[suziequeue]

Following on from our experience last/this year, we are thinking about making one of our current crop of  ram lambs into a teaser ram in order to shorten our lambing period and get the girls receptive to the ram when the time comes.

We have a ram lamb who has a short tail so he's definitely not going to be a breeder. We've got plenty of lamb in the freezer.

When is the best age for him to have his tubes tied??

[Me]

I've done young-old (4-5 month lambs-rams) and all seemed to work just fine

[shep53]

Depends on how well grown and how the testes develop but can be done from 3months of age but must be done 4-6wks before intended use, and you may have problems keeping flys off in the summer .    Personally I  vasectomise in jan when about 8 mths of age ready to use as a shearling .

[mowhaugh]

Depends on how well grown and how the testes develop but can be done from 3months of age but must be done 4-6wks before intended use, and you may have problems keeping flys off in the summer .    Personally I  vasectomise in jan when about 8 mths of age ready to use as a shearling .

Same here.

[suziequeue]

January it is then :-)

Gives us a chance to have a practice run this autumn with a hired/borrowed teaser ram and then make the commitment to having our own for next  autumn.

[farmvet]

How many sheep do you have? An alternative would be to sponge the ewes which would mean lambing would be over in 5 days! If 80+% hold to the tup you could either accept the others as empty or leave the tup in and have another week of lambing 2-3weeks later. The downside is you need 1 tup to about 10ewes although you can stagger the sponging a bit to increase the ratio.

[suziequeue]

Thanks. We considered sponging and decided against it - hence the question about the teaser ram. We have 10 breeding ewes and don't have enough land to increase the numbers much above that.

[Hillview Farm]

How many sheep do you have? An alternative would be to sponge the ewes which would mean lambing would be over in 5 days! If 80+% hold to the tup you could either accept the others as empty or leave the tup in and have another week of lambing 2-3weeks later. The downside is you need 1 tup to about 10ewes although you can stagger the sponging a bit to increase the ratio.

So to get them to lamb in 5 days do you implant them together or do you stagger it?

[Me]

All together

[Foobar]

If you stagger sponging (or the withdrawal of the sponge)  -  If one ram can do 10 ewes in one day (ish) ... how many days rest does he need before he can do any more?

[Me]

Next day he should be ok to go again - but I have never tried this and don't know how far you can push it, 10 per day for a month sounds like it wouldn't work out well
What are people being charged to carry out the vasectomies?

[Dogwalker]

Does it work to just ring the sac empty so he still has his balls but too warm to be fertile.

One of last years bottle lambs from a local farm is like that and seemed to get the shetlands in the mood.
Does it cause any problems I'm unaware of.

[Foobar]

Does it work to just ring the sac empty so he still has his balls but too warm to be fertile.

One of last years bottle lambs from a local farm is like that and seemed to get the shetlands in the mood.
Does it cause any problems I'm unaware of.

The trouble with that is that a "rig" can't be guaranteed to be infertile.

[shep53]

Next day he should be ok to go again - but I have never tried this and don't know how far you can push it, 10 per day for a month sounds like it wouldn't work out well
What are people being charged to carry out the vasectomies?

              This jan £25each on farm .

[Me]

Ok thanks Shep, is that for a minimum number plus call out and drugs or all in?
The short scrotum method is cheap and cheerful but can go badly wrong when it is very cold for a long time - viable sperm can suddenly be produced