EweTalk

VISIT US AT THE NSA EASTERN REGION WINTER FAIR

Innovis will have a stand at this year’s eastern region winter fair which will be held at Melton Mowbray Market on Friday 27^th Jan.  The event should be an informative and interesting day for anyone involved in the sheep industry. We will be promoting our sheep breed lines on the stand and we will have some Aberdale Beulah ewe lambs on display which have come from one of our largest producers, Stanford Sheep in Norfolk. If you are attending please come along and say hello.

For more information on the event go to the NSA website:  www.nationalsheep.org.uk

SELECTION OF ABERDALE YEARLINGS FOR SALE

Due to an increasing demand for yearling ewes  rather than ewe lambs, this year there will be a selection of yearling Aberdale ewes for sale and some of these would be available for sale now. As well as a few ewe lambs we have grown on ourselves we have a number of clients last year who purchased ewe lambs with the view of selling them on as yearlings.

If you are interested in Aberdale yearling ewes then please contact our Aberystwyth office so that you can get your booking in early.

Moving on to pasture's new!

As some of you may already know, today is my last day working for Innovis. Since graduating from Harper Adams in 2008, I have had a fantastic 3 and a half years based in Aberystwyth working with Innovis. Over that time I have worked with some incredible people; the staff at Innovis, staff at IBERS Aberystwyth University, many fantastic farmers and some really great people working in the industry.

I have learnt so much from working at Innovis, and with Charlie Morgan on all things grassland. It has been a priviledge and an honour working for such a great company with really exciting work going on driving the sheep industry forward. I have been fortunate enought to spend two months working on a farm in New Zealand with Inverdale ewes in 2009, and again to spend another 5 months in New Zealand working with farm consultants Abacus Bio earlier this year. All these opportunities have been given to me thanks to Dewi Jones, MD at Innovis, and to him I am extremely grateful.

So today is my last day, and I am looking forward to a nice Christmas meal with the whole team today before the Christmas break. In the New Year, I will begin a new venture working with the British Grassland Society. I am extremely looking forward to this new exciting chapter and all it will have to offer, but I hope to continue to remain in close contact with Innovis in the future.

I would like to say a big thank you to all of you that I have worked with and got to know over the past few years, it has been a real pleasure. This is not the end of 'The Pasture Princess', I will continue with my blog at the BGS and hope to bring some exciting new things to light in 2012. Thanks once again, and have a very Merry Christmas!

Rachel Greenow

Aberdale Dorsets on S4C's 'Ffermio' programme

This week Welsh farming programme 'Ffermio' headed to Llansawel in Carmarthenshire to visit young couple Sion and Claire Williams. Last year the pair took on a 10 year lease of a 255 acre farm, and in the past 12 months have built up stock numbers to 1,000 breeding ewes, including Aberdales, Mules, Texel Mules and some purebred Texels.

The programme focused on how Government grant's for newcomers into agriculture have helped Sion and Claire to stock the farm and reseed 70 acres within the first 12 months of tenancy. There was a big focus on the Aberdale ewes that Sion has purchased over the past year, both the Aberdale Welsh and Aberdale Dorset ewes. Sion explained that Aberdale ewes carry the Inverdale prolificacy gene, which makes them very fertile. The idea for the Aberdales over time is to run them tight on one half of the farm, and finish lambs and keep his other ewes on the other half of the farm. Two days before filming, Sion scanned the 170 Aberdale Dorset yearling ewes that are due to lamb indoors in January. It just happens to be that the ewes scanned higher than any other Aberdale ewes have ever scanned, at just under 250%, including two ewes to scan for 5 lambs, the first time any Aberdale ewes will ever have given birth to 5 lambs!

It was evident to see on the programme that the ewes were looking very well, and are good strong ewes to cope with a heavy load of lambs. Sion explained that he was happy with the ewes that had scanned as triplets, but he is a little more worried about how the ewes scanned with 4 and 5 lambs will get on. Innovis will be working closely with Sion and Claire over the coming weeks, working out appropriate feed rations for the ewes and considering what the best options are for the extra lambs, such as hiring in a lamb feeding machine.

The coverage of Aberdales on 'Ffermio' highlights just how prolific Aberdale ewes can potentially be, especially for early lambing ewes that are being flushed in April - May when grass quality is at it's peak, and Aberdale ewes do not need flushing! Last year the average flock scan result for Aberdale ewes was 192%, up from 186% the year before. These results highlight that Aberdale ewes generally scan between the range of 185-205%, but if grass quality is too good and there is too much feed available, they will be flushed and scan higher. This was the case for Sion, as he is starting out on a new farm in a very fertile area, and being under stocked has meant that the ewes have had a better place for tupping that he would have planned on giving them.

Over the coming months we will keep updating you on how the Aberdales are performing with Sion, including feedback on how lambing goes, what system Sion decides to go for in coping with the extra lamb numbers, and to see how many kg of lamb is reared per ewe and what return that gives him next year. Watch this space to keep updated!

If you would like to watch the programme, follow the link below. If you don't understand Welsh but would like to see the programme, English subtitles are available.

http://www.s4c.co.uk/clic/c_level2.shtml?series_id=469907094

 

Last chance to claim for HCC Elite Ram Project scheme

Many of you in Wales have taken the advantage of the HCC Elite Ram Project scheme this year and/or last year. The scheme allowed you to purchase a performance recorded ram and to claim back 50% of the rams purchase price (set depending on performance figures).

By now most of you should have made your claim, but if you haven't now is your last chance to do so. If you have already purchased a ram and registered for the Elite Ram Project scheme, you must send your voucher, receipt and ram performance figures to HCC by the 1st of December.

For further information please follow the link below:

http://www.eliteramproject.org.uk/

'Wear it Pink Day' raises £120 for Breast Cancer Research

On Tuesday 1st November Innovis hosted our very own 'Wear it Pink Day', with the aim of raising as much money as we could for Breast Cancer Research.

The whole office dressed in pink, with everyone paying £2 for the priviledge! We all brought in items to go into the raffle, and with tickets at £1 a strip a lot of money was made. Homemade cakes and biscuits following the pink theme were sold, and we all guessed which item would be 'next on the washing line'. Eurion won the prize of £11 (half of the money that was made in the competition), and kindly bought the remainder of the cakes left on sale for everyone in the office to enjoy. In total we raised £120 for Breast Cancer Research, not a bad total considering we are a small team.

Eurion showing off his assets!

Chief organiser Amber announcing the winner of 'What's next on the washing line'!

The Pink Ladies! - Judith, Julie and Sheila

The pink themed raffle prizes

New Zealand rams set to work in the UK!

Some of you may have read in the Farmers Weekly a couple months back that the first group of New Zealand Texels have been imported into the UK. Innovis are using some of these genetics this autumn, with 100 ewes being AI'd and another 60 naturally mated to a New Zealand Texel ram purchased by Innovis.

A total of 1,200 mature ewes and 450 ewe lambs are being tupped at Mynydd Gorddu this autumn for either indoor lambing in early March or outdoor lambing in late March/April. In addition to the New Zealand Texel, a further 2 Texel yearlings, 1 Bluefaced Leicester ram lamb and 6 Charollais ram lambs have been purchased as additional stock sires for the Aberdale, Aberfield and Abermax breeding programmes in Aberystwyth. The Aberdale breeding programme is still going strong, and there is a big increase in the number of Aberfield ewes being mated to Aberfield rams. Charollais rams are also being used for AI and natural mating with Texel ewes to produce Abermax lambs. With an increasing demand for Abermax terminal sires year on year, the number of Charollais rams being mated to Texel ewes is being increased to meet this demand. Progress is being made stabilising the Abermax line, as for the first time this year Abermax ewe lambs are being mated to Abermax rams.

As with all terminal sires, Aberdale and Aberfield rams sold or leased by Innovis, all stock rams are regularly fertility tested to ensure that they are in full working order for the mating season. 

First Innovis ram sale a big hit

On Friday 12^th August Innovis held our very first ram sale, taking place at the nucleus farm Mynydd Gorddu near Aberystwyth. With 130 performance recorded Texel, Charollais, Abermax, Suffolk cross Texel and Aberfield rams to sell, we were delighted with a turnout of 75 invited buyers.

The rams were available at set prices ranging from £500-800, with the majority of the Texel and Charollais rams qualifying for the HCC Elite Ram Project scheme. Rams were run into the ring for sale, with a TV showing the figures for that particular ram (also displayed in the sale catalogue). Dewi gave a brief of the figures for each ram, highlighting what benefit each ram would bring for you – from high growth rates to easy lambing. Each registered buyer was given a sellers number, which was displayed if they wanted to purchase a ram. In the event of more than one bidder wanting to purchase a particular ram, buyers were given the option of drawing each number from a hat at that set price, or to bid in £25 increments.

In total 118 rams were bought on the day, with average prices of £744 for 46 Texels, £635 for 28 Charollais, £608 for 26 Abermax, £625 for 5 Suffolk cross Texels and £733 for 13 Aberfield rams.

 We have a small number of our younger shearling Texel and Charollais rams and Aberfield rams available for anyone that did not make it across for the sale on Friday, so please call us o n 01970 828236 as soon as possible if you are still in need of rams for this autumn's tupping.