[plt102]

Hi there,

So far we have 4 ewe lambs: all born without a fuss and apart from one mum being a little bit fluffy and us having to show baby where the teats were, and 2 ram lambs: one needed a little help to be born as his shoulder was a bit stuck (one leg out and one in) and needed topping up with colostrum and milk for his first few days as he was so small and weak. That one is still quite small although doing well. The second boy was born without a fuss yesterday but mum isnt letting it suckle (I must say I didnt notice till this morning that he is really skinny and mum keeps turning to face him to lick him so he obviously isnt suckling). He is really small cold and weak so I'll be giving him a few good feeds today and keeping an eye on them to hope things improve. The ewe lamb that was born a couple of hours before him is already bounding about with the other lambs.

Anyway, my question is has anyone had any experience of a difference between boys and girls in their general health etc? Could it be the rams genetics coming through? I am not complaining as I am obviously delighted that my ewe lambs are so healthy but a little worried in case there is something in the male side of the family that could cause future problems with small weak ram lambs.

Thanks

P

[suziequeue]

In humans - baby boys have higher infant mortality than baby girls. Don't know about sheep.

We only had one ram lamb out of seven this year. By the time he was a week old he was already "expresing his dominance" over the other girl lambs 

[plt102]

wow you were lucky to have 1 boy out of 7!!!!

[in the hills]

Okay - very lucky here. 9 lambs - 8 tups and one lonely ewe lamb.

No, the boys and girl all seem the same in terms of health/behaviour. Guess youd have to look at larger scale farming statistics to get a general picture of tup versus ewe survival, genetics passed from rams to male offspring, etc. Quite complex I would think. Interesting though.

[suziequeue]

wow you were lucky to have 1 boy out of 7!!!!

No lamb chops this year 

[plt102]

oh yes - i suppose - we are trying to build our flock so thinking the other way this year....

[suziequeue]

 

We've got the breed registration man coming in a few weeks time so I am sure he will pronounce on a couple of the ewe lambs..... then we will have more lamb chops. Yum yum.

[plt102]

cant wait to try ourr own lamb chops but at the moment we are toying with the idea of increasing our flock size due to so many healthy girls so might have to wait a while as we already have orders for the boys....