Introduction to the UK sheep industry Dr Joanne Conington Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC) Edinburgh, Scotland, UK Finnish Sheep Conference September 18 2020 Who am I? Post- Covid! 2 UK sheep industry built on wool production 3 3 ScotlandScotland 3.3M N.N.Ireland Ireland 0.9M EnglandEngland 7M WalesWales 4.3M 4 4 ‘Stratified’ UK sheep industry Hill and Mountain Uplands Lowlands 5 6 Scottish Blackface 7 8 Welsh Mountain 9 Swaledale 10 11 ‘Stratified’ UK sheep industry Hill and Mountain Uplands Lowlands 12 Prolific ‘longwool’ breeds 13 13 Longwool Ram Breed Bluefaced Leicester 14 Longwool Ram Breed Border Leicester 15 F1 sheep (cross between hill breeds and prolific breeds) are the most numerous breeding ewe in the UK 16 16 Crossbred Ewe Breed e.g. Scotch Mule (Bluefaced Leicester x Scottish Blackface) 17 Crossbred Ewe Breed English mule / ‘North Country mule’ 18 Crossbred Ewe Breed Welsh mule Bluefaced Leicester x Welsh Mountain, Beulah or Welsh Hill Speckled-face 19 ‘Stratified’ UK sheep industry Hill and Mountain Uplands Lowlands 20 Meat sheep breeds 21 21 Suffolk 22 Texel 23 Charollais 24 Advantages of this structure • Breeds and their crosses fit well to their location and system of production • Use of specialised males and females – breed improvement occurs in purebred • Crossing system maximises use of ‘hybrid vigour’ 25 Disadvantages of this system • Supermarket nightmare ! – Very diverse end product • Capture of the value of genetic improvement is complex • Biosecurity compromised with purchase of animals from other farms / markets 26 UK sheep industry is very diverse –83 ‘Purebreeds’ –Many more crosses and composite ‘breeds’ Only ~19 breeds have >10K 27 27 Native breeds Jacob 28 Native breeds Wensleydale Dorset 29 Native breeds Devon Longwool Hampshire Down 30 Cute imports! Valais Blacknose 31 % flock size by region 32 Meat production = main product 33 33 UK marketing chain 2018 AHDB, 2019 Ave carcass wt (lambs) 19.3Kg (dead weight) AHDB, 2019 34 Genetic improvement - what do we want? 35 Comparing animals across flocks Statistical adjustments Parity # Age of dam Age of lamb Farm Year-month Single-twin Sex (% breed) 36 Linking flocks using common sires Textcccc te A B Animals C D Progeny of link rams Progeny of other rams 37 Estimated breeding values(EBVs) 38 38 Performance recording 39 Data collection 40 Animal identification 41 What problems do we have? Sheep image courtesy of AHDB 42 .. Probably the same as Finnish sheep farmers! Disease ££ ! Skilled Labour shortage 43 .. UK sheep industry biggest problem… 44 Acknowledgements Ann McLaren Nicola Lambe Harriet Wishart Sebastian Mucha Karolina Kaseja Antonio Pacheco 45 Leading the way in Agriculture and Rural Research, Education and Consulting 46.