The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: suziequeue on February 08, 2014, 05:10:32 pm
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Well - we've just had our ewes scanned…….. only four pregnant (with six lambs) out of eleven :o :( :(
Previous years we have had about 120% yield. This year they were only with the ram for three weeks and - although they were all covered, I wonder if they needed a second cycle or something. Certainly neither of the 2012 hoggets fell and all but one of the remaining empty ewes bore healthy lambs last year
Any suggestions as to how we can guarantee a better yield next year? Should we try sponging them do you think?
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Sorry to hear you have had a bad day, Its the thing I'm sure most sheep farmers dread and I certainly do!
Sponging them will get them to cycle within a short period of time so it wont help the number of lambs nor will it help them get in to lamb (conception rate)
What breed do you have,? Do you flush? I take it your using one ram? He may have a low sperm count and only the super fertile ewes have held. Speak to your vet :)
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It's a worry when you end up with a large %age barren, I've been there & my first reaction is to get a few blood tests for enzo etc to see if there is a problem (I think this is a free VLA testing service but you will have to take the samples yourself or pay the vet)
I always cull anything that doesn't get in lamb---if you keep them you are just perpetuating the problem by keeping less fertile animals
This has been painful in some years but it always pays off as you end up with a better more productive flock
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Sorry to hear of the bad results.
Sponging wont give you more lambs but the PMSG injection given at sponge removal can, however it can result in undesirable multiples.
As you say all ewes were covered suspicion obviously points to a sub-fertile ram though failure to implant/early abortion could also be the culprit. You could arrange to fertility test the ram, you could assume the ram is infertile and change him (infertility may transient though if caused by an infection releated temperature increase) but before doing anything rash have a chat with a vet who knows your flock
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Hate to add this into the equation but has schmallenberg virus been considered? I understand depending on timming barren ewes has been reported.
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:hug: Sorry to hear about your scanning results. I can't add anything to what's already been said but you have my sympathy.
We had out first barren ewes last year - one had had a C section and the other was just barren. We rehomed the first to a per home and gave the other a second chance, but she's barren again this year and will be mutton soon. In hindsight, I should have put her away last year (she had twins the first time that I had to top up with a bottle). Experience is a great teacher though.
Hope you find out the cause :fc:
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What breed do you have,? Do you flush?
We have Welsh mountain badger faced. We have had them for about four years now and they have always taken well, lambed easily and been good Mums - but maybe we have been lucky. We normally keep the best two ewe lambs each year and the flock is starting to look very pretty indeed although we have no great plans to show them.
We sent them to the ram of a friend of ours who is a known badger faced breeder and has bred champions so he is familiar with the breed…… but if the ram is sub-fertile then that's just bad luck I guess.
What's flushing?? That's definitely something I can learn from this….. maybe we should be doing more of that. They all get wormed etc before they go to the ram.
The ewe that has been empty this and last year will be mutton. I am not familiar with mutton but am looking forward to mutton curry.
I think I need to tell the ram owner of our results but I am worried that he will just blame us or tell me that all the other ewes he covered were absolutely fine and it's our fault :-[
But actually - if we get six healthy lambs out of it in the spring then that will be grand. I think our flock is almost getting to the maximum sustainable size anyway so a low yield year won't be that much of a hardship. If one of the big ewes go for mutton then I think the freezer will remain full enough
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Flushing is increasing ewe nutrition a lot pre-tupping to get them to shed more eggs. Don't be worried about blame being placed one way or the other, it would be worth phoning the ram owner for a chat to see if he/she have anything to add
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After weaning the condition of the ewe should be low, put them on poor grass to dry up and then 4-6 weeks pre tupping (depending on how much weight is needed to be put on) my ewes were in slightly better condition so I flushed at about 3 weeks pre tupping. You put the ewes onto good fresh grass or you can actually feed them nuts if really needed but be careful they don't get fat as you will have problems there. As Me said flushing gets the ewes to release more eggs so in theory they should carry more lambs. The ewes body feels that with all the extra grass/cake she will be capable to carry and support a larger litter!
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Oh right - yes we did give them a bit of a boost pre-tupping. I didn't know that was called flushing. I will pay more attention next time. Certainly this year we didn't send one of the older ewes as she hadn't put on enough condition over the summer….Hoping to get a weighing scales this year :fc: :fc:
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Depending on when you let the tup in to the ewes - it was actually quite warm in autumn last year, not really that great for covering the ewes.
I did sponge my ewes this year (only putting 9 to the tup), but have found that out of the 6 that went to the white Shetland boy 4 got re-covered after 17 days... so have since gone through all the possible scenarios in my head... and I may have some white lambs or only black ones... (black tup covered his three Gotland girls first time round and did not repeat)
I normally give any barren ewe a second chance, and have had positive results and also negative ones. So it is not always a clear cull straight after being barren - it all depends on what the possible reason was (tup or ewe problem), age of the ewe and condition after a year-off, etc etc If the reason is that tup was in/sub-fertile he will obviously go but that wouldn't mean cull the ewes too...
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Yes - we had different rams in 2012 and 2013 and one ewe has been barren for both so she will go. The rest have another chance next year and we will be keeping a close eye on them over the summer.
The score is:
12 breeding ewes
11 went to the tup in November
4 pregnant with 6 lambs (2 sets twins, 2 single)
7 empty
6 empty for first time -------> retry in November 2014
1 empty for second time -----> mutton :hungry: :hungry:
Learning points
* Pay closer attention to weaning/drying off
* Closer attention to condition
* Closer attention to flushing
* Longer spell with the tup (we may hire one for four weeks this time)
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Often worth keeping the ram in for 5 weeks, 35 days which gives each ewe 2 cycles to catch the ram. With small flocks, it can be harder to boost cycling, but options include sponges or equivalent hormone treatments, which get them all cycling in a short space of time, or the male effect, which just kick starts cycling after the summer when sheep don't cycle. This involves having access to either a teaser (vasectomised ram) or keeping a ram on the other side of a very good fence for a week or two! The testosterone and male pheromones can mean that the ewes cycles have started fully when the ram goes in and are more likely to take in their first cycle. No biological process is 100%, so normally it is expected to have one or two ewes not take on one cycle. This number barren may be down to the wrong conditions for conception, could be too hot, cold or anything that upsets the system. It could be poor ram fertility, or likewise he could've had an upset, lameness, infection upsetting sperm production. If you have any lamb deaths or abortions, it could be an infectious process and would be worth getting samples of any lost lambs tested to see if vaccination would help next year. Also following on from talk about flushing, you may find the ewes weren't in tip top condition, too fat or thin will reduce conception rates. As you say your flock has increased, it may almost be natural selection at work, with less conception as there is less grass etc to go round.
As many have said in the past, scanning % doesn't mean much, its the ones you wean, and with fewer lambs to focus on, you will be able to do your best for them :)
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I feel your pain- we used the same ram as last year but he was walking poorly and we didn't see him working. I had my girls (9) scanned as I had doubts and sure enough only 1 pregnant with twins, rest are empty. Bitterly disappointed but seeing it as an opportunity to get our long awaited pig project started this year, and hopefully we will have two little lambs to enjoy.
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Really sorry to hear that, lots of good advice above.
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Sorry to hear you are disappointed with your results. :bouquet:
As usual, we put a couple of tups out earlier for a few earlier lambs - usually aiming for Valentine's Day for our very early girls. (And sometimes we get some unexpected presents earlier in Feb or even at the end of Jan - if a tup lamb had been rather precocious, for instance!)
However this year, the weather was unseasonably warm until 14th Oct, and we saw very little action, so we expect very little to happen before mid-March. If we'd only given the girls 3 or 4 weeks with the tups, we'd have hardly any lambs at all.
Of our two early batches, we had one scanned and got a reasonable enough result -173%. But the scanner said they were mostly not early, the majority would probably lamb end March / early April. So it may have been as long as 5 weeks before the tup really had any work to do.
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Often worth keeping the ram in for 5 weeks, 35 days which gives each ewe 2 cycles to catch the ram.
Yes - we wanted the girls to stay longer but the breeder called us to say he had run out of grass and had another customer waiting etc etc. So we had to go and pick them up. I think we are going to try and hire a tup for next time around. I know there are lots of posts on here about that so I will do some research over the summer and line something up. I think our local breeder is going more for Ryelands now anyway.
Thanks for all your comments and suggestions
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We will be scanning at the beginning of March, I have everything crossed as I have invested quite a lot in my little flock of Zwartbles, only 5 ewes and a tup. I put raddle on him and all were marked but he was only 9 months old. 2 of my girls will be first timers too.
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Aside from the condolances for the predicament, what a fantastic, informative and positive thread for us/me/you suzie.
Liking fsmnutter - you'll have that extra bit of time with whats born :)
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I was chatting to a couple of the local big scale sheep farmers who have also had really poor results this year, one guy having only 50% pregnant, despite, flushing, teaser and proven rams. General opinion seemed to be the mast year of acorns may have had an affect? :thinking:
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Aside from the condolances for the predicament, what a fantastic, informative and positive thread for us/me/you suzie.
Ditto above :hug:
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I was chatting to a couple of the local big scale sheep farmers who have also had really poor results this year, one guy having only 50% pregnant, despite, flushing, teaser and proven rams. General opinion seemed to be the mast year of acorns may have had an affect? :thinking:
Well - that's very reassuring in a way ………. it's not just me then :relief: but I have learnt a lot form this thread and there are areas where we can tighten up I think. We are - at last - going on a lambing course this year so I will raise the issue there aswell and see what other people say.
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Hmm. you say you gave your tup 3 weeks with the ewes? That only gives him one hormonal cycle (17 days) per ewe and no second chance if one of them happens to miss for any reason. On the occasions when I've borrowed a tup it's been on a six week deal, to ensure that he gets two chances with each lady. We change the raddle colour after the first 3 weeks so that we can see if any ewe has been served at more than one season. I wouldn't be calling a ram sub-fertile until he'd had this length of opportunity to do his stuff. For example, if your ewes were a bit low, nutritionally (or indeed, too fat!) when he went in, they might well have failed to hold to the first service. The poor girls might just have been gearing up for some second-service fun and conception when you took their man away!
There's lots of reasons why the ewes might have failed to take at first service and it has to be said that disease is among these (talk to your vet). However, I suspect that good attention to nutrition (perhaps including flushing) and giving the tup a fair go at the job might yield the results you want next year without the expense and complication of sponging.
Good luck with the lambs you are expecting and here's hoping for the clatter of rather more tiny hooves next year.
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We did 7 weeks to be sure - still waiting for our first lambie soon - fullish moon tonight so out on the scout :)
A teaser would be a good and cheaper idea maybe to have on the place - they are nice pets really good to have around. You could put him in a few weeks before tupping and renting the rams?
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That's such a shame, so sorry for you. We borrowed a tup one year and only one ewe conceived, the tup was too small and too young in my opinion but the owner - an old shepherd - insisted he would do his work nevertheless. I'd suspect the ram is at fault in the case of your ewes, for what comfort that gives :( At least you have six lambs to look forward to, lets hope they are mostly female :thumbsup:
We had our first two lambs yesterday morning, nice big twins 9lb 11oz and 8lb 5oz. The tup had 24 days with the ewes and then went off to the mart because it's time for a change. All my ewes have good udder development so I know he did his job thoroughly. I have a very natural approach to all this stuff, no sponging, scanning, or starve and flush. The lambs stay with the ewes all summer on good pasture, never need to buy creep feed either they grow like mushrooms without that stuff. Then the ewes get about 8 weeks to fatten up before the tup goes in.
I think that only having a few acres means the tup is never so far away that the ewes cannot small him so they are ready when he says they are. If he starts wooing them and pacing the fence I know they are ready. If it's too early I move him and his companion wether to where he can't see them. He tends to have covered them all in a very short time so lambing isn't a long affair.