[smee2012]

OK, so how do I condition score my sheep? My ram lambs are off to the abattoir on Monday but they are so much skinnier than the girls. Granted, two of them seem to have spent most of their summer and autumn with their heads stuck in the fence  but surely there shouldn't be that much difference between them? They are all this year's lambs - the girls were March born (a set of triplets and a singleton) and the boys were April born.

We swapped the two groups over today (no mean feat with two fields, two groups of v similar looking sheep and no hurdles or sheep dog!!) and I'm a bit worried now that the girls aren't going to do so well on the bottom field. Can there be that much difference in pasture? We essentially have a long 2-acre field that has been split into two paddocks and it was all harrowed and re-seeded about 2.5 years ago.

[SallyintNorth]

Condition scoring website 

If the ram lambs are that - entire, not wethered - then they will have lost condition through the tupping season.  You want to get ram lambs away before the girls start cycling, or accept that you'll be keeping them over winter.  You can get the condition back onto them (when the season is over) with cake, but it'll take 6-8 weeks feeding say 1lb per head per day.  Or you can let them winter on and fatten on the spring grass.

I don't know where you are, but up here (far North of england, hill land) we have to start feeding concentrate at around the end of October or the lambs will lose condition.  Stores would normally be allowed to go down to CS2 over the winter, when the spring grass comes their condition will naturally come back up.  Any to be sold before Christmas or in the New Year will need 1/2lb per head per day to keep the condition on them.

Grass certainly can vary enormously within one field, for all sorts of reasons.

This year has been a very wet year and there have been unseasonal problems with fluke and also lungworm causing problems when normally the lambs aren't affected by it.

[Haylo-peapod]

If the ram lambs are that - entire, not wethered - then they will have lost condition through the tupping season.  You want to get ram lambs away before the girls start cycling, or accept that you'll be keeping them over winter. 

We've always noticed that our ram lambs (entire) never seem to have as much condition as the ewe lambs at this time of the year and I am fascinated to read your comment. So does this apply even if they are a couple of fields away from the ewes? Also am I wasting my time caking them too much at the moment?


We've tended to leave our ram lambs entire as a) often their testicles haven't descended in the first week and b) when we have managed to ring them we felt the boys went backwards.  I had thought that I had heard somewhere that entire ram lambs grew better but maybe I'm mistaken. The GFD's are a slow growing breed, I'm now wondering whether they might do better as wethers rather than being left entire.

[SallyintNorth]

As a rule of thumb, entire males grow better than wethers except when they get hormonal.  So it's a juggling act.  If they'll finish off grass before the tupping season starts, then for sure entires will grow faster and probably better (more muscley, less fat) than wethers.  You can cake entires harder than wethers; wethers will slab on the fat more readily than entires.

If they need cake to finish before tupping starts, then that's a judgement call and you need a crystal ball to predict when the fat prices will be best!  We find the prices to be in general best before mid-July, then they drop a little as everyone's lambs come to the mart, and stay flattish till the new year, when they often - but not always - rise again.

And yes, it's to do with the season, the slowdown in growth.  It's maybe more marked if they've ladies nearby, I'm not sure, but I don't think two fields' seperation will make much difference, no.

[sabrina]

I bottled fed two lambs this year. the ram lamb was entire and he grew very well, little female was much smaller and I would have prefered to have kept her on a few more weeks but as he was ready to go in August she went too. Next year I will make sure I get two of the same sex. Farmer left all his male lambs entire as he said they grow on faster and he gets them to market before there is a glut so getting a better price.

[SteveHants]

I do this, but it has bitten me on the backside rather this year. Luckly I have more keep than I need and will overwinter my ram lambs...

[smee2012]

I have been feeding the ram lambs since about the end of October - as the ground has been so wet. Next year we will hopefully get some wether lambs, so that all the sheep can be kept together, in order to cycle the paddocks.

I'll have a good look at that website - thank you!