[DartmoorLiz]

I get the impression that many commercial units cull ewes for old age at around 5 or 6 years.  Many of our older ladies are our best mums and they survive from a time before accurate records so I have no idea how old they are (other than that this is my 5th year with them and they were adults when I started).  So my oldest breeding ewes must be at least 7 but could be much older.   


Who has the oldest breeding ewe in TAS forum?

[farmershort]

11 years old. Due to lamb any day now.

She was our very first pet lamb when we started smallholding in a rental fashion. She then went to live with the in laws on their Welsh hill farm whilst we saved for 10 years for our own holding. She returned to us at our new holding last October. Never stopped lambing.

Wilma is awesome!

[shep53]

Plenty of 9yrold ewes here , once a ewe starts to loose  its middle teeth  in a commercial flock it is very difficult for it to compete as grazing is difficult , depends on breed but mine will start to loose teeth at  5yrs and some are sound at 10yrs

[Fleecewife]

Our current oldest ewe turns 20 next week, but she's not lambing.  Our oldest was Jezebel a registered Heb who had twins at 16, and died 4 months before she would have been 20.
This year our older ewes are having a rest and we are only breeding 5 younger ewes, oldest of those is 10 I think.


Hebs are very long lived, the ewes anyway - we've not had a functioning tup older than 10.


The trick as shep53 points out is keeping their teeth. All bar one of Jezzie's ewe lambs kept their teeth for a long time.  The odd one out lost a single tooth at 4, then no more for many years.

[Hillview Farm]

My oldest ewe to lamb this year is 11.

[bj_cardiff]

The oldest I've kept them is 9. They were healthy ewes and seemed to be doing well but had no teeth. I decided to cull when they were healthy in the summer rather than risk them doing badly over the winter when in lamb.

[Foobar]

I've a 9 year old with all her teeth.  She would be lambing this year if it wasn't for the fact that I've had to take a year out due to taking on a rundown holding.

[Tim W]

Commercial unit here with harsh culling policy
We have a few 2008 born ewes to lamb this time along with a good number of 2009's

These girls will all have lambed as hogs and raised 2 lambs every year after that

Generally production goes downhill after 5 or 6 lambings though

[DartmoorLiz]

Thanks guys and I hope lambing all but particularly the long toothed lovelys goes smoothly. 


So in Tim's flock 9 years is the maximum age where they lambed as lambs and have twins every time you can expect around 14 lambs in a ewe's lifetime.  (1 at 1 year old, 2 from 2-6 years old and then 1 from 7 on).


However, prize winning Jezebel    was 16 when she produced twins.  If she'd done that all her life she could have had 30 lambs


Its another  moment for me but at least I have room for improvement

[Daisys Mum]

I have 2 nine year olds expecting triplets this year, they both had a year off last year.2 seven year olds also scanned with triplets and a gimmer due twins. Keeping all fingers and toes crossed that they will manage to feed them themselves, they are  Zwartbles so very milky sheep and have always managed up to now but....I do have bottles ready 

[Fleecewife]

When we first joined the Hebridean Sheep Society, way back when, there was a photo in the Year Book of a 13 yo ewe with triplets and the wonderful double entendre caption of: "Broken down by Age and Sex"     Love it.  We've never had triplets from Hebs, though they do pop up occasionally.


Jezzie had all twins during the time we had her (from 2001) apart from one single.  She rarely had tup lambs, just the famous Gladstone Laughing Boy.  She kept all her teeth until her last pregnancy, when they started to go mid-winter.  We didn't breed her after that, as although she had excellent conformation still (with the help of extra feeding), we didn't feel the extra demands of twin lambs was worth her life.  Eventually she just didn't wake up one Christmas Day.


I think how long you go on breeding your ewes depends on various factors.  For example, are you breeding for meat or breeding stock?  We produce breeding stock so longevity of both tups and ewes is important in a breed which is reknowned for long lives.  If you are growing for meat production then you need efficient lambers which either raise twins every year on good ground, or thrifty singles which can be reared on marginal land unsuitable for other uses.
If you are just breeding from a few pets, to be lawn mowers and an interest for the children, with some meat for the freezer, then your interest is more in the animals themselves, so you can keep on breeding from them for as long as you like, and let them carry on into a sedate retirement. Economics is less of a concern.
Also there seems to be a big difference in the natural longevity of various breeds, especially how long they keep their teeth.