Texel Rams
In November of 2000, John and Eadie Steele had Texel embryos implanted into their OLIBS ewes. They wanted to be able to provide a complete package to commercial buyers - high health ewes and health-matched terminal sires. The Texel compliments the carcass type of the OLIBS ewe and the OLIBS ewe provides the prolificacy and milkiness needed to produce uniform, quality, market lambs. The Steele's current Texel genetics are unique to North America. They imported 127 Texel embryos from New Zealand to start their Texel flock in 2001. Since then they have used selected semen from Holland and Great Britain. The flocks current size is around 140 ewes, all performance recorded, raising their lambs on pasture only.
All weights and scanning results are recorded on the Ontario Sheep Flock Improvement Program. The Ultrasound Backfat scanning is done at the third lumbar vertebrae (base of the last rib). Our entire flock is vet-certified free of Maedi Visna, Johnes Disease, Caseous Lymphadenitis, Infectious Foot Rot and Enzootic Abortion.
