[Hadynt]

Hi All,

First post but have been collecting info for a long time from ASH. I have a small flock of sheep (1 Shropshire ram, 3 Shetland and 3 Boreray ewes and 1 Shetland wether). I've had them for 10months now since we moved into our smallholding. We ended up borrowing a ram from a neighbour(a medium size mule) as we didn't have our ram at the time we wanted to tup.

We have now had 5 lambs from the 3 Shetlands however nothing from the Borerays. The Shetlands did get a little bigger and bagged up early so I could tell they were pregnant but cannot see any of these changes on the Borerays.

In theory we had the ram in with them from 24th Nov until the 13th Jan so in theory they could lamb anywhere up to the 12th June but not seeing any signs. Are Borerays more reluctant to mate with larger rams? Or is it possible the presence of the wether,who is a little wilder and hangs around with the Borerays, could have stopped them approaching the ram to mate?

I'm not overly worried just trying to increase my knowledge as my sheep journey starts! I will be replacing the Borerays with more Shetlands this summer anyway as I prefer the Shetland temperament but they will go to my brother's smallholding so will still be useful to know!

Thanks
Hadyn

[SallyintNorth]

Only just seen your post and have no firsthand experience of Borerays.  It's possible they could be slower maturing than Shetlands, how old are they? 

[Hadynt]

Hi, sorry I didn't get a notification that you had replied ☺️. The borerays are a little slow to develop like soay(from what I have read)they were 18months old when they went in with the ram

[SallyintNorth]

Re-reading your initial post... the Boreray wether is presumeably horned, albeit smaller than an entire's headgear would be, and the "mule tup" is presumeably polled.   So if the wether was protective of the ewes, it could have made it difficult for the tup to mate, yes.  But surely you would have observed fighting? 

(I put "mule tup" in quotes, because "mule tup" isn't an animal that would normally be used for breeding.  Tups would normally be pure bred, or specific crosses of similar types.  The outcomes would very variable using a mule as a tup.)