Lamb, Sheep Kill UP

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31560, 23 December 1967, Page 9

Lamb, Sheep Kill U P

works in Canterbury stopped killing yesterday for the holidays and they will resume again on January 3.

As at December 16 the total lamb and sheep kill at the seven works in the province at 2,032,000 was between 5 and 6 per cent greater than at the same stage of the 1966-67 season. The lamb kill, which at that time totalled 1,876,000, was up by less than 30,000 or by between 1 and 2 per cent, but the sheep kill —mainly of ewes—was higher by almost 94 per cent at about 156,000 compared with about 81,000 at the same time last year.

The pressure to kill lambs has been building up lately, but industry representatives describe it as not being undue, and according to one spokesman it was probably associated with farmers wanting to quit, stock when they were engaged in other operations such as weaning and shearing and it might also be influenced by fears of fly strike.

An Increased number of ewes have been worked into the kill so far this season. Two reasons have been advanced for this. It is said that it has been possible to handle these ewes because of relative lulls in the flow of lambs at times, and also because earlier in the season in particular farmers were sometimes pleased to quit these older sheep because of limited fetfd supplies.

While it is not the case at all works and in one case there is only a factional difference between the two seasons, generally the average weight of lambs is from about 11b to IJlb less than at the same time last year. The highest average so far for any works is 29.941 b and the lowest 27.671 b. These figures are for works in MidCanterbury and South Canterbury respectively and are a reflection of conditions in the two areas.

Generally there is also an increase in the proportion of seconds, with this again being perhaps most marked in South Canterbury and the least increase being shown in Mid-Canterbury. The proportion of seconds ranges from 11.85 per cent in MidCanterbury to 26.14 per cent at a South Canterbury works.

According to one industry representative the season has been a slightly slow one for lambs. He said that factors in this were possibly the dry winter and the slowness of clover in coming away subsequently, also the impact of grass grub and porina, larger wheat acreages and rather less sunshine and more rain in some parts.

In the same context, of course, drought conditions in South Canterbury and North Otago have been responsible for the lighter weights of lambs killed in that part of the district.

A pleasing feature of the statistics is that the proportion of overfats has fallen away quite markedly. One works reports that they are only a third of what they were at this time last year, and in other cases the drop has been more than a half or something less than that