SOUTH WEST REGION
Regional Contact Member – Richard Fenwick
Julia Staughton with her prize winning ram lamb at Okehampton Show
It has been a quiet couple of months in the South West with members focussed on selecting rams for tupping and making sure their ewes are in the best condition they can be as well as selecting lambs to rake through a potential show sheep for next year.
On a personal note, we have relocated with our Camel Valley flock from Cornwall to Somerset, swapping a sheltered site with quick draining alluvial soil on the banks of the River Camel for a windy hillside with poor draining clay and a very different selection of grasses. It is already interesting to note the very different challenges and management strategies that come with a different environment. It makes one realise that although members have much in common, they all have to develop their own strategies for managing their sheep on the land they have.
Kerry Gaden’s champion and reserve champion sheep at Okehampton Show
In the South West, members use a variety of strategies to determine when their ewes will lamb in the spring. There have been quite a few informal discussions about the advantages and disadvantages of different strategies whether it involves sponging, using CIDRs or just letting nature take its course. We have opted for the latter approach but have found lambing to be very spread out, leading to problems with pre-lambing feeding, weaning and managing Heptavac injections.
Kayleigh Rennie’s champion shearling ewe and Riley Marsh’s reserve champion ewe lamb at Dorset County Show with the judge, Simon Jones
We are keen to avoid hormone based intervention and are keen to lamb at a time when spring grass is beginning to grow, but wanted to achieve a much reduced lambing season. Taking advice from other South West members, we have managed to greatly tighten up our tupping window which will reap benefits in the spring. As well as making sure our ram was in good condition, we employed two new approaches. The ewes had access to a Denis Brinicombe Super Tup Tubby and they were put onto fresh pasture about three weeks before being joined by the ram. It was with considerable satisfaction that nearly all the ewes were sporting distinctive raddle marks within a 7-day window. Hopefully lambing will be more straightforward next year and interrupted nights will be kept to a minimum.
South West members are keen to get together pre-Christmas and a suitable date will be circulated in due course.
At Woolsery Show Chris Slee’s ram was champion with Steph Jasper’s shearling ewe reserve