We would like to welcome you to our 4th on farm Ram sale.
This year we are offering 78 Pure Coopworth Rams and 45 Dorset Down Rams for sale. We feel offering a large selection allows greater decision making around Ram selection. We want people to choose the Rams they like and feel this selling method allows people this opportunity to look at a line of sires. We will also have Rams available for private sale.
We will also be running the sale in conjunction with Bidr. The sale will be live streamed so people who cannot travel will have the ability to watch and bid on the auction from their home.
The 2 Coopworth studs are run 100% independent of each other on separate farms. We use different sires but often swap ewes to give us a stronger linkage under SIL. Both Studs are 100% Pure Coopworth with no other breeds through them, something we are very strong about. Both studs have similar breeding philosophies and between the two makes us one of the largest stud Coopworth operations in the South Island. This allows us to select only the top Rams for sale... we believe it’s about quality not quantity. All the Rams have been through a vigorous culling regime and only 20% of Rams born make it through to our sale mob. We believe there is little difference between the first and last ram up in the sale... something we are extremely proud of. We have used some of our top Ram Lambs each year and this year you will see of these genetics in the sale mob along with other proven sires. It’s pleasing to see the quality stock these are producing.
As I write this confidence in the Sheep sector is low with prices unknown for the upcoming season. We can’t control the unknowns but what we can have control over is ensuring we use the right genetics to make our farms more profitable. The biggest driver of farm profitability is lambs on the ground. Having spent 8 years rural banking the farmers who get lambs on the ground are the ones who in tougher times are the ones who continue to perform well. In my opinion the Pure Coopworth ewe is leading the pack against all other breeds with fertility, mothering abilty and constitution key features. Our stud ewes have lambed close to 200% in the 2023 season. The cost to produce one lamb is the same as 2 so I have 100% confidence our genetics are a stronger option than ever before.
We have really focused on meat and growth over the past 10 years and the results we see through our commercial operation and feedback from clients is demonstrating to us the genetic gain we are making in these areas. We believe our Coopworths are certainly dual purpose... retaining the strong maternal ability that the breed is renowned for but having strong carcase qualities that allows clients to achieve superior results using these genetics without having to cross terminal sires across their maternal flock. We have included the SIL Dual purpose percentile Band in the catalogue to show where our Genetics sit compared to other breeds and breeders via SIL. Although its a tool to aid selection it shows that our rams are at the top end of performance with a power of Meat and growth.
The Glendhu Dorset Down stud was established 50 years ago and is now one of the oldest studs in NZ. Over the past 5 years we have increased our ewe flock by over 50% so we are getting more Rams to select our sale line up from which I feel is evident in this year’s line up. Our focus on our Dorsets is simple. We want strong growth from birth to weaning with high muscle and lambs that will yield highly. We believe terminal lambs should be killed off mum as we try to maximise profit per ha. We also have a strong focus on fertility making sure ewes have 2 lambs at weaning time. We believe in using performance data on our Dorsets to help us drive genetic improvement to ensure we using the best genetics we can. We introduce 2 new sires this year Craigneuk 229/20 and Craigneuk 17/20. 2 years ago Dad and I spent a day at Craigneuk going through all there Rams and subsequently identified these 2 sires as Rams we believe are going to continue to drive genetic growth in our Dorset Stud. Massive weaning weight sires with huge EMAs I am absolutely rapt about how they have bred. Crossing these genetics across the high muscle and growth females has genetically taken the Rams to a new level. The sale Rams have an averaging weaning weight of 51.8kg and an EMA of 23.7scm.
This year, like we have done previously, we will offer 6 Rams from the Sinai Dorset Stud in Canterbury. These Rams came to us earlier this year in March and have been running with ours the whole time. They are all sired by Glendhu Rams.
We look forward to seeing you all and welcome you at any time to inspect the Rams or discuss your requirements.
Regards Fraser and George Fletcher Download the Sales Catalogue here.