[mowhaugh]

I keep Kerrys. They are beautiful, and stone mad. I love them, but you do need excellent handling facilities, they can jump anything.  They will tame, and become friendly with time, but still have that self preservation instinct which can take you by surprise even with the tamest ones. They will easily take on a dog, I can only take one of our dogs to work with the Kerrys, the one who will nip the ends of their noses when told to. Showing them is fun. They are great mums and need minimum input at lambing time.  The meat is delicious, but if you are selling them through the mart, you'll get a lower price per kilo than many breeds as they don't kill out so well.

[Emmett]

We wouldn't really be keeping the tup lambs, just the ewe lambs. My idea was to raise the lambs up a wee bit and sell them at the mart, which is why my mind first sprang to Suffolks. We have two fields next to eachother which totals about 6 acres, out of our 20, I was going to keep the ewes and their lambs in those fields one week at a time and just move them across. I will take the tup lambs away after they are weaned and keep them with the ram on the other side of the farm. The just keep the ewes and the ewe lambs together

[Bramblecot]

It's amazing what you learn through here .  I've just had a read-up and The Kerry Hill Society is obviously a very active showing group in NI .  If you like the idea of showing and the look of the breed, then I'd  say give it a go.

[Emmett]

I've only been on here for about a half a month and already I'm a Smallholder dictionary thanks to you guys! I'll have to thank Rosemary for such a brilliant site!

Even though I'm only 15 i really hope to be showing sheep by next summer! To be honest, I'm hoping that starting the smallholding will be a stepping stone to becoming a full blown farmer! I only have 20 acres at the moment, and to be honest, the only thing I could see making decent money is cattle! But I love sheep so thats why I want to get a pedigree flock up and running alongside the cattle enterprise. There is always land available to rent next to us so that will not be a problem when it comes to expanding! 

Even just thinking about it gets me excited!

The shortlist is now down to Suffolks, Kerry Hills and Border Leicesters!

[mowhaugh]

I would see if you can visit a flock of each of those, and see what your gut feeling is.  It sounds to me like to have the right attitude to make it work whatever you pick.  Good luck!

[Emmett]

Thanks Mowhaugh! I'm going to visit my uncle tomorrow and as luck would have it he keeps both Pedigree Suffolks and Kerry Hills! I'm finding it difficult to find any farmers who keep Border Leicesters though, maybe thats a sign?

[shygirl]

if you like suffolks get some - there wouldnt be any of the popular crossbreds if the originals werent around. they are very beautiful, a bit too big for me though.

ladygrey - why would they feed turkey food instead of sheep food? strange.

[Emmett]

Shygirl I was wondering the same thing too!

[Big Benny Shep]

I love my texels and cross them to the suffolk to get big decent shaped heavy lambs, the crosses do well and we keep the best for breeding. we also have lleyns (they are mental) and NoE mules both of which have scanned well this year. i know white faced lams always do better at market than darker ones where i am and most of our crosses come fairly white.
in my experience leicesters die a lot. we used to have them years back when breeding mules, they were a right pain! very soft and pretty dim, but they did milk well.


HTH

[Emmett]

Benny how many acres do you have?  Thats some amount of sheep! haha For u, flighty sheep wouldn't be too much of an issue, we have full sheepwire and barbed wire fencing around every field and neither would handling as we're getting a lock of sheep panels for a race.

 Around us, I'm not sure about what sells better, white or dark faces but I'll head to the mart on Wednesday! Up in Ballymena, the mart is great for sheep, and they are the official auctioneers of The NI Society of ; Suffolks, Blueface Leicester, Dorset Horn, Hampshire Down, Lleyn, Charollais, Beltex, Blackface Sheep, Border Leicester, Texels and Rouge!

They have a good range!

[Big Benny Shep]

have about 60 acre (shortly gettin more), lambing about 80 ewes end of march. id say look at lots of sheep amd choose your favorite, its easier when you love em 

[Marches Farmer]

They're certainly eye-catching.  Might be worth trying to buy ex-show stock as they'll be well handled.

[Castle Farm]

My cousin breed pedigree Suffolk and Blue faced Lessies  spend his days trying to keep the stupid things alive.


20 years ago they were ok, but have been ruined by stupid breeding practices, as have a lot of animals and fowl.
I bred Llyens and cannot fault them. Ready market for ewes and lambs and just sold 20 in lamb at a very good price.

[Ladygrey]

Shygirl and Emmet I dont know!!!

The creep in the troughs looked really small and odd! so upon asking what it was, the answer was a kind of turkey creep, as its salty or something they get addicted to it and eat lots of it, it contains growth hormone which produced a big fat chunky lamb or ram before a sale rapidly fast!

Apparently though after the sale if they get put on grass they never look as nice again!! so its rubbish really IMO

This is what the reply was! I cannot be quoted or anything but this is what it was!

[Emmett]

Ladygrey that does sound about right haha!

Castle Farm, how are the Lleyns with lambing as I've heard they don't give too much bother! I'm not too sure about them, however, they aren't really that good for showing I've heard.

Benny, there was me thinking I had a lot of land for a smallholder lol Id love to end up with a flock of that size with that land