Factory spotlight focuses on heavier lamb carcases

Last week’s sheep trends touched on what factories are describing as a growing issue of an increasing percentage of lambs killing out-of-spec.

The issue reported is lambs killing at excessive weights of upwards of 25kg or 27kg carcase weight, with some also deemed overfat.

Factory procurement managers state they have been raising the issue with finishers in recent weeks and are actively encouraging them to draft lambs at risk of going overweight quicker.

Some state that carcase weights have crept upwards at an earlier stage in the year and are concerned that if left unchecked it will lead to far greater problems when weights seasonally increase from now onwards.

There are different steps being taken across the various processors.

The two Irish Country Meats plants have been encouraging finishers to move any lambs likely to kill over 25kg carcase weight quickly with plans afoot to introduce price deductions for any lambs killing above this weight.

Kildare Chilling are also cautioning producers that heavier lambs weighing over 25kg carcase weight may be discounted with one cut mooted this week being a maximum payment of €178 per head for lambs over 25kg.

Kepak are currently operating a pricing system at a higher carcase weight limit of 27kg.

Any lamb killing at greater than 27kg carcase weight is paid at 22kg carcase weight.

The factory are monitoring carcase weights and hoping that this will provide enough of a deterrent against retaining lambs to heavier weights.

The best outcome is a process whereby any heavy lambs in the system can be drafted swiftly without cuts imposed.

The economics of finishing store lambs have unfortunately been negative for many this season.

However, retaining lambs to heavier weights in the hope of a price increase is a false economy borne out by higher finishing costs and now the possibility of price cuts.

One area where it is easy to get caught out with is the intensive finishing or ad-lib feeding of lowland lambs with a big frame.

While the typical performance on ad-lib finishing is in the region of 225g to 250g daily, individual lambs with a higher concentrate consumption can gain upwards of 400g daily and reach slaughter weight much quicker.

As such it is important to weigh lambs regularly during the finishing phase and draft lambs on a combination of weight and fat cover.

Table 1 details a number of examples of the carcase weight delivered at a range of lamb liveweights and varying kill-out percentage.

The typical kill-out of lambs finished intensively will be in the region of 44% to 45% for ewe and wether lambs on concentrates for a significant period of time and from 41% to 44% for ram lambs.

Again the kill-out can be significantly higher, particularly in well-conformed lambs and care should be taken when drafting such types.