It has been a challenging spring in some parts of the country, and slow pasture growth may make weaning a proportion of the lamb crop a good option this season.
Rather than continuing to compromise both lamb growth rates and ewe body condition, early weaning allows what good quality feed there is to be partitioned into lambs. Ewes can either be sold early on a strong schedule or given more time to regain body condition.
Trials run at Massey University found lambs over 20kgLW coped best with early weaning (minimum weaning weight was 16kg LW), but it was the quality of the forages on offer that was the greatest determinant of how well lambs grew post-weaning.
Professor Paul Kenyon, who led the early-weaning trials, says early-weaned lambs should be given unrestricted access to legume-based forages such as a herb clover mix at a minimum cover of seven centimetres in height.
If lambs are weaned onto the crop, they should be given time to adjust to a change in feed. Running the ewe and lambs onto the crop a few days before weaning, then running the lambs back onto the crop after weaning will help minimise the weaning check.
He says in late lactation all lambs, but especially multiples, are receiving very little nutrition from the ewe, so when grass-growth is limited the ewes are competing with their lambs for feed, compromising the performance of both.
Early weaning can also be particularly useful in hoggets as it will give them more time to recover body condition between lambing and mating again as a two-tooth.
Partitioning high quality feed into lambs in the late spring early summer period will benefit the whole farm system. It means more lambs can be sold prime before the height of summer – making more feed available for capital stock – and ewe lambs can be grown out to heavier weights early. This means there is flexibility to hold them back later when feed resources are more limited.