Felix Rams has a singular focus on producing efficient and profitable prime lambs by breeding high performance, structurally sound meat sheep rams. Their commitment to collecting good accurate performance data is second to none. Did you know for example that since 2000 they have weighed more than 19,000 lambs within 12 hours of birth? It is little wonder that a Felix client recently claimed – “you’ve solved our lambing problems”. They use birthweights, Lambplan breeding values for birthweight and lambing ease to help eliminate the production of rams that sire lambs with excessively high or low birthweights.
High birthweights cause lambing problems, while birthweights that are too low impact on lamb survival. At Felix Rams the priority is quick early growth, and maturity, not maximum adult ram size. Their rams won’t be the biggest you will buy, because great big rams are almost certainly late maturing rams. Felix Rams will efficiently produce a 22-28 kg lamb. Early maturity also helps getting your suckers to hit the target year in year out.
Over the last five years Felix Rams has been committed to DNA testing potential young sires for yield and eating quality with over 300 animals tested. Every sire used in the last three years has had breeding values for these traits, and eating quality and yield have been included in the mating matrix.
Felix Rams provides Lambplan breeding values for every ram sold, allowing lamb producers to buy on specification to suit their production system. This is particularly important for birthweight and fat cover, where one ram doesn’t suit everybody or every system. Producers who buy their rams can select on these traits to fit their business, and at the same time be confident that they are continually making progress on growth rate, eye muscle depth, worm resistance, yield and eating quality.
Felix Rams will offer around 140 Poll Dorset and 45 White Suffolk rams at their annual on property sale at Greenethorpe on September 6th. Catalogues available at www.felixrams.com.au from August 25, or call Rodney on 0417 499 204, or the selling agents, Allan Gray and Co Cowra, on 02 6342 2377.