Our Farm
We moved into Highfield House Farm in 1986, bringing with us, our Kerry Blue Terriers and some knowledge of farming. We set up with a small flock of mules put to Texel & Suffolk tups. Over the next few years, cattle and pigs were introduced to the farm an in 1990 our pedigree Texel flock was started.
Stonedge & Hightecs Texels
We originally purchased some pure Texel ewes from hill farm in Hope Valley and on getting them home we discovered they had tattoos in their ears. This was the start of the HIGHTECS flock in 1996.
From these ewes and several purchases from Chelford and the Northwest Texel Sales we have built up and grown a flock to satisfy what the commercial market needs, that is plenty of muscle and back end.
In 2005 we split the pure Dutch Texels from our Hightecs Texel flock, to create the Stonedge Dutch Texel flock, in order to keep these breeding lines purely dutch. On starting the Beltex flock we gradually stopped breeding the Dutch style of Texel and now have two flocks of British Texels.
We have Signet recorded for a number of years and all our ewes are in the top 10% of the breed with many in the top 1%. Our breeding policy is to concentrate on muscle and gigot providing the best breeding rams for the producer of fat lambs for the butcher.
A ram of major influence within our flocks is ROXBURGH SHOT GUN WILLIE. We purchased him in 2011 from the English National Sale for 3500gns. At that time he was the 2nd highest indexed lamb in the country and has done a great job for us. He has produced many top priced rams for us and other breeders selling shearling rams at Kelso. He is also the 2nd placed ram for conformation in the RAM COMPARE scheme proving his suitability for the commercial market.
We have continued to purchase select females to add to our flocks to build them up to number 60 ewes.
In recent years we have selected our stock rams by muscularity and gigot score along with trying to keep the breed type. This has seen us both purchasing rams and using our own lambs within our 2 flocks.
In 2016 we got the chance to purchase some semen of a highly rated ram HOLLYFORD VROOM VROOM. We chose him because he had great style and prescence. He was also in the top 1% for Index, Muscle Depth & Gigot Score. He has not dissappointed and we have used him for both our 2016 & 2017 lamb crop.
For our 2018 crop of lambs we have continued the theme of using rams in the top 1%. We kept a son of Vroom Vroom, out of a Tweed ewe we purchased in Carlisle, HIGHTECS YORICK. He is currently the 10th highest Index sheep in the country with a massive gigot score which sees him stood 2nd, just behind his Sire.
We have also used the 2nd highest indexed stock ram, CORRIECRAVIE UNION PACIFIC. Again used for his tremendous muscling and gigot scores we hope he gels well with our Vroom Vroom daughters. We have also used a great muscled stock ram from Wales, PENYGELLI YANNIS, 2 of our own retained ram lambs, HIGHTECS AVICII & HIGHTECS ACTION MAN plus HULL HOUSE ALCHEMIST whom we purchased at Skipton this year.
We are looking forwards to how these rams perform and seeing their progeny later this year.
Beltex Sheep
The STONEDGE Beltex Flock was started in 2010 with the purchase of 4 ewes from the Chelford Sale.
Since then we have gradually increased our flock to 40 ewes by purchasing some of the top bloodlines and keeping our homebred females with the aim of breeding sheep with great breed character and tremendous shape and carcase quality.
Our flock is Signet recorded and hence in 2015 we purchased the highest index Beltex ram (Broughton Willie Wonder) for 9500gns @ Carlisle. He was placed 2nd in the shearling ram class that day and is now the foundation for our flock ewes producing sheep with tremendous style and carcase which his figures predict.
Unfortunately in 2016 we lost Willie Wonder and kept a tremendous son of his, STONEDGE BEELZEBUB. He is the father of most of our 2017 crop of lambs and he has carried his fathers style and carcase quality through too. Beelzebub’s full brother Behemoth also won the Champion Male Beltex at the Three Counties Show in 2017.
Our sale highlights to date are having the top priced ewe lamb at Welshpool for the last 2 years, three sheep exported to Ireland in 2017, Beelzebub winning the Male Champion @ Newark in 2016, selling Behemoth privately and him winning @ 3 Counties in 2017, and having the top priced ram lamb sold @ Newark in 2017.
For our 2018 crop of lambs we have purchased the 2nd Prize lamb from Carlisle, Cynin Countdown as well as using our home bred lamb Coco Pops plus Broughton Willie Wonder.
In 2018 we will have some quality rams & females for sale either off farm or at the following sales, Carlisle August, Welshpool August, Newark September & Ruthin September. Please keep an eye on our STOCK FOR SALE section or our Facebook page.
