CENTRAL REGION – Regional Contact Member – James Cartwright
Thank you to all vendors and purchasers for making the Worcester Show and Sale such a successful event this year. For the first time, we sold a shearling ewe at the event, achieving a price that we were really pleased with. I would encourage everyone to look in on the show and sale next year at Worcester on Saturday 25th July with classes being judged by Robert Locker.
The October open day was very kindly hosted by Grace Leslie and her parents, Helen and Steven Leslie, in the small Derbyshire village of Muggington. Over 50 members attended the event with Grace starting the day off with a farm tour, covering aspects of flock management
through both her Jacob flock and the family’s flock of commercial sheep across the holding, beautifully managed by the Leslie family. Of particular interest to the membership was the family’s success in establishing herbal leys across the farm, which despite the dry weather in the summer, looked in incredibly good fettle and provoked much discussion around drought tolerance after the summer that we have experienced in the region. Robert Locker kindly drove down from north of the border to depart some of his knowledge around growing and finishing lambs, treating us to many facts, figures and things to consider throughout the year concerning growing of quality lambs. Robert also gave a fantastic run-down of points to consider when breeding Jacobs for a high quality pedigree status, giving an insider’s viewpoint to traits over the years that have impacted the breed and how to consider improving points within our flocks. Robert then gave an assessment of some Jacob cross breed lambs, kindly brought to the day by Richard Chapman, who has been cross breeding Jacobs for many years. The pen of Charrolais x Jacob lambs were a firm favourite carcass wise, adding depth of muscle and length in the back to the Jacob, but capitalised on the Jacobs maternal traits to raise strong lambs. It was noted that it is best practice to pen this cross breed quite tightly, as they can be “quite highly strung”, but fantastic performers. A group of four Dorset Down x Jacob lambs were certainly calmer in nature and again very strong contenders for breeders considering crossing breeds to improve lamb performance for the fat lamb market. Richard Chapman commented that it had taken a number of years to get the traders in the local markets used to the black lambs, but that he now generates pleasing returns through the autumn months with his successful cross bred fat lambs.
In late September judges, Gareth and Simon Jones, very kindly toured the region assessing the flock competition, with 13 flocks forward ranging in size from 9 breeding ewes, all the way up to 89 breeding ewes. They completed a huge task over 3 days keeping to an ambitious schedule through the weekend. Gareth attended the open day to present his awards for the various classes as follows:
| 1st | 2nd | 3rd | |
| Best large flock | Pard House flock | Spottywood flock | Lickhill flock |
| Best small flock | Millvale flock | Firtree flock | Goldstone flock |
| Best 4-horned flock | Blackbrook flock | – | – |
| Best 2-horned flock | Millvale flock | – | – |
| Best ram | Millvale flock | Lickhill flock | Firtree flock |
| Best homebred shearling ewe | Millvale flock | Fortress flock | Firtree flock |
| Best ram lamb | Lickhill flock | Hillacre flock | Hillvalley flock |
| Best pen ewe lambs | Millvale flock | Firtree flock | Spottywood flock |
| Best homebred ewe | Lickhill flock | Millvale flock | Blackbrook flock |
| Best 4-horned male | Blackbrook flock | – | – |
| Best overall flock | Millvale flock | – | – |
The Young handlers annual awards were organised by Hayley Higginson who once again pulled together the entries from Jacob classes from our young handlers across the region. With time in the ring and places gained being tallied up, the competition was brilliant this year. The places within the various age classes were as follows.
Aged 8 and under: 1st Willow Bramley, 2nd Noah Greenow, 3rd Iona Stanley. Aged 9-14: 1st Josh Chivers, 2nd Bertie Stanley, 3rd Georgie Lane, 4th Charlotte Tatlow, 5th Sophie Greenow, 6th Isaac Greenow.
Aged 15-18: 1st Olivia Chivers, 2nd Amber Garratt, 3rd Oliver Garratt, 4th Isobel Cartwright, 5th Charlotte Cartwright, 6th Harriet Goucher.
Special congratulations went to Olivia Chivers for her overall championship achievement. The afternoon was closed with thanks to the Leslie family for facilitating a great day, with the usual ending of a raffle to complement the array of desserts kindly made and purchased by the committee members. Albeit saving the best to last, the Central region AGM was held at 15:00. thank you to all the members that stayed to join in the discussions from a successful year past and hopefully an even better one to follow.
I would also like to welcome some new members to the Central region, and I hope to meet you soon. From Cheshire Mr Christopher Barlow and Miss Claire Milligan, Mr Daniel Bracegirdle. Mr Daniel Smyth and Mr Cameron Owen. From Worcestershire Miss Claire and Sally Bryan. From Shropshire Mr Will Bowen. Gina and; James McCurrach. From Herefordshire Mrs Suzanne Protheroe.
Having successfully used CIDR’s for the first time this year, the prospect of lambing seems to have come around far too quickly. Noting that we are a month ahead of our usual lambing time, with lambs expected to arrive from January, it is time to consider scanning. It has to be one of my favourite times of year with our lambing percentage usually falling between 190-200%, I would tolerate a little lower, if the guarantee of beautifully marked ewe lambs was a dead certainty but, to be honest, whatever arrives, if the lambs are healthy and their mums love them, what is not to like?