[Nelson International]

We have some ram hoggs that we were planning on slaughtering this summer, but time has rather got away from us. Is it too late to send them - i.e. is the impending rutting season likely to ruin their flavour? We've previously sent entire rams as mutton and the meat was perfect, but that was more in the heart of the summer so I'm a bit worried that we might have missed the boat.

[Fleecewife]

You don't say what breed. We send our Hebridean entire males at 16 months, so mid August and they haven't started getting 'het up' by then.  But other breeds are less seasonal so 'it depends'.  You can tell when they are getting het up by the rosy colour the bare skin on their bellies around their genital area.  Some breeds seem to give a taint to their meat, also some people are more sensitive than others.  For example I find that Shetland tups stink horribly whereas Hebs don't, but others don't find that

[Nelson International]

Sorry, yes, they're South Welsh mountain, with a little texel in one of them. I'm not concerned about age as we've eaten others older, but I was concerned if the taste changes as tipping season comes on.

[SallyintNorth]

I sent a very stinky and very, very hormonal not-yet 3 year old Shetland tup, who had just tupped 9 sheep for us, off in December one year, because the poor guy couldn't settle back with his wether pals and we'd been going to send him off in spring (after he'd regained condition and the hormones had died down) anyway.  We had him minced, thinking curries or feed the dogs if the meat was tainted. 

B e s t   m u t t o n  m i n c e   e v e r     

Best spag bol. best lasagne, best stews - absolutely fantastic meat.  No hint of any taint. 

[Nelson International]

Thanks Sally, that's reassuring. Working with pigs, my sense is people worry about boar taint much more than they need to, so I did wonder if the same was true of rams.

[chrismahon]

We slaughtered an 8 month old Texel and the meat was 'tainted', to the extent that we couldn't eat it plain, it had to be in a heavily spiced mix. I'd make sure the one with Texel in him can be later identified.