Romney

The Fernvale Romney stud is our jewel in the crown.

It is steeped in history and has progressed and developed with the times.The stud today has entrenched key breeding policies that are used to produce superior animals that will have the genetic make up to enhance the commercial sheep farming operations that they are transferred into.

These key breeding policies include:

• Only multiple born and reared animals are sold or retained in the stud
• Quality outside bloodlines are used every third generation
• Commercial pressure is put on the stud through 40,000 stock units being run on the operation
• Two year ram performance guarantee is given with any rams sold
• All ewe hoggets are put to the ram
• Via Scan and eye muscle scanning used to trace meat yields
• All rams are scour scored and come with a FEC index
• 50K DNA data is available
• SIL recorded

Currently the Fernvale stud comprises 1700 Romney stud ewes. Rams are sold as Commercial sires on properties that range from high country farms in the Southern Alps in the South Island to the intensive fertile Canterbury Plains and many parts all over the North Island. All the Romney rams are fully recorded right from parent history dating back to the 1940s and come with full and current data analysis. 

A large amount of investment has gone into DNA testing of all our ewes and sires. We now have all ewes DNA profiled. The DNA/pedigree of the lambs born is obtained at tailing time. This means that we can guarantee that we are only supplying naturally-multiple reared animals to the market place. 

It is interesting to note that due to the fact that we do not go in the lambing paddock over the crucial period - our laming percentage has actually increased.