Kerry Hill Sheep

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 302, 17 September 1936, Page 13

Kerry Hill Sheep

Sir, —In reply to “Jumbuk’s” inquiry, I will give him a “butcher’s” opinion of the Kerry Hill sheep. Imagine a robust, slightly flat-sided Southdown body, with a speckled Border Leicester type face and scrag, about same length and strength of bone as the Hawke’s Bay Romney, with a Moorland foot, a fleece of Southdown quality, cutting about 71b. average. Being a definite Moorland type, consituation, vitality, fecundity, freedom from lambing troubles, etc., are pronounced features. Carcase features are, first and foremost, thickness of flesh (lean meat) ; for instance, the weight of trimmed chops and cutlets from a 541 b. Kerry Hill ewe would double the weight from a 6411 b. Romney or Romney cross ewe; the legs have slightly heavier bone, with the down shape, the fores very fleshy and requiring no trimming. The fault of the breed is that it is a purely natural grazier and is not suitable in temperament for “hurdling.” Its spread through the Midlands, especially Gloucestershire (the ancient home of the Cotswolds), is due to laying down to pasture of much of the arable land. Scotch crosses with a black-face foundation were the early choice, but the Kerry Hill is beating them easily, and their lamb and leg mutton is growing more popular every day. The Kerry Hill ewe is now acknowledged as the most prolific quick-fattening lamb producer, for grassland farming procurable, and is a typical ideal carcase. Comparisons, they say, are odious, and it is not for such as me to discredit the New Zealand stock of ewes. As a.butcher, I say it is impossible to farm New Zealand’with the present stocks and hold our export trade. As a freezing works manager taking the long view, I say the same; as a works buyer I should say, nothing doing, keep as we are, as my principals hare never allowed me any rope yet to pay for anything beyond our present standard. In conclusion, I would add that Kerry Hill sheep have several close competitors, Clun-forests, Dartmoors, Derby-shire-Gritstone, and Westerns, all with definite characteristics, that indicate there is a particular part of New Zealand where they would beat all other breeds m value per acre (that's the test, not per head carried). There are no Moorland breeds in New Zealand, a country that is 75 per cent, fitted by nature as their proper environment. I maintain that the Romney ewe should be bred to Suffolks or Oxford' Downs, and produce the 481 b. fleshy lamb so popular; the matron for the 281 b. to 321 b. is the Moorland bred to Southdown. Every fat cutting lamb, ewe or wether you export hinders the sale and reputation of the others; English grassgs, not breeds,, keep New Zealand in the position she holds in the lamb trade. Our competitors lack them. From the right stock, with our grass, we would be 2d. up on Australia and Argentina, instead of a halfpenny.-I am. etc., Wanganui, September 14.