This is the most hard fought topic we deal with. I’m actually surprised. It’s easier to talk people into completely changing the way they feed or vaccinate than it is to change their mentality regarding males.
@@LinessaFarms isn’t that strange! We can sell ewes for top dollar but people are fine buying a low ball low quality ram sight unseen as long as it’s cheap. He’s not a sperm donor, he’s your future!
Hello Tim! Great tips and information! Wondering how you keep track of your genetics or breeding? Obviously you don’t breed a ewe to her father, etc. do you use a new ram every year? Is there a video on keeping records of your genetics too?
Hello, Jami. We keep a health record book that covers health records for every animal we have had since 2014. This includes parents, vaccinations, any complications, worming, medications, lambing or kidding, etc.. it’s a lot. You can download our general health forms on our website. Just get a binder and put something together. We rotate rams and bucks through often. We have males that are focused on specific issues. For instance if I need more length, I have a male for that. If I need more shoulder, I have a male for that, etc… with that being said, we are always buying and selling males. Part of our business is buying and prepping breeding males. We will raise a prospective ram or buck, halter break it, hand feed it, breed it for one season and see how his offspring do, and then sell it.
We raise a small flock of jacob sheep for our own consumption and have always kept our ram in with the flock year round... This past year we put a breeding apron on him. It worked great for us to push back lambing and we had mostly twins this year. While I'm sure keeping the ram in a separate pen with a wether would be ideal, the apron worked well for us.
Im trying to figure out if I have a lazy ram. How much time passes once your first lamb drops to your last lamb? We had 3 drop about 4 days ago and none since (out of 20 ewes). Is that a sign? I was thinking they'd come closer together.
This is normal. It is complicated but generally speaking you will see 2-3 “groups” of lambs. We expect to see an initial small group followed by a larger group 6-7 days later and then a smaller strangler group again for those ewes who didn’t get bred on their first full cycle. You can read more about this here: www.merckvetmanual.com/management-and-nutrition/management-of-reproduction-sheep/reproductive-physiology-of-sheep You can also utilize a marking harness in the future to you out with when to expect your lambs. Although marking isn’t 100% effective, it will give you a pretty good idea what’s going on.
Hello. What you are seeing in the video is orchard grass. This tends to grow in clumps and we get most of our fast growth in cool, spring months. It slows down as temperatures increase. We also have clover and alfalfa mixed in but due to the time of year in the video, you can’t see it as well. Thanks for watching our videos and thanks for the question.
I have a ram and ewe that have bean togather most ther life. About 1.5 year. I got them a week ago. They where alone togather a long time. Have sugestions on easest and best way to seperate them ?
Your males and females should be separated most of the year except for breeding time. With this being said, your male will always need a buddy as it isn’t healthy for them to be alone. While we usually keep our males with other males, we will sometimes keep a male with a female just knowing that she will not likely have her babies the same time as everyone else. Many producers will refer to this as the “sacrificial ewe”. For the health and well-being of the ram, if he’s going to be distraught, you may just keep them together. We have a male that has bonded to a female and they always live together. When we let him out to breed the other females, she just goes with him.
Hello Tim! You are like the Animal Husbandry Professor that i never had! I am curious about the teaser ram or buck process. I like the idea of tiring out those males, then using the preferred male to breed, but doesnt that also increase the risk of superfecundation (fertilization of two or more ova from the same cycle by sperm from separate acts of sexual intercourse, which can lead to twin babies from two separate biological fathers)?
Hello, Daiyan. I’m going to tell you a secret most people don’t know. Many of the large commercial farms use rams and bucks as teasers but they have all been vasectomized. Theses rams and bucks are usually referred to as a “teaser” in the industry and their sole purpose in life is to synchronize females for breeding. We will place a marking harness on them and once they start marking ewes/does well, we pull them out and replace them with the actual ram or buck. You are correct, having more than one male with a ewe or doe in estrus can easily lead to blended fertilization depending on how many eggs she has dropped. We have seen this happen in goats without a shadow of a doubt. We have had a Pygmy buck get loose once and we had a boer doe with 2 boer kids and one obviously Pygmy kid. The reality when having more than one male together is usually serious fighting and injury. The males will generally spend more time fighting than breeding and it’s an ugly sight. General rule of thumb… teaser ram followed by breeding ram followed by clean-up ram just in case the breeding ram was having problems or missed a few. If your clean up ram starts re-marking everyone, you have a serious problem.
Amen brother! We’ve been preaching this for years.
This is the most hard fought topic we deal with. I’m actually surprised. It’s easier to talk people into completely changing the way they feed or vaccinate than it is to change their mentality regarding males.
@@LinessaFarms isn’t that strange! We can sell ewes for top dollar but people are fine buying a low ball low quality ram sight unseen as long as it’s cheap. He’s not a sperm donor, he’s your future!
looks like spring has sprung at the farm, good info as always Tim
Thanks, Gerald. We are still getting below freezing at night but we are hoping for more warm weather soon.
Hi I'm from Pakistan I have a farm of beetal goats and I owe u a lot thanks for all the helpful stuff .stay blessed
You’re welcome! Thanks for watching our videos.
“Unless you’ve got some mental problems…” Hahahahaha!!!👍
It happens. 😬
The best info I can get from a good breeder as always tnx tim
Thanks, Jean. 😬
Great information. Thanks, Tim.
Thank you. As always, we appreciate your continued support.
Hello Tim! Great tips and information! Wondering how you keep track of your genetics or breeding? Obviously you don’t breed a ewe to her father, etc. do you use a new ram every year? Is there a video on keeping records of your genetics too?
Hello, Jami. We keep a health record book that covers health records for every animal we have had since 2014. This includes parents, vaccinations, any complications, worming, medications, lambing or kidding, etc.. it’s a lot. You can download our general health forms on our website. Just get a binder and put something together. We rotate rams and bucks through often. We have males that are focused on specific issues. For instance if I need more length, I have a male for that. If I need more shoulder, I have a male for that, etc… with that being said, we are always buying and selling males. Part of our business is buying and prepping breeding males. We will raise a prospective ram or buck, halter break it, hand feed it, breed it for one season and see how his offspring do, and then sell it.
Thank you..
You’re very welcome.
We raise a small flock of jacob sheep for our own consumption and have always kept our ram in with the flock year round... This past year we put a breeding apron on him. It worked great for us to push back lambing and we had mostly twins this year. While I'm sure keeping the ram in a separate pen with a wether would be ideal, the apron worked well for us.
If you take all things into consideration and determine your current method is what works best for you, then that’s the answer.
The best as always
Thank you, my friend.
Im trying to figure out if I have a lazy ram. How much time passes once your first lamb drops to your last lamb? We had 3 drop about 4 days ago and none since (out of 20 ewes). Is that a sign? I was thinking they'd come closer together.
This is normal. It is complicated but generally speaking you will see 2-3 “groups” of lambs. We expect to see an initial small group followed by a larger group 6-7 days later and then a smaller strangler group again for those ewes who didn’t get bred on their first full cycle. You can read more about this here:
www.merckvetmanual.com/management-and-nutrition/management-of-reproduction-sheep/reproductive-physiology-of-sheep
You can also utilize a marking harness in the future to you out with when to expect your lambs. Although marking isn’t 100% effective, it will give you a pretty good idea what’s going on.
which grass is grown behind you?in the video.
can you guide? and where do you use that?
Hello. What you are seeing in the video is orchard grass. This tends to grow in clumps and we get most of our fast growth in cool, spring months. It slows down as temperatures increase. We also have clover and alfalfa mixed in but due to the time of year in the video, you can’t see it as well. Thanks for watching our videos and thanks for the question.
Should i give my buck alpha since its high in calcium?
High calcium, low phosphorus. Calcium is A-OK. 👍🏻
The culprit of urinary calculi is phosphorus.
@@LinessaFarms thankyou for all the informative videos! And thankyou for replying back to my question!
I have a ram and ewe that have bean togather most ther life. About 1.5 year. I got them a week ago. They where alone togather a long time. Have sugestions on easest and best way to seperate them ?
Your males and females should be separated most of the year except for breeding time. With this being said, your male will always need a buddy as it isn’t healthy for them to be alone. While we usually keep our males with other males, we will sometimes keep a male with a female just knowing that she will not likely have her babies the same time as everyone else. Many producers will refer to this as the “sacrificial ewe”. For the health and well-being of the ram, if he’s going to be distraught, you may just keep them together. We have a male that has bonded to a female and they always live together. When we let him out to breed the other females, she just goes with him.
What weight for your ewes do you shoot for before breeding them
75% of expected mature weight.
Hello Tim! You are like the Animal Husbandry Professor that i never had! I am curious about the teaser ram or buck process. I like the idea of tiring out those males, then using the preferred male to breed, but doesnt that also increase the risk of superfecundation (fertilization of two or more ova from the same cycle by sperm from separate acts of sexual intercourse, which can lead to twin babies from two separate biological fathers)?
Hello, Daiyan. I’m going to tell you a secret most people don’t know. Many of the large commercial farms use rams and bucks as teasers but they have all been vasectomized. Theses rams and bucks are usually referred to as a “teaser” in the industry and their sole purpose in life is to synchronize females for breeding. We will place a marking harness on them and once they start marking ewes/does well, we pull them out and replace them with the actual ram or buck.
You are correct, having more than one male with a ewe or doe in estrus can easily lead to blended fertilization depending on how many eggs she has dropped. We have seen this happen in goats without a shadow of a doubt. We have had a Pygmy buck get loose once and we had a boer doe with 2 boer kids and one obviously Pygmy kid.
The reality when having more than one male together is usually serious fighting and injury. The males will generally spend more time fighting than breeding and it’s an ugly sight.
General rule of thumb… teaser ram followed by breeding ram followed by clean-up ram just in case the breeding ram was having problems or missed a few. If your clean up ram starts re-marking everyone, you have a serious problem.
Can I put my 3 month old ram lamb with my breeding ram?
Maybe. You will need to test this out SLOWLY and see how the ram responds to the baby. Some rams will do fine and others will kill them.