Do Katahdin EWE LAMBS BREED Their First Year? | Hair Sheep Breeding | Sheep Farming for Beginners
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 ก.ย. 2024
- #sheepfarming #katahdinhairsheep #breedinghairsheep
I wanted to open up the discussion in the comments about Katahdin hair sheep breeding. Does it just come with owning this breed that you need to wait till they are 1 year + to breed them? Or is it management? Do we need to be supplementing these girls within the first 7 months to get them ready for breeding?
If you have any knowledge on this topic or have thoughts I’d love to hear them in the comments!
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I would think it would depend on how early they are born in the late winter or early spring. It's the same with goats, the sooner they are on the ground, the more likely they'll be up to size and ready to breed in the late fall. Takes about 9 months.
With the right katahdins fed properly this is a non issue. There is more variety within a specific breed than there are major breeds of sheep. If what you have doesn't fit your program cull it and purchase from someone thats getting the results you want with similar inputs. 100% breeding rate on 1st time ewes bred at 7 months with better than 50% having twins. Always flush feed prior to breeding. Hope this helps.
Some of my older êtes breed back 2 months after lambing
Always expect 100% breed up. Don’t worry if a lamb only has one baby but there is no physiological reason they can’t lamb at one of year of age. It could be a nutritional issue, but no other reason than that. So you can either feed more or better quality, or get rid of the ones that don’t breed in your system and only keep the ones that fit your production system.
I'd say buffet style free choice mineral and proper nutrition they should breed. If they don't breed don't keep them or move them later. Or, if you are willing to keep them a year before breeding then do that and don't try breeding them young. Breeding later will help them stay productive longer but will probably not financially add up.
Let nature take its course.
I asked a friend who has a lot of experience with hair sheep and here's what she said:
Best to either breed them at 9 mos so they lamb when they are 14 mos old (if they are big enough at 9 mos old), or wait until they are a year old and they will lamb at 17 mos. We usually wait until they are a year old so the ewe herself grows out better. If they are big enough and you want to breed them at 9 mos, you can; main thing is you don't want to have them lambing for the first time when they are also losing their lamb teeth at approx a year old. They won't eat as well during that time & it's just really hard on them. If they are too small when you breed them for the first time, they just don't seem to reach their full potential size, which is why we try to wait unless they are just a bigger built lamb or we are trying to hit a certain target for showing. Will have more trouble lambing if they are smaller too.
@@solarcowsnever knew about the teething thing! That alone should be reason enough to wait. We let our ramb in with our 4 ewes at 9 months. All appeared healthy to us but only 1 took and she was the one that seemed least well conditioned.