# Age of Ram Fertility



## she-earl (Jun 23, 2012)

I am wondering how soon is a ram lamb fertile.  I had a fourteen-month-old ewe lamb unexpectedly this morning.  I sold my breeding ram back at Thanksgiving and the only possibility is that my ram lamb born the end of Feb. 2012 is the father.  That seems hard to believe as the lamb born this morning was small but possibly viable if I had known and been there.  I found the mother stretched out unable to get up yesterday afternoon.  She seems to be one that occasionally picks a spot to lay down at and then gets just a slight bit off balance or whatever and then needs to get herself wiggled around to get up.  The past couple of days have been hazy, hot and humid but they can get inside whenever they want.  I am wondering if the stress had something to do with her lambing early.  But I never thought my four-month-old ram lamb would have sired a lamb two to three month ago.  That just seems hard to believe but it is the only possiblity.


----------



## CochinBrahmaLover=) (Jun 23, 2012)

she-earl said:
			
		

> I am wondering how soon is a ram lamb fertile.  I had a fourteen-month-old ewe lamb unexpectedly this morning.  I sold my breeding ram back at Thanksgiving and the only possibility is that my ram lamb born the end of Feb. 2012 is the father.  That seems hard to believe as the lamb born this morning was small but possibly viable if I had known and been there.  I found the mother stretched out unable to get up yesterday afternoon.  She seems to be one that occasionally picks a spot to lay down at and then gets just a slight bit off balance or whatever and then needs to get herself wiggled around to get up.  The past couple of days have been hazy, hot and humid but they can get inside whenever they want.  I am wondering if the stress had something to do with her lambing early.  But I never thought my four-month-old ram lamb would have sired a lamb two to three month ago.  That just seems hard to believe but it is the only possiblity.


4 months old? HAHAHA! Yup, you got some bad luck there  He sired the lamb, their fertile by 8 weeks I believe.


----------



## she-earl (Jun 23, 2012)

He is sold and is to be picked up by mid-July.  I didn't know he would be a "proven" ram.


----------



## SheepGirl (Jun 23, 2012)

If he's only four months old, he couldn't have possibly been the father--sheep gestation is 5 months. You don't have another ram at your farm at all?


----------



## she-earl (Jun 23, 2012)

There is no other sheep around.  I sold my big ram right aroung Thanksgiving.  The only other sheep in the pasture are another ewe with her triplet lambs.  Two of them are ewes and the remaining one is a ram.  They were born on Feb. 16, 2012.  The little lamb that was born this morning has the same type of wool as this ram lamb and his mother have.  They have more of an "angora" type wool not the tighter, kinkier normal wool look that I am used to.


----------



## SheepGirl (Jun 23, 2012)

I have no idea then.  If she lambed today, she would've gotten pregnant around Jan 29, about 2-3 weeks before this ram lamb was born, so there is no possible way she was bred by him. And there's no possible way she was bred by your other ram who you sold back in November.

Do you have any wethers?


----------



## Straw Hat Kikos (Jun 23, 2012)

Yeah that's kinda weird. lol


----------



## CochinBrahmaLover=) (Jun 23, 2012)

Oh gee i feel dumb... guess i should know sheep gestation.... LOL!

That IS weird. Are there any other sheep by you, like, maybe one with a 'wether' or ram that could've ventured to your ewes?


----------



## she-earl (Jun 23, 2012)

No other ram(s) or wether(s) around.  The ewe doesn't have an udder yet.  I am guessing that she stressed yesterday and that is what caused her to lamb.  The lamb was about the size of my tripets when they were born and they weren't huge.  I have never seen a lamb at two months gestation but it had a nice amount of wool on it and really looked pretty normal.


----------



## SheepGirl (Jun 23, 2012)

I really don't think it was your ram lamb that got your ewe pregnant. Rams don't reach puberty until at LEAST four or five months old. They aren't like goats where they are known to breed at two months 

But as for the lamb's size, it would naturally be small because of the ewe's age. If it was aborted three months early, it likely would've been a stillborn and be very tiny and have no wool on it whatsoever. However, because it was so fully developed, I think this lamb was a full-term baby (or close to it).

So I don't know. I think your sheep is weird to get pregnant right outta the blue like that


----------



## CochinBrahmaLover=) (Jun 23, 2012)

SheepGirl said:
			
		

> I really don't think it was your ram lamb that got your ewe pregnant. Rams don't reach puberty until at LEAST four or five months old. They aren't like goats where they are known to breed at two months
> 
> But as for the lamb's size, it would naturally be small because of the ewe's age. If it was aborted three months early, it likely would've been a stillborn and be very tiny and have no wool on it whatsoever. However, because it was so fully developed, I think this lamb was a full-term baby (or close to it).
> 
> So I don't know. I think your sheep is weird to get pregnant right outta the blue like that


Have y'all ever considered there was no ram involved, period? Some types of animals can have young, with no males (when say males are short in abundance) . They are exact copies of their mother. 

Now, call me crazy, but when my sister was studing zoo-olgy she learned bout it.


----------



## BrownSheep (Jun 23, 2012)

In wethers in with your ewe earlier?Nsome that went to market maybe?


----------



## kfacres (Jun 24, 2012)

I never seperate my ram lambs from my ewe lambs until I pull the ram lambs to turn in with ewes.  In the last two years, I had a Sept Fall ewe lamb lamb in August at 11 months old, and a Dec. ewe lamb lamb in Dec at 12 months old.  They, both times were bred by penmate, equal aged ram lambs.

4 months old is plenty old enough to accidentally breed a ewe lamb, happens all the time, all over.  Heck, I pull my 5 month old ram lambs and turn them in with 12 or 15 ewes quite regularly.  

Many years, ago, I had a May ram lamb, that I turned in with a ton of ewes for cleanup- and he ended up breeding almost all of them- which started lambing at the end of March, and finished in April (while the ram lamb was 10 and 11 months old).  Those were some of my very best sale sheep that summer.


----------



## boykin2010 (Jun 24, 2012)

Is it possible she got pregnant then the lamb died close to birth. But she didn't actually have the Lamb until now even though it was dead? She basically held the lamb inside her since it wasnt growing anymore.  Then being stressed started labor and she had the lamb.

That sounds confusing and very unlikely but I am just thinking outside the box.


----------



## SheepGirl (Jun 24, 2012)

But the thing is the ram lamb wouldn't have even been born yet if the lamb born was full term. Even if it wasn't full term, the ram lamb would've still been less than four months old, and I've never heard of a ram that is less than four months old impregnating a ewe.


----------



## bonbean01 (Jun 24, 2012)

Reading this thread makes me so glad we moved our ram lamb to his new owners this past week...he was almost 4 months old and it would have been possible...did not want him breeding his mother or young sisters or any of them!  Not so crazy about inbreeding and we have a super ram just for that purpose.  Now I'm hoping we didn't wait too long!


----------



## kfacres (Jun 24, 2012)

do you have goats?


----------



## she-earl (Jun 24, 2012)

No goats. Only chickens in with the sheep.


----------



## kfacres (Jun 24, 2012)

Well, I'm not going to call you a liar- but I'm betting something else is the culprit that you haven't told us about.  I don't believe in divine intervention, sorry, or asexual reproduction in sheep.  

Ever let those sheep leave the place, like to a fair?  

What do you mean by< "around thanksgiving", do you have dates?

And most importantly, are you sure this ewe lambed?


----------



## boykin2010 (Jun 24, 2012)

Does anyone around you have sheep or goats that could have escaped and bred your ewe?


----------



## she-earl (Jun 25, 2012)

I sold my breeding ram on Nov. 17th.  My sheep are always in their pasture which is between our house and our heifer barn.  The fence has no problems because I mow along it every week.  The ewe very definitely lambed.  I checked her at 4 a.m. when I went to feed the calves because she was not acting right the night before.  She was standing in the barn.  When I went back to the sheep barn to tend them after feeding the calves, she was laying in the barn with this "stuff" behind her.  At first I assumed she must have prolapsed because the last thing I was expecting was a lamb.  I went to investigate and found the lamb still mostly in the sac.  She was just starting to get an udder.  You could not see it but when I checked you could feel it.  My triplet lambs born on 2/16 were small and this dead lamb was near the size of them.  I don't know if it was born dead or died after being born.  It had wool on it and I wonder if I had been right there when she lambed if I could have kept it alive.  I am as puzzled as everyone else.


----------



## neener92 (Jun 25, 2012)

boykin2010 said:
			
		

> Is it possible she got pregnant then the lamb died close to birth. But she didn't actually have the Lamb until now even though it was dead? She basically held the lamb inside her since it wasnt growing anymore.  Then being stressed started labor and she had the lamb.
> 
> That sounds confusing and very unlikely but I am just thinking outside the box.


I personally think this is what happened although you'd think the lamb would have rotted inside of her and killed her if it had been in there that long. We had a cow not to long ago carry a twin calf for one day after giving birth to the other, it had already started rotting inside of her, this didn't kill her. I've also had a pot belly pig carry three rotten piglets inside of her full term, they weren't even halfway developed.

Did the lamb smell bad at all other then the normal smell? You may not have noticed.


----------



## she-earl (Jun 26, 2012)

No bad smell.  My husband and I don't think she carried a dead lamb and then eventually had it.  If she had, the lamb would have been rotting, she would have been sick, etc.  We have dairy cows and are familiar with that type of situation.  Is there any chance my breeding ram could have serviced her but the semen just "laid" there for whatever reason and she settled after he wasn't here anymore?


----------



## Remuda1 (Jun 26, 2012)

Been following this thread with interest, it's intriguing! If I were you, I would email the vets at Pipestone Vet. I had a ewe fertility question a few weeks ago (I've never purchased anything from them) and I'd heard you could email them so I tried it. I got my answer directly from one of their vets that actually has the same breed sheep that I do. And he was very congenial. I got the response the next day. Just an awesome resource. If you try it, I hope you'll post what you find out .


----------



## kfacres (Jun 26, 2012)

pipestone is the best source of sheep knowledge in the USA.  Very direct and to the point, with accuracy.  I use them all the time for serious questions and stumpers...

I'm betting that GK will give you an answer quite similar to the one I did above- about something else being the cause.

There have been mummified lambs born before, not sure how long they can carry them-- but I think it's usually some sort of abortion deal- and they delivef them at the due date-- but the lamb had been dead for 2 months or so...


----------



## boykin2010 (Jun 26, 2012)

So, are you saying there is no one around you that could have had a ram escape and breed your ewe? I've heard of it happening before. You wouldn't believe what a ram would do to get to a ewe in heat.


----------



## boykin2010 (Jun 26, 2012)

Just thought of this scenario. I am not sure how reasonable it really is...  Where are you located? Is it possible a wild sheep such as a bighorn bred your ewe? I do not know if that is even possible...


----------



## she-earl (Jun 26, 2012)

We are located in SE PA so no wild sheep.  Our fence is in super shape.


----------



## Symphony (Jun 27, 2012)

CochinBrahmaLover=) said:
			
		

> SheepGirl said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


----------



## Cornish Heritage (Jun 30, 2012)

It could be Lepto. Lepto causes abortions & is pretty much everywhere. The ewes either abort early or sometimes the lambs will die & stay inside for a while. Either way the lambs will be dead. Not much you can do about it. Normally the ewes will build an immunity to it. There is a vaccine out there.

Liz


----------



## shawnfisher (Jun 30, 2012)

Cornish Heritage said:
			
		

> It could be Lepto. Lepto causes abortions & is pretty much everywhere. The ewes either abort early or sometimes the lambs will die & stay inside for a while. Either way the lambs will be dead. Not much you can do about it. Normally the ewes will build an immunity to it. There is a vaccine out there.
> 
> Liz


nearly all abortions in first time lambers are vibrio.  The most common symptom in a mature ewe, with vibrio-- is one normal sized lamb-- and one that's either a 'mummy', or one that's a dwarf-- and usually dies.


----------

