2020 newsletter
Hello everyone and welcome to Spring 2020!
Yay … spring is here! … we just love this time of year! … Even with all the unrest and uncertainties of 2020, we can’t help but feel hopeful, excited and full of beans! … Spring brings new beginnings, new grass shoots are showing, new life’s popping up everywhere, the birds are singing flat out, the days are getting longer and there is a bit of warmth in that sunshine again! It simply is a time full of joy … no matter what!
There’s nothing more rewarding than coming through another very challenging winter and seeing your animals and the land blossoming, looking well and rearing to go … it is that love and delight for our “business” that keep us going … and so another cycle begins!
Spring is normally quite a “relaxed” time here at Carthew Genetics … our ewes are getting set stocked a few weeks before lambing … then we “sit back” and just wait and see … all our sheep lamb totally unsheperded on the hills … it’s all about easy care and survival of the fittest here … to ensure we can sell you truly robust, healthy and happy animals, they need to be able to survive AND thrive with as little human interference as possible!
Of course we observe from a distance … we’re all about family and it’s personal to us … our animals are like family and we know where they have come from, their parents and how they have grown …
Happy Families—- Coop 2T ewe and her twins (2019)
... and much appreciated, honest feedback from some of our clients just confirms and sums it up … the” good and the bad”, the “rights and the wrongs” … we’re always for trialling new things and we’re keen to share our successes and failures with you … and just had to share this hard case feedback from one of our clients …
“Dear Simon and Pascale
As I have previously stated, Carthew Genetics works against itself. The rams are true survivors and that is a credit to your breeding policy. I have tried other breeds/strains and survival has been appalling. Sheep are not a big proportion of my enterprise now, because I am old and lazy, but when sheep were big, I wish I had latched onto your genetics in the 80’s. Thank you for your email – I wish you the best … but Beltex? They look like Pigs … am I missing something? Well, keep us informed. It is hugely valuable and informative to hear the views and direction of one’s ram breeder.
So please repeat your problems and victories every three months? We all have sympathy for trials and tribulations of farming.”
We love hearing from you … your honest opinion and insights, constructive criticism and queries … don’t hesitate to write or ring us anytime.
We know, we have the right genetics to set you up for a successful journey … our sheep grow fast, survival rates are high and all along the way, they have a presence and are happy to live!
Because we focus on the detail and measure everything we produce quality animals that translate into resilient and structurally sound, productive sheep … offspring ratios, weight gain, survival rates and even our thicker skin, make our stud animals desirable … the natural result of our stringent and review and culling levels means, we put quality before quantity!
… our breeding programs and philosophy of having some fun while respectfully exploring what it means to be farming in beautiful New Zealand are paying off on many levels … our Stud Sires are represented consistently on the first page of SIL ACE reports … again three of our 4-5 year old Coop Stud Sires (SIMBA, SIMON AND BOYCE) are #3, 6 and 15 for Maternal Worth across NZ and all breeds! Woohoo … go SIMON! … hehe
Suftex Sires 2020… nice bums!
All our genetics flow from our original Coopworth (maternal) and Lamb Supreme (terminal) animals. We have full ancestry information on both dams and sires from 1967 with our Coopworths, from 1997 with our Lamb Supreme and 2002 with our Suftex Supreme … we’ve been here for a while and planning to stay for a while yet … with our eldest son Benjamin, showing some real interest in the genetics side of things, which is really exciting!
So if you’re already part of our extended family and know what number of rams you need for this coming season … contact us now and secure your order for 2020! If you would like to experience our genetics and quality … contact us now to find out more!
We would love to have a chat, get to know you, your business and welcome you into our world.
Simon, Pascale and Family
Thanks to the pioneering work and inquisitive mind of Simons father, Bill Carthew … or “Opa” how our children call him … we are where we are today with our sheep! … Feeling deep gratitude!
Bill Carthew was one of the first breeders to cross Border Leicester rams with Romney ewes, a combination which led to the Coopworth breed and introduced sheep farmers to the concept of genetic performance.
Genetics weren’t part of the sheep farming philosophy in the old days and the value of a ram was based on the number of ribbons it had won or how many thousand guineas it had made at a sale … and it was just not adding up for Bill.
As a son of bookseller and Mayor of Pahiatua, Bill always wanted to be a sheep farmer. When he and his wife Di finally got their own farm, he became involved in sheep breeding “as a matter of survival” … their first year lambing was 84%, which was seen as “acceptable” but Bill just knew he couldn’t survive on that!
So he went out and met a group of people who were crossing Border Leister rams with Romney ewes, they were measuring results in lamb number born and survival rates, weights and weight gain and wool weights.
Bill had a strong feeling that this was the way he and the New Zealand sheep industry had to move forward … and so the “Carthew Genetics” journey began …
The Coopworth Sheep Society was formed (with one of the conditions being that you weren’t allowed to “show sheep”) and later the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries became interested in the work of the Coopworth breeders and developed a performance recording system (Animal Plan & Sheep Improvement Ltd. “SIL”), which sill to this day is the most sophisticated sheep recording system in the world!
When it came around to lambing time, Bill would grab his lambing bag, equipped with booklet and pencil, brass tags and his famous “fishing net”, which he quite successfully used to catch lambs!
It was easy to record the number of lambs born to a ewe … but how did the system know if the ewe was a good mum and/or a good feeder?
Bill came up with is very own clever system … he created codes like GM = Good Mum, VGM = Very Good Mum and the odd VVGM = Very Very Good Mum … these “codes” were recorded against the animal and only the good ones would be retained for breeding purposes … I seem to remember there was a lot of manual recording, writing and evaluting going on at the beginning!
And it paid off big time! … Thank you Bill for all the great work you have done and for never stopping to finding better ways to improve sheep farming!
Bill just celebrated his 85th Birthday @ Waireka Home in Pahiatua and we wanted to celebrate him with you here on our newsletter!
Sadly, just as I was writing this, Bill passed away peacefully today (9.9.2020) … R.I.P Bill xox
