[Castle Farm]

I keep Lleyns.

The cost of a tup hire this year is £4 per ewe, up to 25 ewes.

The farmer I hire mine off has about 1000 ewes and over 1500 lambs.

From the male lambs he will select and re-select untill he finishes with the best of them, usually about 4 at the most.

The rams he has bought in are never less than £1500 each, so hireing a ram lamb from him is cheap at £4 a ewe, as you don't need to keep it all year round.

[SteveHants]

I keep Lleyns.

The cost of a tup hire this year is £4 per ewe, up to 25 ewes.

The farmer I hire mine off has about 1000 ewes and over 1500 lambs.

From the male lambs he will select and re-select untill he finishes with the best of them, usually about 4 at the most.

The rams he has bought in are never less than £1500 each, so hireing a ram lamb from him is cheap at £4 a ewe, as you don't need to keep it all year round.

You'd hope if he has 1000 breeding Lleyn ewes, he'd have 1800 lambs or so, unless he negative flushes.


That is kind of my case in point about tup breeding - wasn't anything to do with Wiltshire Horns per se - just the size of flock you'd need to manage to find a tup you'd want to use.

[FiB]

Wow, how do you tell 4 good ones from 100's that  wouldnt make it as tups   Hats off.  I'd love a lesson in sorting!  I was thinking of buying a ram lamb/yearling at the beulah sales (not one that is being sold as a ram) this autumns and trying him as a tup - but that sounds like it might be folly? Such a lot to learn!

[Blackbird]

Apart from this the joy of sitting in a field with a dozen relaxed sheep chewing the cud is worth it.

That's what it's about for me too. Whether I'll feel quite so mellow when it's a freezing, sleeting day in January remains to be seen of course......

[SteveHants]

Wow, how do you tell 4 good ones from 100's that  wouldnt make it as tups   Hats off.  I'd love a lesson in sorting!  I was thinking of buying a ram lamb/yearling at the beulah sales (not one that is being sold as a ram) this autumns and trying him as a tup - but that sounds like it might be folly? Such a lot to learn!

Litter size, weight at weaning, muscle scan, fat scan etc..... These figs can the be compared to the performance of the entire crop of ram lambs for the entire breed (or those breeders recording ebvs). You can then go off shape etc. Of course some of the rare breeds (and commercials too, come to that) dont use ebvs...so youd have to compare the growth of your ram lambs to the others in your flock and then factor in his litter size....


Point is, no matter how rare your breed - a flock of six wouldnt give you a saleable tup unless by massive fluke (of course, if you had ebvs for them you could compare, but prob wouldnt be worth the cost of muscle scans etc)

[Fronhaul]

I have to disagree on the subject of producing saleable tups from small flocks.  I think you will find that many producers of top quality tups actually run a flock within a flock and it is from the sub flock of top quality ewes that they select the tups they put forward for sale.  I do know that one commercial flock that regularly wins major awards and achieves top prices for tups (and ewes) selects from a group of 20 ewes.  You need to know your bloodlines and have a very clear idea of where you are going to achieve this.  And this breeder is involved in a minority breed that does not use ebvs.  But he is far from the only one I know using the sub flock approach.
 
 As for selecting a prospective tup try to go and see the ones you are interested in the field first if you can.  A prospective tup should shout at you in the field that he is special.  Outline, topline and that unidentifiable factor call it wow factor or presence or what you will but you will know when you find it.  Sometimes hands on examination will burst the bubble but your first reaction is worth trusting to develop a shortlist.

[Foobar]

I think that unless you are very skilled and have purchased accordingly,  you are unlikely to have a flock of 20 perfect ewes.  I'm sure he's chosen those 20 best ones from his 200 other ewes over time.  The greater your flock numbers the higher the chance that you will have that perfect ewe or ram.


I've hired rams before and paid £5 per lamb born - so that's performance related pay which is good .  I wouldn't buy a ram at a sale.  I think you need to see him on farm, and see his siblings and parents (and offspring too if applicable).

[lachlanandmarcus]

I paid £50 to buy our old Shetland tup and he gave me 3 crops of nice lambs before he was PTS. This year I will be crossing to a Cheviot and am using ram lambs (two swapped over at half time in case one non performer) and this will be a loan, the cost - a ewe lamb from the resulting 'output'. Suits both parties well.

[SteveHants]

I think that unless you are very skilled and have purchased accordingly,  you are unlikely to have a flock of 20 perfect ewes.  I'm sure he's chosen those 20 best ones from his 200 other ewes over time.  The greater your flock numbers the higher the chance that you will have that perfect ewe or ram.


I've hired rams before and paid £5 per lamb born - so that's performance related pay which is good .  I wouldn't buy a ram at a sale.  I think you need to see him on farm, and see his siblings and parents (and offspring too if applicable).

Well exactly - what he is doing is looking at his top performers out of 200. So; he'll put his best ram to those 20, and keep the best ewes as replacements, which will mean he has an even better subflock next year and so on, he may then expand his 'pool' of best performers that he selects rams from and so on. And should a good ram crop up from amongst the rest, well....

[plumseverywhere]

Ooh crikey, I'm glad that I only keep 'pet' sheep. My 5 have cost me a bottle of home made wine, were mainly reared off of the excess goats milk, we had the heptavacP in the fridge for the goats anyway oh and a bag or 2 of creep. Luckily fencing already done.


We'd never have been in a position to start a breeding flock for financial reasons.

[woollyval]

Read this thread with great interest having kept sheep for an awfully long time! I think its as expensive as you want to make it!
So you could go for say 10 fantastically expensive shearling ewes from a top flock plus a ram from another top flock....and whether pedigree rare or minority breed or commercial breed the expense is going to be eye watering.....and even more eye watering for more!

So you could buy 10 old cast ewes from a top flock....will still have a lambing or two in them but you will pay peanuts comparatively and get ewes that have proven themselves in a good flock. Same for a ram, a good proven chap in the twilight of his career!.....you then can breed your own 'top quality' flock

Equipment.....yes you can go and buy thousands of pounds of shiny new stuff, but some of the smartest Texel sheep I have ever seen including 4 royal show champion rams in the same field was a small farm literally held together with baler!!! Their stock/grassland management was amazing...their equipment basic and involved lots of bits of pallet....!

Making a profit is very very possible.....my sheep have always been in profit and I have kept everything from longwools to minature sheep and plenty of commercials.
Steve in hants.....Oh yes it is possible to breed top tups from a small flock....its part of the stock skills that you aquire! I sold a wensleydale ram lamb several years ago and he went on to win at every show he went to as an adult....and I only kept a few wensleys for fun at the time (but again based on some old ewes and an elderly ram I aquired in a job lot of sheep)
Its possible to be profitable from commercial meat lambs, esp as the price is good at the moment, but its also perfectly possible to be profitable from specialost sheep....esp ones with coloured or long wool as skins from these sheep sell for amazing amounts

When it comes to feed bills.....simple answer is do not run too many sheep for your land......and too many smallholders have too many animals 
Vets bills can be reduced to minimal with good stock management and learning from other experienced people BEFORE expensive mistakes are made.
Medicines.....again mostly over used and not understood properly which is sad....and incredibly expensive.....make sure you know your wormers, fly treatments etc.

Sheep of all breeds can cost little, be kept on a budget and can make a profit but it requires resourcefullness and knowledge....plus a little bit of luck   

[Blackbird]

I think we've overlooked the 53p each for packets of Rich Tea biscuits! The lambs don't understand them at all, but my elderly GFD ewe will stand patient as you like for foot treatment, Crovecting and dagging etc. provided there is a steady supply of biscuit morsels going in at the front. Worth their weight in gold as I could never turn her! 

[Buffy the eggs layer]

Ha ha Blackbird,
 I too have discovered the sheep charming power of the Rich tea biscuit but if you are paying 53p for them then you havent discovered Aldi!
I'm with you on this one one Woolly val but in the words of Henry Ford...,
"If you think you can or you think you can't, you are probably right"
If you dont belive that something will work for you then it wont. Equally if you belive its possible then you will find a way to achive it.
Many of us have to start off with breeding stock that is either all that we can afford or the only ones that show breeders are prepared to part with and still manage to produce saleable stock of good type and quality.  A combination of good managment and good breeding as well as a little good fortune makes all the difference.
However there are clearly many breeders who do not share this experience and struggle to make their hobby pay.
The costings that I listed inthe start of this thread were simply to give newbies a guide to possible expense. As for proffit however, well thats clearly a little harder to estimate.
The fact that some members do make their sheep pay though, will hopefully encourage others to find ways to do the same.
 
 

[Big Light]

I'm with the Small Flock can produce quality tups on a regular basis brigade.

 I have worked flocks of 3,000 ewes down to flocks of 12 ewes and it is in fact easier to know the strengths and qualities of your animals with the smaller flock and if you are happy enough to split a small flock to 2 or more tups then you can maintain your genetic diversity and match qualities you desire. You obviously need to buy good sound foundation stock but it can be done and it is nonsense  to say other wise.
There are people with commercial breeds that regularly produce 4 or 5 figure tups from flocks of 20 ewes

You can keep records far easier with a smaller flock ( whether mentally or not), you can improve a small flock easier ( In's and outs) you are more likely to know the pedigree and potentially what the sire / dam or grandsire/dam was like especially with rare breeds

"If you are breeding rams, even in a minority breed, I would probably reckon a flock of about 50 is too small, but might have to do if the breed was rare"  - The point of most rare and minority breeds is that they are rare and in a lot of these breeds, only a few breeders (if any) have flocks of 50 or more - therefore if we followed this hypothesis all breeds would end up in danger of loosing all genetic diversity and potentially having inbreeding issues and is again nonsensical

"I think that unless you are very skilled and have purchased accordingly,  you are unlikely to have a flock of 20 perfect ewes" - in respect of this nobody really has a perfect ewe ( even the champion sheep will have a fault the shepherd knows about ) but the being skilled and purchase accordingly is just being a good stockman/shepherd and this skill is not outwith the reach of most should they want to achieve it. You have to be selective about what you keep whole but it's just about being true/honest to the breed

This is the same with most stock, i breed top quality birds , i don't need thousands of birds for that i can select a small breeding pen! and produce a champion quality bird.

At the end of the day it suits some people with a higher than average quality small flock to produce tups. There is the need to be able to contain them separately which may be more difficult for the small holder but if by producing / selling 2 or 3 tups / tup lambs from the small flock the person can try to break even or make a profit then the market at the end of the day will be the judge!

Anyone wishing to follow this path should not be dissuaded by others comments but if starting out they should buy the best stock they can afford -  better to buy 2 quality ewes than 6 average sheep and build up thereafter

[JFDI]

That makes a lot of sense and was easy to understand too.  Thank you.