[Penninehillbilly]

I only have one ewe, she has M+F lambs. When we were going to ring the male OH couldnt feel anything,  so we decided to leave him a couple of days, unfortunately we couldn't catch him again  .
Now 12 weeks old. What age will they need separating please? 
I have a yearling tup I could put him with, but want to leave him on mum as long as possible.
They have all been running together, so get on OK.

[landroverroy]

If he's destined for meat, and presuming he's still feeding off his mum then I would leave him with her for at least another month. Ewes don't normally mate again while they are still feeding offspring. That way he should keep growing without the check of weaning and if you've got them on good grass he should by then be fat and ready to go.

[Penninehillbilly]

Thanks, that's a relief:-).

[SallyintNorth]

Ewes don't normally mate again while they are still feeding offspring.

Except the ones that do, which on ex-BH's farm was around 1-2 in 200.  I.e., we had one or two most years that got tupped by their unringed sons (or that of their flockmates.). Some of these perhaps had stopped feeding their own lambs by this time, but there were a few over the years which were very identifiable and were absolutely definitely still feeding lambs when successfully tupped.

There was some Charollais blood in the flock, and at least one of these identifiable sheep was definitely part Charollais.  Our Charollais sheep seemed to come to the tup earlier than the others (Mules, Texels and crosses thereof). So much so that, as the Charollais blood permeated the flock, ex-BH had to start taking extra care about who was where from about mid-August onwards.  (We normally aimed for the first lambers end Feb.  The majority through March.)

So as long as you are ok with the small risk, by all means keep them together.  Unless they're Charollais or Dorset or Suffolk or one of the other breeds that breeds early or year round, in which case the risk may be larger

[Penninehillbilly]

Ewe was supposed to be swaley, I think there was a primitive tup on the wander, sire was half zwarble, half swale.
If I can leave them together another month I'd be happier, female lamb is a bit thinner than him, takes after mum I think.

[SallyintNorth]

Should be fine with Swale, not sure about Zwartbles though.  To mid August sounds like a reasonable risk to take