Blackface breeding in Northern Ireland

A sheep farmer growing up in prime Blackface territory in the Glens of Antrim would have been brought up with the idea of Blackface sheep having a black face and grey nose not forgetting the tight skin! Unless you are selling breeding stock - in economic terms how important are these visual traits? Surely "easy care" traits that require less labour, ewes with good maternal ability, lambs with high growth rates and superior carcase quality must be more important characteristics.

In recent years the Blackface breed has been strongly challenged by increased use of cross breeding in hill flocks in Northern Ireland. This can only be redressed through a stronger focus on the economically important traits required by commercial breeders who will be aiming to make their living from sheep without subsidy in the Post Mid Term review era.

Many commercial upland farmers, especially those that sell store lambs, have realised that by using a Texel or a Leicester sire they can in many cases improve their lamb price by more than the loss of their ewe premium. This replacement of the Blackface ram can only speed up with the removal of direct payments and the drive by commercial farmers to maximise profitability. Recent research from Agricultural Research Institute of Northern Ireland has shown the economic benefit of such a policy.

Northern Ireland historically has had a stratified sheep breeding policy. This has led to the idea that Blackface ewes will always be needed to produce crossbred replacements for lowland flocks. Research findings in Scotland and Ireland have shown that mating existing crossbred flocks with a third breed is producing sheep that are performing as well or better than those first cross ewes without the risk of buying in disease. Many lowland farmers have taken this on board and are now breeding their own replacements.

Greenmount Hill Farm at Glenwherry has 1000 Blackface ewes and is actively working with Blackface breeders to develop the breed and offer an economic solution for pure breeders. In the past new stock rams for Glenwherry were selected on little more than visual characteristics at local sales. Unfortunately the offspring of these purchased animals were disappointing in many cases, with the progeny of homebred rams outperforming those of purchased sires. A refocus on our breeding policy led to collaboration with the Blackface Elite Company. The Blackface Elite Company includes farmers from Northern Ireland and Scotland who utilise Signet recording systems in flock selection.

Northern Ireland members of Blackface Elite attended a recent Scottish open day. The Lennox family from Loch Lomond are founding members of Blackface Elite who select their breeding stock on Signet performance figures and physical correctness. In the last 10 years their lamb carcase weights have increased by 3 KG/lamb and carcase conformation has improved from 50 percent in O carcase classification to 88 percent in EUR classification. Post-decoupling how many hill farms similar in size to the Lennox business can afford to miss out on an extra £10,000/year? This is the amount that the Lennox family have increased their margin by selecting stock rams on performance figures rather than visual appearance when compared to 10 years ago.

BF Elite members are also actively involved in looking at DNA markers for footrot resistance and worm tolerance/resistance, both of which are traits that strongly influence profitability and labour requirements. The Blackface breed has been the foundation of our sheep industry in the hills and LFA areas. If it is to compete economically in future then it must embrace change and adopt modern breeding technologies.

A group of ewes from Greenmount’s hill farm at Glenwherry that are the result of selection based on Signet recording through the Blackface Elite (BF Elite) Scheme