What is the Ideal Weight for a Market Lamb?
Over the years, I’ve read many articles about the ideal weight for market lambs and had many conversations with producers. I am left with the impression that many domestic lambs are grown to well over 100 pounds, to 110 and 120 or even to more than 130 pounds. I have long wondered why. Why make lambs this heavy?
As many of you have gathered by now, I am coming from the old world; from Germany, to be precise. My first 11 years of a total of 29 in the sheep business were spent “over there”. Naturally, when I came here I did many things the way I did in the old country, one of them being that I harvest my lambs at 80 to 90 pounds live weight. However, most of these lambs were at first sold at the local sales barn and I didn’t give the weight much thought from a marketing perspective, only from a production perspective. A few were sold directly to individual customers. While I had mostly positive feedback, I distinctly remembered a customer complaining about the size (or lack thereof) of the leg of lamb. She stated that the ones she previously purchased at the supermarket were much larger. I suggested that this is where she ought to get her lamb from here on, figuring the leg of lamb was compared to a large grain-fed Suffolk lamb (or something like that), with which I wasn’t going to compete.
A group of White Dorper market lambs, weighing above 80 lbs. on average. Photo by Ulf Kintzel.
Seven years ago I moved to the Fingerlakes area and had to look for new customers. Two of the new ones were food vendors who purchased my lambs and sold it in places like New York City to restaurants and stores. To my surprise at that time, the weight was discussed quite extensively. They wanted heavier carcasses. I wanted to stick to my guns. So I started thinking a little more about why I did what I did and why I wanted to stick with “my” weight and not theirs.
Let’s crunch a few numbers first so that we are all on the same page. When a lamb is harvested, the carcass weight is about 50 percent of the live weight. That figure can vary a little. Lambs of wool sheep breeds when carrying some wool will often “dress out” a little less than 50 percent. Hair sheep breeds tend to dress out a little above 50 percent. Then, you need to take into consideration the amount of food the lamb still had in its guts at the time of harvest because that affects that percentage as well. On top of it, in some slaughtering facilities the carcass is weighted with the head on and in some without. So let’s not complicate the issue and for easy math let’s settle for 50 percent of a live weight being the carcass or dress weight.
I have medium sized sheep. The ewes will reach about 160 to 180 pounds when fully grown. Individual animals may weigh a little more but I do not have sheep that weigh above 200 pounds when fully grown. However, many sheep breeds in the US do get that heavy. A large sheep has higher maintenance than a medium sized sheep. Yet, a large sheep cannot give you more lambs either.
Furthermore, higher maintenance most often requires feeding grain, something I don’t do. Naturally, a medium sized sheep cannot have a lamb as large as a large sheep. Secondly, a lamb grows with relative ease and speed, if fed appropriately, to 80 pounds and slightly above. I reach that weight on average between 4 and 5 month with my male market lambs. The top lambs get to 80 pounds at three and a half months. These are mostly single male lambs from adult ewes. Some lambs will need 6 or perhaps even 7 months to get to this weight. These are often lambs that were born to a young ewe, perhaps even a twin born to a ewe that lambed the first time that doesn’t get the same milk as others and therefore grows slower.
At about 80 to 90 pounds I have a lamb that is exactly as it should be: the bone, meat, and fat ratio is exactly right. The lamb is meaty and it is ‘finished’ – meaning it has just the right fat cover. Fast growing animals put a bit more growth into meat a while longer. So they might be finished at 90 lbs. or slightly above. However, once the lamb reaches a weight well above 90 pounds and starts reaching 100 pounds, that ratio starts changing. The lamb now starts putting more nutrients into producing fat and less into muscle growth. They also grow slower. So while I need to have more input for the same growth, I also have the input turned into more fat. You are not getting bonus points or premium prices for more fat last time I checked. So it makes sense to sell these lambs at this point, which amounts to about 40 to 45 lbs. dress weight with some lambs just under 40 lbs. and some in the high 40s or even 50 lbs.
I always figured that this is a rather selfish approach, viewing the issue from only my end, the production end. Then I read a research report by Whit C. Stewart in “The Shepherd” magazine that addressed this issue. According to the author only six percent of the graded carcasses in the US were 45 to 55 lbs, yet these ‘light’ carcasses retrieved the premium. The author gleaned the data from a USDA weekly report. He goes on listing the norm for carcass weights in New Zealand and Australia, being 35 to 44 lbs. and 39 lbs. to 52 lbs. respectively.
When it comes to sheep, I am always listening to what they do down under. The sheep production in these two countries are the leading edge in the sheep industry. It so happens to be the case that their approach and mine are matching. In case of my vendors I went to rather great length explaining why I didn’t want to increase the weight before harvesting. Perhaps in the future I only need to use one sentence: “For my medium-sized sheep, 40 pounds dress weight makes the ideal lamb carcass.”
As ex South African now living in Canada where eating sheep is relatively new, I really enjoyed your article on the right size to harvest (and grass fed!). However, what I enjoyed most, is the photo on your website! Any chance of me obtaining a copy? I promise not to use it for any purpose whatsoever other than perhaps a framed picture in our home.
kind Regards
Louis
Good Day.
As an Australian/Canadian returned home to Canada and looking to eat lamb again. I was happy to stumble on your article. I have recently connected with a farmer to buy a lamb and you article has given me some tips on how to purchase. I agree the aussi and the kiwi are great sheep farmers.
Here in Australia, the size/ mature weight of sheep is becoming an issue from the perspective of getting shearers to shear the larger types. Shearers and shearing contractors are now starting to decline jobs on properties with larger sheep. This is because of leg and back related stress injuries to shearers. Unless robotic shearing is greatly improved, we will remain dependant on manual shearing for some time. Aside from the shearing factor, there is the question of what size enables optimum productivity from a given area considering the seasonal variables that are beyond farmer’s control. Also what are the most profitable weights specified by processors and consumers? There can be significant penalties for carcases that don’t fit the grid specifications, just as there are penalties for over or under fat carcases. Based on my observation those chasing size or heavier mature weights may inadvertently be producing animals that have lost the ability to lay down sufficient fat cover. I guess at the end of the day the consumer will determine that successful sheep breeders will need to tailor their sheep to the required weight in order to remain viable in sheep breeding.
I would think the people that are buying who think bigger is better probably do not care about quality.
But they will be the first to post negative comments and drag your name and years of hard work through the mud. No thanks. They can go somewhere else. I will continue producing quality. 🙂
Thank you.
I am extremely new to the world of sheep breeding. My wife and I run an orphanage in Honduras, and we have about 12 acres of farm land. We moved here from Texas, where sheep is a four letter word.
We bought a ram and ten pregnant ewes in October. We now have 19 sheep including the lambs. I have no idea what size these sheep should grow to or slaughter size, but I think the ewes weigh roughly 90 lbs.
I do know that there is a market for lamb here and we have had our first taste, and I am hooked.
If you have a market for 80lbs lambs, good for you brother. I’m just getting into raising sheep, and the way I’m thinking hay is about seven scents a pound, so each pound of hay returns 4-5 times its costs.
When I first came to the US from NZ and cooked lamb I thought something had gone drastically wrong with my palate. Long story short it turned out that the US and Aussies that grew the meat I was eating were grain feeding the animals. Problem solved I buy lambs feed them only grass and kill them out at about 40lb dressed weight. Delicious
Hi! We just raised our first Dorper lamb ramb. He was 36 pounds of meat. In CA the grass is very dry so we put him on forage hay for the last month. Should we have grained him or left him on pasture? He was very lean and little fat.
Hopefully he still tastes good. Any advice is appreciated.
Hi Anna,
Congrats on raising your first Dorper lamb ram! The author of this article, Ulf, is a frequent contributor to the Cornell Small Farms Program and can provide advice on your question. He can be reached by e-mail at ulf@whitecloversheepfarm.com or by phone at 585-554-3313.
Except some people actually like fat mixed into their meat. I’m one of them. 😬 I know many people are obsessed with lean. I think the fat has nutrition too. But I gather that you are paying more to produce the fat layers.
I liked the weight and was driving the kids nuts by shuffling my chips constantly. A chain of online gambling establishments is also an ideal alternative for this industry. Simply like when we were kids, we do have our guidelines.
How long should be a dressed lamb body without the head?
Is the average weight 40lb withoy the head?
Can you still have the head to boil for soup?
Here in Essex they’re saying 24″ and i think that is way too small, merely a suckling lamb i would have thought.
I have Egyptian family staying and would liketo host a big bbq for them so any tips would be great, if you have any too please.
Many thanx Heidi.
Tel:07784 613 168 if email wont go through.
Sorry about typo’s
I’m in Essex, England
But they will be the first to post negative comments and drag your name and years of hard work through the mud. No thanks. They can go somewhere else. I will continue producing quality. 🙂