>Who measures the loin eye area? What is your percentage hanging and
>dressed weight?
Our vet, a certified ultrasound tech for Angus cattle does the
measuring. We generally see a return of 50-60% of live weight as
retail cuts. (low end for rams, high end for ewes) I don't have
hanging carcass weights on most of mine so I can't give you that
figure. Our sheep are small, adult ewes rarely go over 100 lbs (I
still have a lot that are in the 65-75lb range) and adult rams are at
most about 120 lbs with a lot of mine closer to 105 lbs. I still
don't have a good scale to measure adults with, the lambs we hang in
a sling but I'm not strong or tall enough to do that with the adults
esp. rams.
We just got the data on the lambs I am keeping as potential replacements:
5 ewe lambs scanned
Loin eye in cm2 date scanned weight age in days
5.98 11/19/03 46lbs 195
6.18 11/19/03 54lbs 195
5.98 11/19/03 54lbs 195
6.14 11/19/03 49lbs 191
11/19/03 50lbs 191
2 ram lambs
5.42 11/19/03 68lbs 201
6.68 11/19/03 56lbs 199
Dan Morrical from IA state sent me information on how to correct for
weight at scanning so I still need to do that.
--
Oogie McGuire - oogiem@desertweyr.com
Weyr Associates - Multimedia and Web Authoring Services & Consulting
Desert Weyr - CMK Arabian horses and Black Welsh Mountain Sheep
http://www.desertweyr.com/
Paonia, CO USA
