Southdown ram sells for a breed document of £4,000

A Southdown ram, Windrush Lancelot, has bought for £4,000 in a personal deal, in what’s a brand new document for the sheep breed.

Southdown breeder Harry Wooden of Usk, Wales, bought his two-shear ram Windrush Lancelot to the Goodwood flock of the Goodwood Property, Chichester.

Windrush Lancelot was the champion at this yr’s Southdown nationwide present, held on the Lincolnshire Present.

The Southdown ram had additionally been first-prize shearling and reserve male champion on the 2022 nationwide present.

“He has at all times been an distinctive ram, proper from start and whereas reluctant to promote him, he has been used at house for the final two years, so his genetics will stay inside the flock for a while to come back,” Woods stated.

Windrush Lancelot, which was bred by means of synthetic insemination (AI), is by imported sire Percheron, with the semen having been bought from the Lengthy household’s Chaileybrook flock following Percheron’s personal Nationwide Present championship win in 2018.

Windrush Lancelot is out of an east Dean-bred dam and originates from New Zealand breeding by the Southern Cross flock.

Goodwood Property flock supervisor Nick Web page stated he had been eager to buy Windrush Lancelot for a while for each his mixture of breeding, measurement and carcass.

Web page stated: “He’s a terrific, trendy Southdown ram and the genetics he carries shall be a wonderful match for these already inside the Goodwood flock.”

Southdown breed

The Southdown is the oldest of the terminal sire breeds within the UK and has been chargeable for the event of most of the native terminal sire breeds, together with the Suffolk, the Hampshire Down, and the Charollais.

In the present day the breed might be discovered within the UK, France, Australia, New Zealand and America and lots of different nations throughout the globe the place its capacity to supply top quality lamb has led to it being recognised as a high quality breed.

Within the UK, the breed is at present present process a major revival as a brand new technology of breeders are specializing in maximising the breed’s industrial attributes to develop the breed into a contemporary terminal sire.

The breed’s simple lambing, docility and ease of ending make it an appropriate sire for a spread of sheep farming techniques in all corners of the UK.