More sheep coming next week! (was: need encouragement)

[patandchickens]

miss_thenorth, she said that the lambs she is selling should ideally not be bred til December (for May lambing) although *could* be bred as early as August if I really wanted to push my luck.

FarmGirl, yup, that is my project for tomorrow, to call around to nearby breeders of other kinds of sheep -- but AFAIK while you can milk anything, you will definitely get more milk out of some breeds than others, and if I am only going to have 2 of them I don't want to be getting just a cup-and-a-half of milk per day, ideally

I am starting to really stress out again about the whole breeding thing. The dairy sheep woman was not terribly encouraging about it, she sort of vaguely suggested that yes sometimes people do rent out a ram for a few weeks or even let you take your ewes to their farm, but doesn't do it herself and didn't actually know anyone who did it. Her suggestion was that I a) get more ewes and b) keep a ram, or that if I did not want a ram full-time I could buy one in the fall, let him breed my ewes, then sell him (i.e at auction).

Unfortunately I have no truck or trailer so I cannot easily be buying and selling these critters or trucking them all around :/

And I am really leery of keeping a ram, both in terms of cost and extra facilities and child safety. (not to mention "me safety").

Sigh, I wish they sold dairy sheep at Walmart <ducking and running>,

Pat

 

[FarmGirl]

I'm told that Icelandic sheep can be very milky, easy to manage and come in lots of pretty colors. Are there any Icelandic breeders in your area? (Link http://www.isbona.com/)

Another way to do it is artificial insemination but I'm not sure what's involved there.

Can't wait to hear how you make out

 

[lupinfarm]

Pat you don't need a truck or trailer! I brought both my does home in the backseat of my truck. They came home in a dog crate. We had sheep briefly as well and they came here in the back of a ford focus.

The brilliance of sheep (and goats) is that they're small enough to transport by car.

 

[miss_thenorth]

Ours came home in dog crates in the back of our truck. Call your vet, I'm sure AI is a definite possibility,--when I was looking at dexter cows, she had viable sperm available, and said it was an easy procedure for a vet. I think that might be our route next time around, but I also know some sheep farmers real close by who I would be talking to first.

Farmgirl, whereabouts in Ontario?

eta, my sheep are not milk breeds either, but we're not making cheese.

 

[FarmGirl]

miss_thenorth - we live in Mississauga but we have some land in Prince Edward County near Milford. That's where we will settle in a few years...

 

[big brown horse]

Pat after the ram is "finished" can't he be "fixed" (what is that term???) and then later butchered?

That was my plan anyway.

Here is a bit of advice on the advantages of early and late lambing. I got it from my Storeys Sheep Guide, hope it helps:

Early
There are fewer parasites on the early grass pasture
Ewe lambs born early are nmore apt to breed as lambs
You can have all lambs born by the time of the best spring grass.
There are fewer problems with flies at docking and castrating time.

Late
It is easy to shear ewes before lambing.
It avoids the danger of lambing in the severe weather.
Mild weather means fewer chilled lambs.
Ewes can lamb out on the pasture.
Less grain is required for lambs, since you have lots of pasture.

 

[patandchickens]

I have read and also been told by the dairy sheep lady that AI doesn't work in sheep the way it does in cattle or horses -- it has to be done laparascopically (ka-ching) and has a lower rate of success and is generally only ever done if you want specific genes and can't import the actual animal himself.

miss_thenorth, you have Cheviots, yes? Could I ask, about how much milk are you getting per milking or per day?

FarmGirl, my husband is from Mississauga (Port Credit) and we lived near Winston-Churchill and the 401 back when we were first married and had not yet found a property

I talked with DH about the concept of possibly getting ewe lambs this year (for reasons of price and availability) and thus not actually having milk til next year, and he was surprisingly agreeable about the concept... maybe because it would mean I don't have to milk this year, I dunno. I would still rather find some animals I can milk THIS year, darnit!, but we'll see. I will call other breeders around here tomorrow, I will probably sound really stupid ("I am looking for just two ewes, to milk, do you have anything that might be suitable?") but oh well

Pat

 

[big brown horse]

There are lots of tips on how to keep your ram from turning into a "battering ram" .

There is a shield that you can put on them like a halter that blocks out their vision when their head is positioned in the ramming position. For a pretty reasonable price, you'll effectively stop a butting ram without interfering in any of his other functions. It also says you can hopple, yoke or clog the ram too--all of which are old European practices.

 

[patandchickens]

Pat after the ram is "finished" can't he be "fixed" (what is that term???) and then later butchered? That was my plan anyway.

Since by breeding age a ram would be full-grown anyhow, I am not sure there would be any POINT in wethering him by then?

Yes, one could buy a ram, run him with the ewes for a month, then send him to the processor to be turned into mutton, and it's not like I haven't considered it... I just fear that the economics would not work out well for us. (But I am not real clear on the selling price of a HEALTHY [that is the big sticking point], fertile, grown ram with no prohibitive problems. So I don't know for sure. And it probably varies regionally anyhow.) The other problem with that, for me, is that as much as lupin and miss_thenorth may talk about transporting sheepies in the back of the car, I cannot envision transporting a full-grown breeding RAM in my stationwagon, so the logistics get tougher for me.

Pat

 

[patandchickens]

There are lots of tips on how to keep your ram from turning into a "battering ram" .

There is a shield that you can put on them like a halter that blocks out their vision when their head is positioned in the ramming position. For a pretty reasonable price, you'll effectively stop a butting ram without interfering in any of his other functions. It also says you can hopple, yoke or clog the ram too--all of which are old European practices.

Yes, I know what all the books say, but to me the bottom line is that despite all that (or perhaps "as the *reason* for all that), in real life rams are one of the more dangerous livestock on farms (in terms of # injuries they're responsible for, in proportion to the number of them being kept) and I have children and no particular energy/money to build seriously ram-proof fences/stalls. Sorry, I just don't see me keeping a ram. Fine for other people, not going to happen right now for me.

Call me a weenie ,

Pat