A NEW DIRECTION FOR THE OLD RAM

[mystang89]

We used to class our wool into 2 lines and the wool buyer would come and weight it and pay us for our fleece lines a$1.00 a kg and skirting's at $.50 a kg.But this lot is just "too rough" and it will be composted.

From my understanding that's what it used to be around here but now it's down to about .10 per pound. Most Shearers say it's just not worth it.

Sorry to hear about Jenny. My heart always hurts when I think about her condition but I'm glad she still has you she can rely on, even if she doesn't always realize it.

 

[Bruce]

The young chap made "short work" of the pest species.

MUCH better. What is that stuff?

for you and Jenny. Hopefully she is happy in the moment even though she won't necessarily remember it.

 

[Baymule]

For your sake, I am glad that she is past the melt down stage. She may be getting worse, but at least the melt downs are gone and that makes it a little better for you. God bless you for being such a good man and loving Jenny through thick and thin, sickness and health and being there for her. I have had a front row seat on friends faced with such difficulties and it is all consuming.

That invasive brush looks rather formidable, glad that you are getting a handle on it. We all seem to have our pasture battles, mine is greenbriar, sumac and trumpet flower vine. The roots go 90 different directions and pop up all over the place.

 

[The Old Ram-Australia]

Kunzea parvifolia (violet kunzea) ,if you do a Google search you can read about it.It is highly invasive and takes over pastures if left un-treated...T.O.R.

 

[Baymule]

I looked it up, it is touted as a lovely shrub for landscaping and is listed as non-threatened! Seed is listed for sale. Only after I included invasive in the search did information come up on it being out of control. I guess nothing eats it...…. Pretty flowers though.

I am very careful to not plant something I will be sorry for later. I research things to death based on toxic and invasive.

 

[The Old Ram-Australia]

G'day folks,we are about to find out if the Kunzea is a food source for the stock.I know for sure that the Persians will eat it and if "hungry" enough will stop it in its tracks.We will tomorrow be introducing the Aswssi's into this paddock at 10 to the ac and if need be the Damara's will go in also.When we finish our spraying detail we will start on cleaning up the bits the machine was unable to reach.I guess we have a wait of about 3 months to access the results.There are 2 other option we have to control the regrowth ,one is with herbicides and the other is using a "fire-stick" to kill the new shoots.

This last week i spent a little time looking at potential new markets for lambs.One i am considering is for the "spit-roast" area and while chatting to a butcher he told me of another for lambs that dress around the 14 kg mark ,now 14 kg's are what were described in the "old days" as Lantern lambs,because if you held a light up inside the carcass you could "see straight though it".But as the butcher explained the Italian /Greek have a liking for Pizza oven roasting and the simply cut a full lamb into 4 and roast it in the Pizza oven and prefer a "low fat" body.Have any of you looked into or had experience with this type of sale?Because the spit roast lamb needs to be 18/20 kg and about score 3 this alternate market may be easier for some and less costly to produce...T.O.R.

 

[Bruce]

14 kg is a pretty small lamb!

 

[Baymule]

It is good to diversify your marketing. What does a spit roast lamb sell for and what does a lantern lamb sell for? How does that compare to your normal sales?

We are taking 6 lambs to slaughter November 12, USDA inspected slaughter. Then I am going to advertise the meat for sale on various internet sites. I want to build a direct marketing base. We’ll see how it goes.

My nemesis is green briars. Once we hack them down, the sheep eat the new sprouts and leaves. Over time, the briars finally die out. It sounds like once you can knock down the Kunzea, the sheep will take care of any new sprouts.

 

[The Old Ram-Australia]

Thank you Bruce and Bay.In answer to Bruce it's a 14 kg carcass, but this is where the knowledge of your "costs" come into play.You need to establish what your fixed and variable costs are per breeder unit are.

Say you have a 15 kg lamb (hanging up) and you charge $10.00 a kg that's $150.00 for the lamb in our case our total cost per breeder over a year is about $50.00 per head when we are fully stocked at 1 breeder to the ac,so our margin in that case is very good i am sure you will agree.Currently because of the "dry" we are only running 1 breeder to 2 acs but even then we are on a profit margin of about 30% which is still OK because of the lower workload and the higher lambing % of the new breeds.....We will be retaining about 60% of this years ewe lambs to provide the new base and will progressively sell the ewe lines we have used to produce the new flock base..The thing is when we do get the rain we will be in a position to quickly get to our preferred breeder ewe numbers with stock "born on" our farm....The option of getting the higher weights for the Spit lambs (18/21 kg) will depend on any given season but you have to balance the time taken as the price of $10.00 a kg will most likely still apply.You must remember that we do not intend to ,"direct market" our lambs to end users, but will use the normal selling system or wholesalers,we will however be able to gain a premium on private sales of breeding stock.Which in the past was $300.00 for Rams and $180.00/200.00 for ewes.But this premium is some years off as we breed performance into the new flock.

I M O ,the key is knowing your C.O.P. and using the season to dictate where you best return will be......T.O.R.

 

[Baymule]

I have tiny green speckles coming up, it is clover! Clover is coming up in pasture #1, 2, the pipeline and our yard. Our front yard is rather large, we left room for truck and trailer turn around and parking to either side. We often turn the sheep out to graze it down. This summer's drought, we just turned the sheep out and never cranked up the mower. We just pulled up the tall weeds the sheep wouldn't eat. I seeded clovers and non endophyte fescue 2 years ago, it reseeded and came back, that and the sheep eating it and passing the seed out in fertilizer capsules is hopefully resulting in a good stand of winter/spring graze.