Romney Sheep Breeders
Here at Locks Farm our focus is on breeding Romney sheep that are both fully recorded and also have the highest performance possible.
Our aim is to breed the very best Romney sheep for “less work, more profit”
Romney Sheep Breeds Brochure
To download a brochure listing all of the available Romney sheep breeds, please click the image below:
What we do?
We focus on: Easy lambing and good mothering ability, producing Romney sheep with a strong constitution, high fecundity (number of lambs born), high growth rates (early maturing), good muscularity and structural correctness Longevity.
Testimonials
Joel Rowe
Farming 2000 ewes in Pembrokeshire West Wales, and moving from an intensive indoor high input system, to a more extensive outdoor low input system saw me opt for the Romney March Ewe. The Romney is an excellent forager, hardy, a good mother with good feet. Chris and Caroline Hodgkins tups have provided my Romney flock with a boost to prolificacy while maintaining the excellent foraging ability to perform predominately on grazed forage.
The individual tupping and performance recording and constant culling of negative traits carried out by Chris and Caroline on their flock give me the confidence that each tup purchased will perform to the same standard, this has been proved in practice, I would recommend them to anyone.
The Wairere Connection
Wairere pronounced [Y-REAR-E] comes from the Maori word meaning Waterfall.
We formed Wairere U.K., a joint partnership with Derek Daniell (of Wairere Station in New Zealand).
Click here to read more about Wairere
Youtube Video
Please click below to view our promotional video, detailing how a Wairereuk Romney sheep can work for you.
More testimonials
James Uys
We farm 1000 acres in Gloucestershire. 900 acres is in the ESA and 100 acres is reseeded and fertilized regularly. We run 2000 Romney ewes and have been breeding Romney’s since 1987. During that time we have tried many Romney rams from UK Romneys to NZ imported Romneys and while our flock has improved, we have struggled to find the right kind of tup for our ewes. We purchased some tups from Chris and Caroline Hodgkins in 2010 and I have been very pleased with the results.
The rams we purchased worked tremendously well. We put 8 rams with 1000 ewes in October and these scanned 150% with 3% barren. The rams were with the ewes for 4 weeks. We then put the same rams with another 1000 ewes. These again scanned 150% and only 2% barren. During the last half of November the weather was very bad with lots of snow and ice. The ewes winter outside and receive no hard feed.
The ewes lambed outside in March and April and both flocks lambed within 3 weeks. Lambs were born with very little assistance and were very quick to suckle. So far I am very pleased with the lambs that we have from the Hodgkins tups. They are hardy and make life very easy for the ewes. I think finally we have found the right type of tup for our ewes. I would not hesitate in recommending Chris and Carolines rams. They are very good on their feet, they have fantastic constitution and work very very hard. What’s more, they Leave superb easy born, fast growing lambs.
Harry Metcalfe
At Blackbrook Farm we run a flock of 1350 Romney ewes. We started the flock 13 years ago buying most of our foundation ewes from Lordsland Farm and Bob Whitehead, both well known traditional Romney flocks. About five years ago we started useing Newzealand genetics in the form of rams from Richard Chantlers High Country Romneys. These had the effect of increaseing our lambing percentage which was our main objective. We also benefited from the other advantages of years of the New zealand breeding system.
We started looking at all the advantages of buying rams from recorded flocks. Other people doing all the recording of mothering traits, lamb growth, confirmation, muscle depth etc all things we would like to take advantage of but dont have the time to achieve. I visited Chris and Caroline at Locks farm two years ago and was impressed with there system. I liked what they were doing with the recording and bought four rams which produced good lambs that had plenty of get up and go and have grown on well. We bought rams again last year and have been pleased again with the lambs, the acid test will be this comeing year when they lamb for the first time.
The Locks Farm Romneys fit in well with our system where we use New Zealand genetics over our ewes and then put the higher yielding ewes back to more traditional type Romney rams to keep the type of shape and size that we want for our own replacements and the good number of ewe lambs that we sell. Its an ongoing project thats both interesting and increaseingly more profitable.
Graham Palmer
The first rams were purchased from Locks Farm following a Romney society visit in 2008. The following lambing proved a real test and even snow was shrugged off. This highlighted the incredible vigour and will to survive whatever was thrown at them. Subsequent purchases now mean that all Romney lambs produced here are sired by rams of three bloodlines from the same source.
All are fertility tested pre-tupping and are confidently used to cover 75 – 100 ewes with tight lambing and negligible barreners. Their soundness and constitution are a very welcome supplement to the UK bloodlines making shepherding of what is a relatively low input breed even easier. At the sharp end there are also benefits. As we market all our lambs direct, the pure Romney proves perfect for all year round meat production.
We have no trouble drawing lambs off grass every week of the year at an average of R3L. The scale of selection and recording at Locks Farm will increasingly be influential in improving our productivity from field to fork.
Gordon & Jennifer Wyeth
We are a family run ‘Livestock Farm’ caring for 3000 ewes of our own and managing a further 3500 ewes for 3 other farms. About 5 years ago we had the chance to change ‘our ways’ to an ‘Easy Care Flock System’, and through a lot of research, we came across the ‘New Zealand Romney’
Since then, we have been buying some ewes and buying or hiring all our rams from Chris & Caroline and are now totally committed to the ‘New Zealand Romney’. The quality and easy lambing characteristics mean our forage-based system works efficiently with large numbers of sheep and makes a good profit at the end of the year.
We trust in Chris & Caroline’s research and determination to source the best genetics possible in order to provide the easy care system we now rely on for all the flocks. We would highly recommend Chris & Caroline’s stock to anyone and have the results to prove it!
If you would like to download a PDF version of our testimonials brochure, please click here.
Frank Langrish
If you like feeding sheep concentrates, trimming their feet, having them inside a shed for lambing and looking after them all night, then please do not even think about keeping Romney Sheep. Having kept them for more than a century on the Romney Marsh and running large numbers of ewes on an extensive low input system, feeding only grass and forage crops, we know that they are a great breed of sheep.
Recently we have been looking to widen the genetic base of our flock and are convinced that using New Zealand genetics is the way forward. We have felt that we needed to increase lambing percentage slightly, but at the same time be sure that the ewes have the milking ability for those extra lambs as well as retaining the easy lambing and great mothering ability of the breed.
The Waiere Romneys are extremely similar in looks and wool type and after initial trials we have found the lambs finish more quickly at slightly higher weights. After visiting the Waiere flock in the Wairapa and realising the conditions the sheep were kept in were much harsher than our own system, we have decided to replicate what is being done and this year we have lambed a small number of ewe lambs with success.
The flexibility of the breed to finish at any age from 12 weeks at 18kg carcases to 25kg hoggets that are of a good conformation and lean suits our system where we try to supply local markets for more than 40 weeks of the year. An added bonus is that the ewes this year should produce wool worth close to £6.00 a fleece. So there are Romney sheep and there are the rest!
