This spring due to Covid 19 restrictions, Sheep Ireland held 10 online workshops for LambPlus breeders during the months of February and March. The workshops were conducted using Microsoft Teams and Zoom with the aim of showing breeders how to use all areas of the website to record their flock data.

Breeders joined the online workshops, which were facilitated by Sheep Ireland’s David Coen,  and were able to watch on and discuss as each screen was demonstrated.  The sessions were designed to have small groups in a discussion group format where breeders could ask questions at any stage, as well as discussing areas where breeders might be having any difficulties.

100% of participants would recommend the online workshops to other LambPlus breeders.

These workshops proved especially useful for new LambPlus breeders who were using the website for the first time, as they got a full tour on how each screen can be used, and how breeders can easily review a lot of information on their sheep. For existing breeders there was still lots to learn, from cleaning up your flock inventory using the off farm sales screen, to genomic ordering and viewing genomic results to using all the reports that are available.

More experienced breeders found the greatest benefit from discussing how to use their reports as flock management tools such as comparing ram performance on the ram report or assessing lambing data across multiple years. These reports are easily generated on all Sheep Ireland accounts.

Overall, there was a good up take from breeders with very good feedback via an online survey. All the breeders involved said they would partake in another LambPlus online workshop in the future and all participants said they would recommend the workshop to other LambPlus breeders.

Sheep Ireland will look to carry out more workshops during the coming year with breeders, both online and, restrictions allowing, out on farm.