« Breeding - why it all happens »

Many years ago a ewe  JES 3019, was bought by Willie Oosthuizen from Eddie Sloan,

She should have been SA Champion ewe at the the time but was probably over fat, because she had only lambed once. However Willie could also not get her pregnant after that.

We tried embryo flushing her and to our astonishment gave 31 embryos of which 10 were conceived.

DTC 0301,0302,0303,0304,0305,0306,0307,0309 [8 ewes], and rams 0308 and 0310.

These lambs have all produced some excellent animals in their productive life. Their sire DTC 8260, a ram that bred fantastic length [see later], has left a huge mark in the IDF industry.

JES 3019 sire was DTC 9048, a ram with good hindquarters and great dam line, one of the DTC 'blou bloed ooie' and his sire was HFR 4031. Her dam line was also out of a 'blou bloed' ewe line.

DTC 8260 sire is the well known DTC 7002, once described as a ram with no faults was also SA Reserve Grand Champion, and his dam line also came out of the DTC 'blou bloed ooie'. 8260 has also produced embryo lambs with DTC 5084 [ The 2 X SA Champion ewe] and proved to be a great success, producing 'long john' DTC 0313, which has also produced many 'long' animals.

 'Blou bloed ewes' - in every herd there are some ewes that produce quality lambs irrespective of the sire used on her. These are the ewes that should be identified as soos as possible to breed stud rams from.If you happen to breed 3 or 4 of these ewes into a pedigree, there is a big chance that this bloodline will be a top breeding animal. DTC has had a few of these and just to name a some [as mentioned in Hall of Fame above] - DTC 2030,DTC 2294 DTC 7007, DTC 4124, DTC 6041, DTC 4191 [mother of DTC 6017 - JAFTA], DTC 1282, DTC 7128 ETC.

I was fortunate to be on Gerrit Erasmus farm in October 2015 and saw 2 very long rams in his herd. Upon a closer look at the pedigrees of these 2 rams we found that both had all of the above in, and confirmed the reason why they were so long.

One of the rams GE 4103 was sold to Willem van Huysteen at the Molopo Sale in June 2016 for R12000 and the other  GE 4125 has all the possibilities of having a huge influence in his herd.

 GE 4125 has an interesting background to his pedigree. DTC 9122 was an SA CHAMP RAM, DTC 6143 was a full sister to the sire DTC 5093 that produced a SA CHAMP RAM GE 7011, PDK 3054 was  RES SA CHAMP RAM, DTC 5071 bred the SA champ RAM DTC 9122, RD 9004 was a SA CHAMP RAM, DTC 7002 was a SA RESERVE CHAMP ram, DTC 0046 stood 1st in his age group at SA CHAMPS and GE 4125 looks like a CHAMP himself [BELOW].

 

IF we look at DTC 6001 [see photo on next page] we see a similar bloodline as above except that in his pedigree we have a son of the SA CHAMP ewe DTC 5084 [DTC 9326] which is the full brother of the successful  DTC 9323. They  stood 3rd and 4TH in their class at the SA CHAMPS , where DTC 9311 stood 2nd, a full sister to the ewe here in the pedigree DTC 9312. VERY INTERESTING. DTC 9122 stood 1st in the class [became SA CHAMP].

[below] DTC 6065  -  35KG @60 DAYS and 45KG @ 90 DAYS [new kid on block]

 

 THE NEW KID ON THE BLOCK - DTC 6065 [see photo above]- is very similarly bred. His sire is also DTC 8260 but the dam is the full sister to 'long john' DTC 0313 - WHICH makes him even more valuable [son of SA CHAMP EWE DTC 5084]