It’s Official, Baber Rams are Top Tups! The essence of our sheep breeding philosophy remains unchanged, to produce high performance, fit and fertile rams, with high libido which thrive on an all grass diet. We are delighted to publish this year’s Ram Lists based on Signet figures and extremely proud that most of our rams have appeared in the top 5% for several years but this year we are particularly thrilled that our rams have risen still further with many occupying the top 1% of the national recorded flock.
Read our August 2024 newsletter for more news on Baber Rams
Achievements over the Years
Ewe Lambs Top of Suffolk Evaluation
One of our ewe lambs (UK 0 3639455 09547) was listed as the top sheep ever in the Suffolk evaluation. In 2019 there were 12 animals with indexes of over 400, of which seven were bred in our flock. We have bred the top 3 Stock Sires in the Suffolk evaluation, and within the Texel breed, one of our home bred ram lambs (UK 0 3639455 09464) was one of the highest indexed stock rams in the breed.
For the last 15-20 years we have been recording and selecting for ease of lambing and lamb vigour in all our breeds with a view to lambing all our ewes outdoors. The Exlanas have always lambed outdoors and over the last few years we are now lambing most of the Suffolks and Texels outdoors as well, including the ewe lambs lambing at 12 months old. Both 9547 (the highest Index ewe lamb) and her twin sister 9548 lambed this year, as a ewe lambs, outdoors.
We have now supplied 6 rams into the project, and this helps to underpin the accuracy of the BLUP evaluation of our rams. We were thrilled when our ram held the top overall ranking position in the first run of the Ram Compare Project and five years later is still looking impressive. Once again, we are delighted with our performance figures of the rams we have on offer this year.