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Author Topic: Rare breed = expensive  (Read 28421 times)

twizzel

  • Joined Apr 2012
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #30 on: February 02, 2013, 11:09:56 am »
I think also this winter has been really difficult for farmers- if your fields are flooded, you're running out of hay/straw and you can't bring all of your sheep in, I guess they must pick their best, younger ewes and send the rest off for whatever they can get for them.
Next winter will be even worse what with all of the winter corn that's been drilled and hasn't come through but that's a completely different thread topic in itself.

Marches Farmer

  • Joined Dec 2012
  • Herefordshire
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #31 on: February 02, 2013, 01:24:54 pm »
I agree.  We normally leave the turnout field ungrazed from the end of August, to give the ewes a good bite after lambing, but grass growth has been so slow this winter, due to both waterlogged roots and low light levels, that they've been on it for the last week and brought into the shed at night, as an attempt at reaching a balance between eating the hay stocks and pugging the land.  We grazed the hoggetts on a neighbour's 3 fields through last Winter but the grazing ran out at Christmas this year.

quiltycats

  • Joined Nov 2012
  • Ooop North
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #32 on: February 02, 2013, 02:07:17 pm »
A poor quality sheep costs just as much to feed as a good one and more to put right.

We won't put our sheep though the market, mainly because what ever any one says there is prejudice against the rare breeds by the commercial boys. I have never had a farmer feel sorry for me because the market price of a rare breed Ryeland Tup wasn't  in the thousands that the Swaledale Tup breeders get, (luck money or no luck money). There is and always be mass market and niche market and disease and bad weather and ill luck and poor choices can affect anyone. When there is less reliance on subsidy and more reliance on actual market value then I might give a grudging thought of sympathy to the big boys.

 

Marches Farmer

  • Joined Dec 2012
  • Herefordshire
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #33 on: February 02, 2013, 06:56:45 pm »
Depends what you mean by "big boys".  A hillside in Wales might support hundreds of outdoor lambing ewes producing lamb on ground otherwise too poor for food production, but if you don't have housing and are having to buy in hay or feed because of the atrocious weather conditions, your profit margin this year will be eroded to almost nothing.

SteveHants

  • Joined Aug 2011
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #34 on: February 03, 2013, 12:32:03 am »
Theres plenty of people producing lamb without subsidy.


You pick your breeds accordingly. If pedigree whatevers are not useful commercial sheep, dont be surprised if commercial farmers dont pay top money for them. Yes, a lot of money gets passed round some tup breeders, but thats a whole different game - it usually stays within a 'circle' of breeders until someone is brave/foolish enough to buy into that who is not part of the cartel.


I'm a commercial sheep farmer and I have never paid over £600 for a tup - I dont think many people do.


If you wanted to attract commercial money, youd have picked a commercial breed - there are plenty small sheep producers who do, and breed Texels or Beltex, Suffolks, Hampshires, Lleyns etc and make good money doing it.


No point in buying a flock of Ryelands knowing full well that they are not what the commercial market wants and then feeling annoyed because they fetch nothing at market.

Marches Farmer

  • Joined Dec 2012
  • Herefordshire
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #35 on: February 03, 2013, 08:31:14 am »
True.  We're very keen to help conserve rare and traditional breeds of all classes of stock  and are about the only ones in our area so we have a bit of a monopoly.  We put our Badger Face (which is classed as a traditional breed rather than a rare one) to our Southdown tups every other year and this produces a good commercial carcase to sell at market.  We also hire out registered SD tups, mostly to smallholders who don't want a ram on the place all year, or to commercial farmers who're tired of lambing difficulties and high feed costs due to using Continental breeds and want to try a native breed again.  Horses for courses, I guess.

quiltycats

  • Joined Nov 2012
  • Ooop North
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #36 on: February 03, 2013, 10:28:19 am »
The OP was indicting those who raise rare breeds on a small scale for not lowering our prices out of sympathy with commercial large scale producers. I sincerely doubt any Ryeland breeder is "feeling annoyed" the commercial market are biased against them, which is why it seems absurd that a non-rare breeds sheep farmer would seem annoyed that with in the private selling arena we too can command decent prices.

The Tup Cartels artificially inflate the perceived price of a tup and in a far more exaggerated way than Ryeland, or any other minority, breeders ever could inflate the price of the breed across the board.

As I said previously   "There is and always be mass market and niche market and disease and bad weather and ill luck and poor choices can affect anyone."


Fleecewife

  • Joined May 2010
  • South Lanarkshire
    • ScotHebs
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #37 on: February 03, 2013, 12:46:17 pm »
Please don't forget also that there is a larger purpose behind the keeping of rare and minority/traditional breeds, which is ultimately to the benefit of those who rear sheep as their livelihood.  This is the preservation of traditional breeds through times, such as now, when they are not popular commercially.  You may say that they are rare for a reason, implying there is something wrong with these breeds, but they are simply out of fashion or, more likely currently inappropriate for today's needs.  The reason they need to be preserved is so that when conditions change, as they are doing all the time - climate, customer preferences, shepherding, a wool market and so on - the rare breeds will be there ready and waiting to have their now appropriate characteristics available to breed into commercial stock.  This might be better feet,  a double coat (if wool prices were to go down even more and allowing the new crosses to survive better outdoors all year), a short tail ( less prone to flystrike), ease of lambing (the northern shorttails have a wider pelvis for their size than other breeds so tend to lamb more easily), good and quick mothering (where shepherding costs may become too high to be able to intervene at current rates), finer or coarser fleece (depending on the market - remember how the fashion for wood floors has shrunk the carpet market), there are all sorts of traits within the rarer breeds, which were developed in different times, which will be of benefit to future sheep breeds - remember the Suffolk which was developed from the Norfolk Horn.
Breeders of these traditional breeds need to be able to live too, by selling their stock.
 
However, the price for meat sheep is bound to be less than that for pedigrees of whatever breed, and the price for poorly animals will be less than for good strong healthy ones.  Most breeders of the rare breeds are raising stock primarily to sell on as breeding stock, and selling the meat of those that don't make the grade is a secondary product.
 
The vast majority of those raising rare etc breeds are not doing it to have a couple of pet sheep (which are usually not bred from) but are serious breeders raising good quality stock for other breeding enterprises.  So comparing the prices of pedigree sheep, of whatever breed, with prices of meat sheep, again of whatever breed, is not comparing like for like.  Pouring scorn on one type of enterprise against another just because you are unfamiliar with it is non-productive - both types of sheep enterprise are equally valid, but different.
« Last Edit: February 03, 2013, 04:25:48 pm by Fleecewife »
"Let's not talk about what we can do, but do what we can"

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Do something today that your future self will thank you for - plant a tree

 Love your soil - it's the lifeblood of your land.

SteveHants

  • Joined Aug 2011
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #38 on: February 03, 2013, 03:47:11 pm »
This is all true -


What I am saying is, you should probably know your market before you decide on a breed. Its no good buying something non commercial and feeling people are 'prejudiced' against your breed if you choose to sell at mart. I have kept (and still keep) rare (ish) breed sheep, and I know I won't get top money at mart for my lambs (although Wilts Horns don't do to badly these days usually about £10/head less than commercial type lambs).


However, I have chosen my market/plan carefully - I know I am going to be selling the vast majority of my lambs at market and so in my final phase of my "glorious three-year plan", have put my commercial (woolshedding) ewes to a suftex. I still now produce pure Wilts and polled woolshedders as replacements, but I will target these differently.


Small flocks of rare breeds will also have to target their market carefully. I think it is a very good thing that people are choosing to keep minority breeds going, I did exactly the same thing when I started. I see the sheep industry as a whole entity though and I never felt any 'us and them' compared to commercial sheep farmers.


One thing I do hope though is that owners of rare breeds do take a look at the place of their breed within the system and keep them accordingly. Its much better, for example, if you were keeping primitives to try and approximate as best you can the niche they fit into. For example: when I do get round to hatching my cunning Wilts/Shetalnd plan, I will be looking for shetlands that are lambed outside, preferably kept on poor ground and are not caked.

VSS

  • Joined Jan 2009
  • Pen Llyn
    • Viable Self Sufficiency.co.uk
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #39 on: February 03, 2013, 04:08:07 pm »
At the end of the day, an animal is only worth what someone is prepared to pay for it.



Alot of it is down to where you choose to sell your sheep. If you have a rare/unusual/primitive breed, you are wasting your time taking them to the local weekly sale. You will get very little for them. You will have to take them either to a specialist rare breed sale, or sell privately.
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Fleecewife

  • Joined May 2010
  • South Lanarkshire
    • ScotHebs
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #40 on: February 03, 2013, 04:40:45 pm »
This is all true -


One thing I do hope though is that owners of rare breeds do take a look at the place of their breed within the system and keep them accordingly. Its much better, for example, if you were keeping primitives to try and approximate as best you can the niche they fit into. For example: when I do get round to hatching my cunning Wilts/Shetalnd plan, I will be looking for shetlands that are lambed outside, preferably kept on poor ground and are not caked.

Absolutely.  This is the main reason for my reservations about showing rare breeds, which can end up with generations living in soft conditions just to keep them winning top prizes.  Then they get to the point where they no longer show the original hardy and thrifty traits of the breed.  It's a bit of a quandary though, as showing brings the breed to the notice of others, which in turn helps increase their popularity.
 
We are lucky to live at altitude and keep our Hebs outdoors all year round, and many of our breeding stock customers come to us because of that, so there are plenty of breeders who see the importance of maintaining conditions similar to the original ones for the breed.  We do lack salt spray though  ;D
We recently bought two Shetland gimmers which are lovely specimens and came from close by, but they are on the large side so I will watch with interest how they do in our climate.  So far they are eating for about 6.........  It will be interesting too to see how future generations turn out (these two are white which might explain their size; we have kept only coloured Shetlands before)
"Let's not talk about what we can do, but do what we can"

There is NO planet B - what are YOU doing to save our home?

Do something today that your future self will thank you for - plant a tree

 Love your soil - it's the lifeblood of your land.

thenovice

  • Joined Oct 2011
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #41 on: February 03, 2013, 06:11:10 pm »
Perhaps if some of the rare breed keepers were more concerned with promoting the breed, and their qualities, and less concerned with how much money they can charge, or how many shows they can win, the sheep might be less of a rare breed, and more available to everyone. This could only be a good thing surely?  :innocent:

quiltycats

  • Joined Nov 2012
  • Ooop North
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #42 on: February 03, 2013, 07:20:30 pm »
Out of curiosity Thenovice how do you think minority breeders selling at prices our market will buy, as opposed commercial produces selling through the general auction marts differs ? Are you suggesting the commercial producer is going to say "nay lad that's too much here have this animal cheaper"
Do you perhaps think that agricultural shows, some how don't count as a means by which the qualities of farm livestock is promoted. Or that only minority breeds are shown ? 




landhallow

  • Joined Nov 2012
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #43 on: February 03, 2013, 07:30:34 pm »

I should have said my crosses were castlemilks x shetlands and that THEY would be of no use to someone such as yourself.
But then having said that my 50% Castlemilk x shetlands shed there fleece entirely.. I wonder what their daughters would be like if crossed to a Wilts.... :thinking: :thinking: :D
[/quote]

Hi Colliewoman, I have Castlemilks and am wondering whether to cross with Shetlands. I can get a Shetland tup locally no problem, whereas I am finding it quite difficult to find an unrelated Castlemilk tup... Didn't realise they would shed their fleece either  :D How do you find the Castlemilk Crosses in comparison to Castlemilk through n through?

thenovice

  • Joined Oct 2011
Re: Rare breed = expensive
« Reply #44 on: February 03, 2013, 08:01:57 pm »
Come on, lets be honest, im not a proper shepherd/farmer, its not my main source of income. And i would imagine that a lot of rare breed keepers and enthusiasts on here had the land and disposable income first, and then decided to get sheep. If the market prices rise and fall, its not the end of the world for them. If someone wants to pay £250 for a mini, primitive fashionable sheep, wait 18mnths for a 10- 15 kilo low fat super healthy carcase, and they have the money to do it, then thats fine. But dont pretend charging those prices is for the good of the breed. Its not proper farming and you cant compare it to meat production. And yes, i do have sympathy for all the farmers who are struglling at the minute, and to say its all about subsides is ridiculous!

 

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