, so no parasite issues.
I only worm If I have a problem / IE the weight gain dips bellow 200g/day avg when weighted every 4 weeks.
90% of my sheep never see click or crovect, - I cull militantly up and down bloodline when an animal gets ill.
A ewe gets foot rot twice, or struck once, Her daughters, mother and sisters are all removed from the flock.
I see little point in keeping freeloaders or spending money where it is not needed. The imrpvements are visible after just one year, and as you keep going the Sheeps welfare increases rapidly. Very much the idea behind the easycare sheep.
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From our personal perspective our biggest costs are medicines / care products. Clik or its equivalent has a use by date, wormer / flukicide is also relatively costly when needed. Heptavac or lambivac is expensive too. These are our biggest annual costs. Many medicines etc seem to be sold in doses for 25 sheep, so space permitting, it would keep costs per head down to have more sheep, up to a maximum of 25, or multiples of 25. Just a thought.