As I have stated, one of the biggest problems is numbers or the lack there of. There simply is not enough hairsheep lambs hitting the commercial market to make an impact!
I have been on this list and a few other hairsheep lists for over a year now. From reading the posts I have concluded that most everyone here is on a hobby level with a handful of sheep. Out of all of us here, how many have more than 10 sheep? How many of those have more than 25? How many of those have more than 50? And of those, how many have more than 100? As far as I can tell, the only producers who have a large volume of hairsheep are Helmut Lang in Canada and Bill Hoag in Texas. Who else is raising hairsheep on a large scale? If you want the packer to take notice, you need to produce large numbers of uniform lambs. Several years ago a few of us area producers started the Indianhead Sheep Breeders Association. One of the first projects and goals of the group was group marketing of lambs. A couple of us contacted and discussed this with packers and buyers. What we were told was that we could receive premiums for volume, large groups (300, 400, 500 or more) of "uniform" lambs. This meant that we would all have to have the same or similar ewe base and use the same type of sire and all lamb at the same time so all lambs would be market ready at one time. When we presented this concept to the rest of the membership, no one could agree on the breed types or the time of year to lamb. So there we were, sunk before we even set sail! Another aspect along with volume and uniformity is consistency. In order to secure long term markets, you need consistency. Our operation is primarily a commercial sheep dairy. Our sheep milk is marketed through the Wis. Sheep Dairy Cooperative which we are producer members of and I hold a seat on the board of directors. In the early days of the co-op, it was tough to get cheese plants interested in our product. Although we had a quality product that held huge potential, most processors were very skeptical. We had no track record. Processors did not want to start a sheep milk cheese project if they could not be sure of a consistent supply of sheep milk from our co-op. After eight years of steady growth and consistency of quality and supply of sheep milk, processors have taken notice and demand for our product is beginning to outstrip the supply. As for the grass fed vs. grain fed issue, if you live in an area close to a larger city where you can find customers that this concept will appeal to, than you may be successful at direct marketing grass fed lambs to those individuals. If you are in a more rural area as I am and have better access to commercial markets, then grain fed or at least grain finished lambs are probably what you should produce. A few years ago on lamb pool day at our local sale barn, I was helping sort and grade lambs when a women brought in 18 very nice looking lambs. She began bragging that she had finished these lambs on grass alone with absolutely no grain. Even though she received top dollar for the lambs, she became furiously angry when the grader put them into a group of feeder lambs destined for a feed lot. He told her that although he agreed that they were very nice lambs, they simply did not have the type of finish the packer was looking for. There could be the argument here that instead of trying to tell the buyer what type of lambs he should be buying, maybe it would be more profitable to produce the type of lamb the buyer is looking for. Of the 400 ewes on our farm, about 100 are hair breeds and so I will contend that if we all increase production and maintain uniformity and consistency, we will be taken more seriously in the market place. Larry Meisegeier River Ridge Stock Farm Bruce, WI 715-868-2285 [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.sheepmilk.biz =============================================== This message is from the Barbados Blackbelly Sheep mailing list (http://www.awrittenword.com/listserv/index.html). To respond to this message, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe or change your membership options, go to http://lists.coyotenet.net/mailman/listinfo/blackbelly To search the archives, go to http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
