Misfitmorgan's Journal - That Summer Dust

[misfitmorgan]

The lambs are all doing well and most have found their springs by now. We need to go out and castrate, band tails and put in ear tags. We will be listing the boys up for sale soon.

The goats have still not kidded, they look heavily pregnant though.

 

[Bruce]

They are waiting for you to get really busy with something else.

 

[misfitmorgan]

They are waiting for you to get really busy with something else.

No no, they are waiting for the next snow/ice storm and temps to drop below freeing again....dont be silly

 

[misfitmorgan]

Ok so our big ewe consistently has 2 lambs nursing off of her and is taking care of both with out any problem. The thing is I believe she stole the second lamb from one of the other ewes. The only reasons I care is because if she did steal it firstly that's amazing but secondly it wont be her genetics. If she somehow had twins and I just thought one of them was from another ewe.....that I saw it nursing off of but the other ewe may have in fact stolen from the big ewe. Whenever I try to to go outside to watch them the adults all complain for grain and ignore the lambs so I've been trying to watch out the window but the distance is a bit far to read ear tags and I cant see the entire pen.

So basically, how do I figure this mystery out? If I could see the big ewe with the "twins" and the ewe I thought was one of the moms has a different lamb that answers it. At this point flipping ewes to check won't be very helpful because as far as I know they have all had lambs now.

Least the mutt lambs are easy to tell apart from the suffolk.

 

[Baymule]

Go feed them and stay with them until they call their lambs to them to nurse. In the evenings I feed and hay the ewes, then I sit on a milk crate to enjoy the sheep. The ewes follow a pattern, they gobble the pellets, then eat hay and when satisfied, they call their lambs to nurse. In between the lambs come up to chew on my clothes, shoestrings and get scratches. The ewes come up to get petted and scratches. This is the time they are most relaxed and is the best time for observation.
I didn’t ear tag as the lambs were born. I normally have spotted sheep and recognize what lambs go to what ewe. This year I had 19 lambs, 11 of which were white! Oops. I realized a little late that I might have a problem and used the evenings to sort them out. I either grabbed them as they were nursing or squirted with food coloring to tag later.

 

[misfitmorgan]

Go feed them and stay with them until they call their lambs to them to nurse. In the evenings I feed and hay the ewes, then I sit on a milk crate to enjoy the sheep. The ewes follow a pattern, they gobble the pellets, then eat hay and when satisfied, they call their lambs to nurse. In between the lambs come up to chew on my clothes, shoestrings and get scratches. The ewes come up to get petted and scratches. This is the time they are most relaxed and is the best time for observation.
I didn’t ear tag as the lambs were born. I normally have spotted sheep and recognize what lambs go to what ewe. This year I had 19 lambs, 11 of which were white! Oops. I realized a little late that I might have a problem and used the evenings to sort them out. I either grabbed them as they were nursing or squirted with food coloring to tag later.

Would be a great idea the trouble I am having is if I am out there they all think I have something for them eventually even if they have already eaten their grain. I stood outside for 45 minutes yesterday watching them and the only thing I saw was one mutt nurse her lamb and the big ewe call her twins. I am inclined to think she had twins and 294 didnt lamb. 294 has never been thrifty, always a smaller very thin ewe which is odd as she is directly off of slack lines but I believe her dam was inferior as the sire was full slack and huge. But she is always having problems with wool growth and weight. Looking at the big ewe and the twins, the twins are truly twins, exact same size, color and wool growth....to the point I can pick them out from the group of 8 lambs without any trouble because those are the only two that look a like.

This weekend we have plans to pick up the gravel the county snow plows were so kind to sling into the first 6ft of our yard along our entire property. The piled gravel on the shoulders right before snow flew, like a foot tall and the plows plowed over to far, so everyone has front yard gravel and no one is pleased. The shoulder is completely flat down to dirt pretty much. Then start our spring clean up...it shall be one heckin task this year.

 

[Baymule]

Does this put 294 on the cull list or does she make up for her shortcomings by having a bodacious lamb (when she lambs)?

You have to go pick gravel out of your yard? Rake it up maybe? We have rock in our driveway, it seems to wander off into the grass. Do rocks have legs?

 

[misfitmorgan]

Does this put 294 on the cull list or does she make up for her shortcomings by having a bodacious lamb (when she lambs)?

You have to go pick gravel out of your yard? Rake it up maybe? We have rock in our driveway, it seems to wander off into the grass. Do rocks have legs?

As soon as a replacement is old enough she will likely be on the cull list. I still have to verify if she has a lamb on her, if she does she is safe. She does also I noticed yesterday have a very large(as far as sticking out, area is like size of a quarter) lump on her cheek like she has an abscess. She did not lamb last year or the year before, the year before we put it down to her being young still, last year she was thin come breeding time so never took, this year we flushed more heavily and she was a good weight going into and coming out of breeding season. So if she had no lamb this year she is likely done, I really wanted a girl lamb out of her though if she is really that weak/un-ideal it's probly not the best idea. The slack line she is from is different then the other slack we have in our herd already and slack's are all monster size suffolk.

Our basic breeding goal atm is to combine the size of the slack lines with the less locally common Kimm lines we have. Both of those farms breed for all around sheep, maternal instinct, udder, conformation, loin/leg size, amount of muscle, etc etc.

Really goes to show that if people just buy a pricey ram and badly bred ewes the results don't usually make anything good. Best case the ram's genetics come out on top and you dont see the faults until the next generation. I dunno pretty bummed about it atm.

Yes like a half truck load of gravel.....in our yard.... We have not ditch between out yard and the road, in fact no one in our section of road has a ditch. So it's road, gravel shoulder, our lawn/yard....but instead of being our nice grass that DH takes good care of this year it is gravel. So much gravel you would not be able to mow the grass, it is legitimately a problem. I will get a picture if I can remember too. Given my picture history though I wouldn't hold your breath.

 

[Bruce]

The same thing happens here. I used to mow the grass between the road and fence, now it is all road dirt and gravel.

 

[misfitmorgan]

The same thing happens here. I used to mow the grass between the road and fence, now it is all road dirt and gravel.

We generally get a bit of gravel spread into the yard but this is ridiculous.