Mawethu Kondile – African Farming

Sheep Farmer

Mawethu Kondile, Qaga, Qonce (King William’s Town), Eastern Cape

We’ve just finished shearing the sheep and I managed to get five 120kg bales from 204 sheep. We market the wool through BKB, which sells the wool through auctions for the export market to countries such as China and Brazil. From the wool I produced, we’ve managed to get a single bale of AAH-class wool from our young lambs (one year old).

This is the top-of-the-range class wool, something I’m very proud of. We have two bales of AAF class, one BF class and one split bale. The latter consists of Lox 1 and 2, BKF1, CBP and BP, among others.

Next week we’ll start preparing for the mating season. We’ll be dipping the sheep and deworming them using Talimax, an antiparasitic injection effective against sheep scab, roundworms, nasal worm (all stages), screw worm, blue ticks and other internal and external parasites.

We also provide a supplement feed I mix myself at home, using 6 x 40kg crushed yellow maize, 4 x 25kg crushed lucerne, 1 x 50kg molasses meal, 1 x 50kg SS200, 2 x 40kg lamb and ewe pellets, 50kg salt, 50kg feed lime, 40kg germ meal and 50kg soya meal, which contains about 30% protein.

The sheep have access to Multiblock in the kraals that they lick morning and evenings. The rams will be released with the ewes mid-October.