When to trade out your Ram?

[kuntrygirl]

I would certainly sell one. I have a beautiful 4 year old ram that someone has already asked about buying. I also have a four month old that is looking good. I will try to get a pic of him and download for you to see. My blackbellies are Texas Barbados Blackbelly. I will try to get pics of them online for you to look at. If you are interested I am quite sure we can work out a deal that would be satisfactory. We are not trying to make a living on them, we keep them for pleasure, what we sell pays for some of the feed. Haven't processed any to the freezer yet, but will. I love lamb chops and actually anxious to taste blackbelly. I understand it is quite tastey. HOwever if you have need of a ram I would much prefer to send him to you then eat him ,lol. I'll try to get you pics of him , mom and dad.

Oh great. I can't wait to see the pics. And yes, I am looking for a NON-RELATED ram to keep with my ewes. I would love to speak with you about purchasing a ram from you. We can PM each other back and forth with more details. Thanks a bunch!

 

[barredcountrycoop]

be glad to. by the way what breed of chickens do you breed? I'm looking to add some buff orps, rhode island reds and a couple of americanas. ice giving me the day off tomorrow may start on the new coop. I will also get you a better pic of the young ram and his dad for you to see.

 

[boykin2010]

This was helpful info to me too. I just got started in sheep and i have 5 pregnant adult ewes and one unrelated purebred katahdin ram lamb. One of the 5 just had a baby girl and i am anxiously waiting on the others to deliver. All the ewes are mostly katahdin and they are all bred to a barbado male. The baby i had looks similiar to the one you have as your picture kuntrygirl. Except for the white maybe.

I am glad i went ahead and bought the unrelated ram lamb. He is from excellent genetics and has GORGEUS markings. I dont think i would ever be able to butcher him as we have bonded since i have been bottlefeeding him. But i do realize someday in the future his sons are going to need to be butchered but i would never be able to butcher my ram lamb i just got. I may castrate him after he has bred to keep from inbreeding. Then get another unrelated lamb and start over.

Good luck in finding your new unrelated ram lamb.
I would also love to see pics of your new lambs you have kuntrygirl

 

[kuntrygirl]

I would also love to see pics of your new lambs you have kuntrygirl

These are all of the new babies.

 

[barredcountrycoop]

beautiful lambs kuntrygirl. had two more sets of twins over the weekend. it's chaos in the pen, got babies running everywhere and moms trying to keep up with them. Really would like to sell that young ram now, I need the room ! lol

 

[Dean.Collins]

I'd go ahead and get new rams in when you have too many related ewes to breed back to the ram. Or just get a second ram and use him for the other ram's daughters.

But how do you even track.../manage this?? this is the part i'm having difficulties understanding. Fine if you have a flock or 30-40 ewes and 1 ram but what do you do when carrying 50 rams and 1500 ewes?

How do you even pen them up for mating season so you can segment them out with the ram/ewe combinations that you want.

Do you really setup 50 small paddocks for each ram?

 

[BrownSheep]

Most operations I know with that many sheep don't give a darn who gets bred to who they through the rams out with the flocks and statistically it's pretty unlikely you'll have much inbreeding going on.

 

[SheepGirl]

I would do 10ish different paddocks or pens, so that way there are five rams in each pen. Then you can use a marking harness or marking paint, each a different color for the different rams in each pen, and that way you know which ram bred which ewe and when. You will have to change the colors of the five rams every 17 days or so.

But with 50 different rams and 1500 different ewes, I think the chance of inbreeding is very slim...and if it is, the usual negative effects of it (slow growth rates, slower maturity, etc) will be such a small percentage of your total lamb crop it won't even matter IMO.

Of course if you want to know the parentage for EACH lamb, that's a totally different story...in which case you probably should use a marking harness or paint the ram's brisket.

 

[Dean.Collins]

ok i get you, basically once its 50/1500 you then just cull the smaller/slower and keep the fatter/faster to top up your flock and replace deadstock and old mutton culls.

thanks.

But how do you work out which rams are/arent performing if you have 50 rams i cant imagine you would have the range of colours for 50 chalk harnesses unless you broken them down into 10 pens etc as suggested.

btw do rams ever fire blanks? eg they'll mount but dont have semen to get a ewe pregnant? how do you then know that yes this ram is working.

 

[SheepGirl]

ok i get you, basically once its 50/1500 you then just cull the smaller/slower and keep the fatter/faster to top up your flock and replace deadstock and old mutton culls.

thanks.

But how do you work out which rams are/arent performing if you have 50 rams i cant imagine you would have the range of colours for 50 chalk harnesses unless you broken them down into 10 pens etc as suggested.

btw do rams ever fire blanks? eg they'll mount but dont have semen to get a ewe pregnant? how do you then know that yes this ram is working.

Yes, rams can be sterile. So especially with that many rams and the number of ewes you need bred, have a breeding soundness exam done on all of them. You can probably even get by with 30 or 40 rams rather than 50, though.

I don't even think they make them in 50 different colors, I think only about 6-8 or so (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, black), but the paint you can combine colors....yellow-green, blue-green, dark red, dark blue, dark green, etc. But with the paint you have to repaint the brisket every couple of days. That could be a hassle with up to 50 rams.

As for culling the smaller ones--keep in mind those may be twins or triplets, which is a desirable trait in most flocks. The larger, heavier ones are more than likely singles, which is NOT a desirable trait in most flocks. So if you could you & a couple other shepherds could be out on the range with the lambing flock and catch them as they lamb and ear notch the lambs to denote their litter size (one ear notch for a single, two ear notches for twins, etc).