Sheep Farmers
Teagasc BETTER Sheep Programme
John O’Connell, Ballinamore, Co. Leitrim
John farms alongside his wife & their 3 children. The 34.5Ha farm is mostly heavy impervious soil & is split in 2 equal sized grazing blocks with an additional 2.4Ha of forestry adjoining the home farm. He is currently managing a system consisting of 200 mid-season lambing ewes, 80 contract reared dairy heifers & 25 contract reared dairy bull calves. In 2020 John grew 15t DM/Ha of grass. The sheep on the farm are stocked at 12 ewes/Ha and with the flock weaning 1.8 lambs/ewe joined from the mature ewes and 1.0 lambs/ewe mated from the ewe lambs joined.
Denis O’Riordan, Kealkill, Co. Cork
Denis is a hill sheep farmer. He farms 350 Scottish blackface ewes mostly sells his lambs as stores after weaning. The farm consists of 16Ha of enclosed green/improved land in 2 separate blocks along with 60Ha of private hill and a share of open commonage. The ewe flock spend most of their time on the hill with ewes generally only brought down off the hill from mid-February until 7 weeks post-lambing, with single rearing ewes going back to the hill before this. In 2020 Denis’ ewes had pregnancy rate of 92% and weaned 1.0 lamb/ewe joined.
John Joe Fitzgerald, Dingle, Co. Kerry
John, his wife & their 5 children operate a hill sheep farm. The farm consists of around 12Ha of green/improved ground & share of approximately 80Ha of open commonage. There is also a half share of an enclosed section at the base of the commonage where ewes are kept prior to lambing. The ewe flock currently consists of a mixture of Scottish Blackface & crossbred ewes but the replacement policy for the coming years is to increase the amount of Scottish Blackface genetics in the flock to make to flock more resilient to grazing on the commonage for 9-10mth. 2020 weaning rate of 1.2 lamb/ewe.
Shane Moore, Athleague, Co. Roscommon
Shane farms with his partner & their son. The farm is mainly good free draining soil & includes area of marginal land usually only grazed by cattle. The owned land (30Ha) is split into 2 blocks approx 5km apart with a third block of 4Ha short term rented land. There are 160 mature ewes & 50 ewe lambs being put to the ram alongside 10 suckler cows. He is currently building ewe numbers & is targeting a stocking rate of 10-12 ewes/Ha. The flock weaned 1.6 lambs per ewe joined from the mature ewes in 2020 & the breeding policy for the farm is aimed at developing a prolific flock.
Brian Keane, Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford
Brian farms alongside his father. They operate a sheep, beef and tillage farm. Brian lambs his ewes from early March and is currently running a mix of Belclare, Suffolk and Borris type ewes. Brian recently joined the Teagasc BETTER farm sheep programme and is starting to measure grass and take more detailed flock performance measurements. A key part of his plan for the next few years is to increase the number of lambs finished off grass while also increasing flock output.
Francis Gonley, Colga, Co. Sligo
Francis & his family run an all sheep farm & operates both hill & lowland sheep flocks. The lowland flock graze a block of largely good quality ground but can be described as a heavy soil type. The hill flock is located on land located near Benbulben & the block is home to a 190 ewe Scottish Blackface hill flock & grazing reasonable quality green ground adjoining a large area of commonage of which Francis has a 72.5Ha share. The mature ewes in the lowland flock weaned 1.6 lambs/ewe joined in 2021 while the hill ewes weaned 1.1 lambs/ewe joined.