[JFW67]

Hi All,

This lambing season I had an unpleasant shock 6 weeks before lambing to find a healthy wee lamb in the field with a healthy mum.  Clearly the result of a ram lamb last year.

This year I am being doubly cautious.

I had assumed I would be weaning the rams as they turned 4 months in an age progressive order.  However, this seems to be clearly not as simple as I thought.   Two of the ramblings have been showing signs of serious interest in the ewes, but when I checked their tags one is the eldest and the other is the youngest . . .  But are comparable in size. .

I’ve now done a bit of extra reading and gather from a few sources that age is less significant  than size in relation to reaching fertility.  Big healthy ram lambs may be fertile significantly earlier than small less developed but older siblings.

I removed the two big lads from the flock leaving the smaller ones behind.  Both have ewe siblings so the mothers will not be stressed by the sudden weaning event.

1.    Can anyone confirm the size beats age theory?

2.    My back up will be to remove any rams that show interest in the ewes,  and remove each ram as he reaches 4 months.  Does this make sense?

[Rosemary]

My understanding is that it's an age / weight thing - with puberty at about 60% of adult weight.
If you only have small numbers of females, I think you can get "nappies" to stop ant shenanigans

[twizzel]

The general rule of thumb is if you want them to do a job and get ewes in lamb, they won’t, and if you don’t want them to get anything in lamb, they will 


We wean everything around 12-14 weeks, so far haven’t had any accidental pregnancies 

[JFW67]

Thank you Rosemary and Twizzel

[Twotwo]

I wean the ram lambs about 12 weeks and ewe lambs 16 weeks, seems to work for us… although I left the ewe lambs longer this year for various reasons, it will be interesting to how it effects lambing percentages.

[Richmond]

Do none of you castrate the ram lambs then?

[twizzel]

Do none of you castrate the ram lambs then?

Castrate all of ours but keep 3 or 4 entire each year. This year kept 3 entire and have a rig too.

[Rosemary]

Do none of you castrate the ram lambs then?

I only ever castrated ram lambs that I thought might not go fat in October and need to be overwintered - triplets and the like.

[Blue Feather]

Wow, I didn't know this was a potential problem! I haven't been castrating any of my ram lambs. They stay with their mums until they are 5 to 6 months old then go for meat (end August). I haven't had any mishaps, after 7 lambings, so far...! (Jacob x sheep)

[PipKelpy]

I've 1 tup lamb, Isaac, he's a Wiltshire Horn and will be 5 month old in another week or so. He's with siblings, hoggs that hopefully he'll be tupping in November, 4 ewes being culled and Dorset x lambs still On their mums as they were born a month later.

I haven't seen him sniff anyone.

However, Triplet, who was my Dorset Down tup, started tupping June 2004 when he was 5.5months old! Now that was a surprise!

DD can lamb whenever, don't think Wiltshire Horns can, so im not too worried at the moment.