[Foobar]

A question for those of you who are up on their performance recording techniques ...


For those of use who want to performance record but don't have enough sheep to warrant the cost of doing it properly via signet etc, ...  is the adjustment table detailed here: http://www.sheep101.info/201/adjweanwts.html
a sensible way to obtain an adjusted 8 week (or 60 day) weight to measure maternal ability?


That site is obviously american, and I was wondering if those factors are dependent on breed, and if so, are there any UK breed tables out there?

[Tim W]

I don't know for sure but my guess is that this system is as good as any if you don't have enough sheep to warrant using BLUP

I doubt that any of this would be breed specific

8 week weights in lambs will be due to a variety of factors not all of which are down to the maternal ability, including;
milk of dam
mothering ability of dam
lambing ease
vigour of lamb at birth
growth rate of lamb

But I would try using this system ----sounds like a good start to me

(If you wanted to use BLUP at any stage the statisticians tell me that there is very little point unless you have at least 30 lambs sired by at least 2 (and preferably more) rams every year---so that's at least 60 lambs in a flock which means probably 40 ewes minimum, to get any meaningful accurate data I would want to at least double this )

[Ladygrey]

(If you wanted to use BLUP at any stage the statisticians tell me that there is very little point unless you have at least 30 lambs sired by at least 2 (and preferably more) rams every year---so that's at least 60 lambs in a flock which means probably 40 ewes minimum, to get any meaningful accurate data I would want to at least double this )

How would I start if I wanted to use BLUP? is it purely on pedigree animals or do crossbred ones still add to the data?

[Tim W]

At the moment UK evaluations via SIGNET will only accept pedigree/purebred data however this is set to change. If you want to do it I would say collect all the data and wait 18 months, you should then be able to enter any data from crossbreds

If you are good you will persuade them to enter 2 or 3 years of data for a single years fee (sorry Sam if you are reading this!) So record sires and dams, birth dates and weights, born-- alive and dead, 8 week and 20 week weights and weights of all ewes before they go to the tup ---put it on an excel sheet and save it for a year or so

[Foobar]

Brill, thanks Tim.

[Ladygrey]

Thanks Tim!

I did this last year so will continue doing it, its going to take a very long time to build up a large flock of charmoise... but Im up to the challenge