The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: SallyintNorth on June 24, 2015, 11:21:10 pm
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I have been hearing that only very limited exports have been allowed, and therefore the breeding programmes of these sheep in the UK have been using fertility techniques such as embryo transfer to increase numbers.
Discuss.
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Pyramid scheme?
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Strangely enough I only heard of these sheep yesterday, this thread got me to google. Very cute looking & I can see why people are keen to get.
As for what you suggest is happening I think it is completely immoral but it's sadly the world we live in, very very money driven.
Is there anything that can be done - I doubt it :-\
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Slightly off topic but I just don't understand this drive to bring in more and more continental,sheep breeds when we have huge diversity in our own native sheep, which are bred to suit our climactic conditions. I assume they are going to become another sort of pet for those with more money than sense, and the breeders who have managed to import a few to supply this "must have darling" demand will be laughing all,the way to the bank!
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With the kind of money they're selling for I'd imagine that most of their purchasers are big enterprises/farmers.
With a new importation of a breed will come the need for a structured breeding program to ensure the offspring aren't inbred and give genetic diversity for the future.
I'd say that embryo transfer is probably the quickest/ best way to achieve this in a short time and it'll be something that big enterprises will have experience of with their cattle, I can see why they would do it.
I'm not sure if just because something can be done, it should be done but at the same time I can see that having made a significant investment in stock, breeders will need to recoup this.
Anyone who is going to spend the amount of money these sheep cost, will surely have researched them thoroughly - more fool them if not.
There are always going to be 'fads' whether designer dogs or exotic sheep - time will tell if the Valais Blacknose go the distance.
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Aye, we have around 60 British breeds with all kinds of lovely fleeces and all habituated to our conditions to some extent.
But I know that even Mrs Scothebs herself, our lovely Fleecewife, has a soft spot for these cute creatures!
The whole import vs AI/embryo transfer thing is a tricky one.
As a farmer in an area clinging on to its 'TB free' status, I'd have to say that if people must import bloodlines, of whatever species and breed, then less actual live animal importation is preferable. So on that basis, bringing in only a few animals and then breeding up locally is preferable.
But I do have misgivings about the use of intrusive fertility mechanisms. Less so when we're saving one of our own rare breeds, perhaps, than when it's being done to introduce an animal from elsewhere. Especially when, as far as one can make out, the only attribute this sheep has over any of our native (or already present) breeds is its cuteness.
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Well LG, I am importing Charmoise via frozen semen as though there is a growing UK Charmoise flock genetic diversity could be improved. In this instance I feel the continental breed fills a niche better than anything the UK has at home - that need/niche being easy lambing, ability to thrive on low inputs and still achieve excellent results on the EUROPE carcass grid.
Possibly in future farming pressures will change and the Charmoise niche will diminish and other breeds will come to the fore either foreign or domestic.
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I agree. The farmers around me who use Texels moan every year about the lambing problems, those using Charollais about how thin-skinned the lambs are .... It's fashion and folks jump on the bandwagon
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Isn't this what they've done with the NZ Suffolk ie the Easyram company?
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In what sense?
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To me, as a farmer, it's more 'worthy' and justifiable to do some intrusive fertility when there are arguments such as you cite for bringing in continental blood, Me.
However, that's just me being a profit-driven money-grubbing farmer :-J. Should it only be justifiable for profit with a mainstream meat breed? No doubt these 'early adopters' will be making quite a bit of profit selling their VB lambs on... and yes, that gives rise to the concern of 'pyramid-selling', in that the only way to recoup the initial very high purchase price is to breed more to sell at a high price to another keeper, who will have the same quandary. Much as happened with alpacas - and at least they have lovely fleece that can be sold (although you'd never make back the purchase price of a breeding female through selling her fleece.)
There is a market for VB fleece at the moment, as it has rarity value. However, I hear it isn't particularly soft, or fine, or anything special really, so that bubble will burst pretty quick, I would think.
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...Valais Blacknose ...... the latest thing since Alpaca! .... another get rich quick for those at the top (thanks to ADAM!) .... They are VERY CUTE though!
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an expensive waste of time.......... you cant eat them - waste of money - you can show them to school kids, and spend £thousands on them............ how to recoup? You must sell to other breeders... soon the numbers will rise, the price will fall and everyone will be burnt like with alpaccas and then onto the next rare continental breed.
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you cant eat them
Whyever not?
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you cant eat them
Whyever not?
Would you buy lamb at £90 per kilo ?
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Me: well they ve imported semen and done embryo transfers for they're easyrams, same as what you were saying :wave:
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They are made of lamb/mutton and have, so I am told, got a good carcase and are large sheep.
So they can be eaten.
I agree that any keepers won't be making any money out of selling their meat, but that wasn't the question :D
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You're right Sally, I do have a soft spot for Nez Noire de Valais - I became aware of them long before Adam did his visit and just fell for a picture of a lamb at a wool event. But I'm laughing my head off at folk importing them at such vast expense.
When I saw them in person at the Smallholders show, I was surprised that a) they are huge, and b) their fleece is not very nice, from a spinners point of view. I also wonder how they would adapt from their native environment: largely our wet, v their relative dry. All that heavy fleece in our endless rain could mean they struggle outdoors.
As for embryo transplant per se, I have mixed feelings. One of my sons worked with the Dolly team, so I have an insider's view to some extent - not all positive. However, I almost became involved in embryo transfer myself when I was trying to get a 'fallback' flock established in Oz. The reason behind that was that in the aftermath of the horrors of F&M, we realised that all the Hebs were in Britain, so very vulnerable to extinction by Government policy. Unfortunately, the importer, who lived on a small island off the Oz coast, in the end couldn't afford the costs involved, so the plan fell through. In that situation, embryo transfer (in this case into a maternal hostess of a different local breed) was the only way to get the animals into Oz. All to do with Scrapie Resistance genetics. So I think it has it's place, and of course it's a scientific breakthrough tada. In the case of the Hebs, as an extra protection for Oz from Scrapie, all the donor Heb ewes here, would have had to be slaughtered after egg collection, so their brains could be checked for signs of scrapie itself. Well, no-one was going to give up their quality stock for that, so the Ozzie animals could have ended up as being second rate. I've not totally forgotten the scheme and its purpose of creating a small nucleus of a British rare breed as far away from here as possible, as an insurance policy, but I'll let others actually do it.
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Well, I suppose the British keepers of this breed are establishing an off-site gene pool, in case something happens to them in their native habitat. :thinking:
Ideally, though, it would have been better to be a dry mountainous area, such as their home, I agree.
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Me: well they ve imported semen and done embryo transfers for they're easyrams, same as what you were saying :wave:
Oh right, yes I think they have. Personally, I dislike the intrusive methods including AI and would much prefer things done naturally. When you are looking at shipping genes across the world then it is the most practical and biosecure way to do it. I have a selection of females and a ram or two from this round of AI and hopefully will get the same from the other ram on ice and will not need to import for a long time. Other people are showing interest in following suit so maybe I will be able to just go and buy a nice ram by then! The only problem for me is finding another flock with similar aims and management, doing it all on farm I know a lot more about the ram I keep.
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I know a different species but when AI was first mentioned in the welsh pony world there was much worry, but it's a pretty common practice now, not used it my self but will do in the future, particularly with mares that I don't want to leave home. Improves my choices,. Also the embryo transfer is done a lot in the eventing and jumping world, a lot of mares far to valuable to push.
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As horses have been mentioned... :innocent:
My friend has produced all her good Warmbloods by AI. How else is an ordinary UK small-scale breeder going to get the best German genes into their stock? I dont see the problem
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In the 18th Century the Merino was imported to improve the fleece of Down sheep breeds but couldn't cope with the wet climate.
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In my opinion I would say lets focus on the traditional breeds of Britain, no doubt these breeds belong where they came from. Also with the amount of sheep rustling I would never have a sane moment. I have heard that a farmer paid £55000 on a few ewes and a ram and spent £5000 on CCTV, ridiculous. Mind you the wool would be a treat for spinners. :thinking:
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Well their are some cracking rare breeds out their to try - but the blacknose has a novetly value no one can currently play against - and I can see it having its place - that and I've been told its as good a forage converter as any breed and can cope with crap pasture........
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Who knows? 20 years from now will all the comercial boys be using valais mules or valais sires?
The lleyn was almost extinct 25 years ago...
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no
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Somehow I don't think so, everyone prefers Lleyn, Texel, Beltex, Welsh, Mules, etc, etc. The Valais would be an absolute pain to shear, the risk of fly-strike would double, unless they're quite resistant to fly-strike and I bet they're quite a fatty breed too.
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SHeep breeds change with fashion but I think novelty value and the ability to produce a good Mule or butcher's lamb don't necessarily go together. Most young lambs are rather appealing. When you're dealing with a long, muddy fleece at shearing time maybe the appeal would fade somewhat.
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Interesting thread! We only came across this breed very recently and it is very easy to get hooked! As the owners of a Greyface Dartmoor flock here in West Wales we can get very blasé about "ultra cute" lambs - but these take the prize very easily.
Good points about the fleece and flystrike though. Our Greyfaces also have very coarse wool like the Valais, are probably a good bit smaller, but can be a bugger to shear and getting them dry enough to shear takes a few days. Not sure the Valais would really cope with our wet weather here, I have read they can be inside for 6 months or more in their home patch. We have avoided flystrike so far this year, but it is a constant threat and digging wold be just as bad as with a grey face. After all, they are sheep, they eat grass and it comes out the other end in various states of gooey, most of which stick to wool like glue and get steadily worse!!! As my neighbour points out, they are a rare breed for a reason!
As for the price (what are they going for anyway?) that will fall. When we started with our Greyfaces it was quite difficult to source breeding ewes and they could be expensive although we were fortunate. Now, just a few years later, you can barely give them away and whilst I am all for keeping bloodlines and pedigrees, we have had to resort to some crosses to get bigger lambs faster to subsidise the pedigrees.
Much as they look cute, I think I'll pass on this one (along with the alpacas, ostriches and just about everything else!)
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Working on a rare breed NT farm I see some breeds that have always been 'parkland', or as I like to (affectionately) call them 'pointless breeds'. Like the Bagot Goats. Some like White Park Cattle are less pointless, but nonetheless way off commercial. But they all increase diversity in the gene pool overall. Yes it is a form of Pyramid selling, but you just need to know where you are on the Pyramid, in that respect it is no different than increasing your flock on the guess that lamb prices will be better next year. Personally I am not seduced by the cute pictures and prefer to stick with my Ryelands but then Alpacas never appealed to me either.
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This baffles me! We have over sixty 'native' breeds in this country and yet we import foreign breeds. If we want the consumer to buy British then surely we should be breeding/producing British sheep .(Stand up and be proud)!! Many of our own breeds need our help to keep the numbers up.
Farmers spending tens of thousands on a ram then bleating on they can't make any money out of sheep.C'mon??
Yes I believe these will be a passing fad until the market for them is flooded, then what?
Personally I think they look demonic!!!
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Steve has a point - Breeds are often rare for a good reason - And most breeds I can think of their downsides - Some are escape artists, others too small, bad grades, slow growing, too much wool, strike, feet etc, and Most farmers have stuck with simpler systems based around breeds perfected to their area, and that simply means a lot get crowded out as they dont match, that said they do widen the gene base and are very valugble in that respect.
Something as simple as the fact that using Hebrideans to cross with texels to produce a breeding ewe - the resulting 1st cross is an excelent animal, grading well in its own right, fast growing but alot of the hardiness of the hebridean, and the ability to thrive and grow well on VERY poor grazing, and live out all year - the genetics are coming from the rare breed, and have a place, but on its own the Heb is difficult to make pay in the purest sense.
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One of the Valias breeders is offering their last 3 fleeces for £60 a fleece on FB (https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=1085259358165854&id=1084275421597581). Says
They are incredibly soft not at all like any other of the British long wool breeds
which frankly has got my back right up. Not only do we have some wonderful longwools with gorgeous fleeces, but from what I've heard, the Valais is more at the GFD end of the scale than the Leicester Longwool end. :rant: :rant:
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But then, Sally, if they advertised them as "almost as good as several very hardy British native breeds you can buy for a fraction of the cost of these", would they have any takers ....?
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But then, Sally, if they advertised them as "almost as good as several very hardy British native breeds you can buy for a fraction of the cost of these", would they have any takers ....?
lol. But yes, they would :D. Spinners love a new fluffy to try... :excited: :spin:
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I saw them for the first time at the kent show, met the owners, who were very nice, the sheep are really very calm and friendly, much larger than I had thought, and in time as they become more popular the price will come down, too higher price for me at 4k per ewe. :)
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I saw them for the first time at the kent show, met the owners, who were very nice, the sheep are really very calm and friendly, much larger than I had thought, and in time as they become more popular the price will come down, too higher price for me at 4k per ewe. :)
4k a ewe!!!! I'm lost for words I need to go and sit down.
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A fool and their money . . . . .
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A fool and their money . . . . .
Very true
I did touch a Valais at a show this year in may, I was surprised how rough the hair/wool was, was expecting it to be much softer, the ewe was very tall, taller than a zwartbles and thin, like a mule after milking the whole summer and skipping a few worming doses even though the lamb/lambs it had with it was/were very small and young.
It was highly amusing though as when I touched the ewes side, she turned her head and scratched where I touched with her long and twisted horn, I did it a few times in different spots and she kept repeating it, hitting the exact spot each time, maybe it just proves I am easily amused ::) but I found it hilarious! she was chewing the cud the whole time she did it