Feeding triplet-bearing ewes more pays dividends

There is a "whole heap of untapped potential" in feeding triplet-bearing ewes better, Mararoa Station manager Tim Smith believes.

Mr Smith and his wife Trish manage the Landcorp-owned property at Te Anau, which runs 40,000 stock units - sheep, beef and deer.

They have been involved with a research programme aimed at increasing triplet lamb survival through improved feed management from mid-pregnancy to weaning.

The project was outlined by Mr Smith and Dr Julie Everett-Hincks, from Agresearch, during the Innovation at Invermay field day.

A thousand triplet-bearing ewes, identified at pregnancy scanning, were randomly assigned to two pasture feeding treatments through to weaning.

With the FeedPlus mob, ewes were fed according to actual requirements based on liveweight and fetal number of three.

With the control mob, the ewes were fed according to normal Mararoa management for twinning ewes.

The study highlighted the importance of ewe body condition score (BCS) between pregnancy scanning and lambing on triplet ewe performance, particularly the significant effect of increased BCS throughout late pregnancy on improving subsequent litter survival, litter weights and lamb growth rates.

FeedPlus ewes had higher body condition scores than control ewes at pre-lamb vaccination.

Control ewes lost nearly 0.5 BCS between pregnancy scanning and pre-lamb set stocking whereas FeedPlus ewes maintained BCS.

The effect of BCS on ewe performance was very important for tripleting ewes.

Every unit increase in BCS at pregnancy scanning improved litter survival by 0.33 of a lamb and an increase of BCS at pre-lamb set stocking improved litter survival by 0.45 lamb.

An additional BCS at pregnancy scanning translated into an additional 1.2kg in litter weight at birth.

The FeedPlus system also produced 30% more pasture from set stocking to lamb weaning than the control.

Pasture cover needed to be above 1500kg DM/ha at set-stocking, to achieve apparent intakes high enough to maintain ewe BCS.

The FeedPlus treatment produced an additional 12% returns per hectare than the control.

That was from cows and calves using the extra pasture.

A research proposal has been designed for this year to improve triple ewe productivity and maximise financial returns.

This will be by increasing ewe BCS from 3.5 to 4 from pregnancy scanning to set-stocking (pre-lamb) which is expected to lift individual lamb survival rates from 66% to 87%.

If lamb losses were reduced by 2%, then that translated to improved financial returns of about $79 million across the industry, Dr Everett-Hincks said.

With 17,000 ewes at Mararoa Station, then a 2% reduction in lamb losses equated to $58,000, or $148,000 for 5%.

Understanding how much feed the ewes required was critical and pasture had to be actively managed, Mr Smith said.

Internal processes on the property had to be seriously looked at and there was also a lot of planning involved.

"It takes a lot to get your head around," he said.

He was farming in a commercial situation and he did not want to have to intensively manage the ewes. As long as they had plenty of room and plenty of grass, they were happy.

It was when they started looking for grass and wandered off that problems occurred, Mr Smith said.

Other benefits included flow-on benefits to twins, minimising ewe losses and ewe productivity and longevity, through better feeding.

 

 

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