7 general, have worked hard to develop a hardier ram for use in the commercial world”, says Richard.
“Breeders, in general, have worked hard to develop a hardier ram for use in the commercial world”
Weight for Age Wins charollais rams help this Welsh farm to hit optimum specification for Waitrose Newton Farm, near Brecon, Powys is a family farm, managed by Richard & Helen Roderick. They have three sons Andrew 15, Tudor 14 and Matty 11. Richard joined the family business in 1984 on leaving WAC, Aberystwyth. At that time Newton was 220 acres. Over time the business has grown and diversified into a 620 acre mixed farming unit comprising 70 suckler cows, 1030 breeding ewes and 55 acres of cereals. Beef progeny are finished through Celtic Pride or sold in Brecon Market as forward stores. The farm joined Tir Gofal in 2000 and
Glastir in 2012. In addition they run a holiday cottage nearby which sleeps 12 people in six bedrooms and have long term lets as well. The Charollais breed was brought onto the farm in the 1990’s to improve the confirmation of the fat lambs. Initially this proved problematic as the type of ram bought produced rather tender lambs; their ears were virtually “see-through”. The finished carcass classification was hugely improved however, which encouraged us to continue with Charollais sires and they learned to buy hardier types. “Breeders, in
The Roderick’s have tried various terminal sires in their farming system and to date no other terminal sire can improve on the weight for age and excellent confirmation produced by the Charollais ram. “If the supermarket specification would allow, Charollais X lambs could easily be taken to well in excess of 22kgs without being over-fat”, Richard added.
“No other terminal sire can improve on the weight for age and excellent confirmation produced by the Charollais ram” Currently they run 1,030 ewes, with 160 replacement ewe lambs. The ewe flock consists of both Texel X and Suffolk X Mule. They currectly use 75% Charollais rams and 25% Texel. The Texel rams are used on the longer, leaner Suffolk X ewes, while the Charollais serve everything else.
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