The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Community => Coffee Lounge => Topic started by: reddevon on November 08, 2015, 05:57:04 pm
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Evening All
In brief, we have four male lambs( wife thinks they were castrated but band could have slipped I guess) running with 17 of their half sisters. As they were castrated we didnt think it would be a problem having them all in together. Whenever we pass it seems as though at least one of the boys is mounting a girl, could be the same boy each time, could be a different one.
Questions:
1. Do castrated males ( born march) normally mount ewes ?
2. If they don't, implication is one or the other of the rams isnt castrated , and therefore there could be a number of six month old ewe lambs in lamb to their half brother. Advice on possible problems and is it worth the expense of aborting the pregnacies?
We dont normally put ewes in lamb for another year so question two includes query over the relationship and the age of the ewes?
All ideas, suggestions gratefully received!
Thanks for reading
Jon
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Nobody told the wethers they have been castrated and are not big roughy toughy rams.
Sure they mount their sisters, their mothers, their brothers and their aunts - yes, their brothers if they'll stand still long enough.
I think the only way to be sure that one or another of your wethers has kept his bits is to capture them all and have a look. Even if he's a rig you should be able to detect the testicle as a lump under the skin. Even then, the sperm is kept too hot so the likelihood of them being fertile is less.
The band is unlikely to have slipped, but the testicle may have popped back in just before the ring closed, especially in the small breeds. This is what causes a rig.
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The young lady who sheared my sheep works with a large commercial flock which the ram lambs have maternal looks. One unspotted ram lamb managed to service 200 ewe lambs, only noticed when they looked in lamb.
They had to resort them and the only difference, apart of course from the essential tackle was a bit more hair on the legs.
The good news was they lambed successfully with no problems just a hell of a lot of unplanned work.