Breeding and Lambing out Ewe Lambs - A Series of Three Articles:
Part Two: Breeding and Gestation
Fall is upon us with cool, clear weather, reds and oranges flaming in the sugar bush, and the rams getting frisky. The ewes are in high spirits as well, as the nights get cooler and the days get shorter. And of course another surefire sign of fall is that the shepherds are finalizing their breeding plans! Those charts and graphs and scrappy bits of lists are being pulled together and shaped up into a coherent breeding scheme. For some breeders, the ewe list will include lambs from this spring. How to plan for a safe and successful lambing season for these little gals? To answer that question, I have compiled the results of interviews with some of our ISBONA shepherds, and will share here their breeding and lambing protocols.
The first, and perhaps most important tip, is to choose wisely the ewe lambs that you will, or will not, put into the breeding pen. I certainly have found through bitter experience that it is not worth the difficulty and heartache to breed a ewe lamb who is still too small. My policy used to be to put them all into the breeding pen, and if they were big enough to breed, then they would. And if they were too small to breed, then they would still benefit from the extra nutrition provided during flushing.
Hah! I quickly found out that I was completely wrong in my assumptions. I discovered to my dismay, that ewe lambs that were much too small to carry a pregnancy successfully, or to be able to mother effectively, will still breed and conceive and even carry a pregnancy to term. Shame on me! I had one spring when I found myself taking over the care of newborn lambs birthed by yearling mothers either without milk, or without the maturity or energy to care for her lamb(s). That was a lesson I learned quickly and absolutely. If she looks like she might be too small, then the best place for her is far, far away from the breeding rams. There she will put on the growth she needs to breed and lamb safely and effectively, the following year. She may well jump right in with twins or triplets as a two-year old, contrasted with one sad, small and weak lamb her first year, and possibly not much better the second.
Laurie Ball-Gisch had a comment in her correspondence that sums up nicely an effective attitude towards the issue of breeding the young ewes, "I really believe that raising sheep is as much an investment in patience and time as it is money and labor... In deciding to purchase or retain ewe lambs in a flock, one must remember that these lambs should represent an investment in the future of your flock - not an instant return."
I could not agree with Laurie more, and specifically feel that the extra year we give those smallest ewes, will be more than repaid in the years ahead. If a shepherd feels that she cannot keep a ewe on the farm that first year if she is not going to bred and lamb, then it is a much better plan to either send that ewe lamb out as a meat lamb, or to sell her to another farm that will let her grow on.
Experience may tell you how big is big enough to breed that first fall, but a criteria often found in the literature is 60-70% of her expected mature weight. Raylene McCalmon shares her selection criteria, "(a) minimum of 80 lbs. and appropriate conformation - the pelvic girdle needs to be wide. I have held back ewe lambs that meet my weight limit but are tall and narrow in the pelvis."
Everyone interviewed agreed that consistent care and support during the growing season is the best guarantee of good results the following spring. While true for all of our ewes, it is especially true for our youngest girls. And one last thought on those littlest ewes - be SURE that they are safe from marauding rams. Come the cooler weather, our rams are very determined breeders, and you will need to be sure that there is no chance of gate crashing or fence leaping on the part of our enthusiastic Romeos!
The next question to settle is if you will handle your ewe lambs separately during any flushing offered, or during the breeding season. Her nutrition from now until she lambs has everything to do with how the pregnancy and delivery will go and you must control that nutrition throughout. This cannot be emphasized enough. Too little nutrition decreases the chances of conception, increases difficulty during lambing, starves the udder and results in stillborn, small or weak lambs. Too much nutrition is a guarantee of lambing difficulties with overgrown lambs being born to the smaller, immature ewes.
The shepherds interviewed had a variety of approaches during the breeding and gestation season, but all agreed that close attention is critical. Elaine Clark and Raylene McCalmon both suggest testing your hay supply to see what you have to deal with for winter nutrition. Jimmie Londagin likes to keep his ewe flock, including the lambs, on pasture as far into the fall and winter that his supply will hold. I also, have had good results either sorting for breeding right off the fields, or even keeping the breeding groups on pasture, even if I have to supplement with hay as well.
There are mixed experiences with graining during either flushing or breeding. A quick summary of my poll results suggests that it is best to make that decision on an individual farm basis. The dangers of grain in the fall are two-fold. The first is that flushing in general, with or without grain, may encourage too many twins amongst the ewe lamb flock. There are always individual ewe lambs that can twin well and easily, and give us two well developed lambs the following fall. But there are also ewes that will twin on increased rations, but will not have either the mental maturity or the udder development to successfully raise a pair of satisfactory twins. Perhaps the most modern farm we visited in Iceland last November, has made the decision to stop flushing their ewe lamb flock for this very reason. They found that about half of them would twin, but that the twins would not reach a good meat weight by fall. By waiting until after breeding to offer supplements to their youngest ewes, the lambs in the spring, were good sized singles that made market weight by fall.
Experience will be the best indicator of whether to flush your ewe lambs, or if grain should be a part of the flushing regimen. If you are getting more twins to your yearling ewes than either you or they can handle, then back off on your fall feeding. If the twins you are getting are good starters at birth that grow out well by fall, then you probably have hit the right mark with your fall nutrition.
Grain in general, either in the fall, or throughout the gestation, is to be handled very carefully with the ewe lamb flock. Are they getting enough to eat? Are the big girls pushing them away from the feeder? Did we miss with our decisions on ewe lamb size? And of course they make those sad Bambi Eyes that Icelandics are such an expert with, convincing us that they are so hungry! But be careful with that grain bag. Feed as little grain as possible to those young girls, and feed it for as short a time as necessary.
What the specific parameters will be, is dependant to a great deal on your pasture, or your hay quality and supply, and the size of your girls going into the winter. But a general truth is that it is very possible, and is occasionally desirable, to lamb out bred ewe lambs without having given them a bite of grain.
For our farm, I have found that a good combination of conditions includes keeping the ewe lambs separate both during breeding and gestation. I feel most comfortable keeping them in one group where I can guarantee that they have plenty of access to the feeder without competition from the big, bossy mature ewes. I also find that I can easily feed them the scant grain rations that I use if I feed them separately. I do not grain my mature ewes at all, but gestate them on hay alone. I have a ready supply of hay, and I am comfortable with the quality, and the mature ewes do quite well under those conditions. For the ewe lambs however, I find that they do best here if they are fed a quarter pound of a 16% protein, sweet feed, starting around January 1, right through lambing. That quarter pound gives her plenty of nutrition to support both her growing body and that of her lamb(s). However, it is very important to keep a steely resolve when feeding them grain. They will scarf it down immediately, and dig around for more, casting thin and plaintive glances your way. "We are so hungry!", they will say, "Surely we will never make it through this terrible winter!" But stay firm. Just remember how bad it is to be pulling oversized lambs out of a yearling ewe, and don't overfeed that grain!
James Keith shares his opinion on feeding those little gals, "The most important thing is to not overfeed ewe lambs. They will complain and carry on like they are starving. Be resolute and stick to the feeding plan you have come up with. You don't want lambing problems because of oversized lambs. 5-6 lbs. of good quality first cut mixed hay/day/ewe lamb should pretty well do the trick. Don't start second guessing yourself midway through the pregnancy and up your rations."
Other shepherds do not find it necessary to feed their young ewes separately. They have found enough feeder space to offer the ewe lambs, even as they are intermingled with the bigger girls, and they like the convenience of not breeding or housing them separately. I have traded the inconvenience of using one breeding ram for all the ewe lambs, for more control of their feeding situation, and it is the farm plan that I will use again this fall.
James Keith has a compromise plan, as he explains, "During breeding they are in with the other sheep. We strongly believe that the ewe lambs should be housed separately during gestation in order to control feeding. Our experience has been that if they are with larger sheep the older sheep get more than their share at the feeder." He has been able to make individual breeding choices in this way, but still keep a tight control on their nutrition.
Another debate that arose during my interviews, was whether horned ewe lambs should be offered a horned breeding ram. Is she going to have a hard time come spring birthing out a horned lamb? There was a variety of decisions on this topic. Elaine Clark likes to use a horned ram lamb, but she also puts a marker on his chest so she can have an accurate breeding date for the ewe. This allows her to be sure to attend the birth and be available to help with those horns if necessary. At lambing it is usually just a matter of gently pulling the vulva up over those horn buds, and it is a small intervention that eases the way for that yearling Mom.
It is a common practice in Iceland to only use polled rams on those immature ewes. We visited a farm last fall that brought in a polled ram each year to breed their ewe lambs. They only raised the horned strain of sheep, but wanted to lamb out their yearlings using only a polled sire. That is the practice that I have decided to use here. Worrying that I will not be at a birth of a horned yearling, I am more comfortable knowing that she is probably not carrying a horned lamb. The downside is that I have crossed the two strains, which is usually not advisable, but I find that for this first year only, the balance is still to the good. The resulting lambs may have to got to meat the following fall if they have some sort of nasty scurs as a result of the cross, but I still find that this is a small price to pay for the ease of lambing under those conditions.
To sum up the results of both my personal experience, and of my ISBONA survey:
- Make careful choices regarding which ewe lambs will be bred, and which will stay back a year.
- Decide if flushing will be advantageous on your farm. The answer will be in the resulting lambs next spring, although
a hay analysis may help in making that decision.
- Control the nutrition! This cannot be emphasized enough. Too little means small and weak lambs, and too much means
trouble at lambing time. Sort the ewe lambs out from the adult ewes if necessary.
- Enjoy planning your crosses!
Assuming you have successfully navigated these difficult waters through fall and winter, you will have lots of growing bellies in your ewe lamb flock. So next time, some tips on how to lamb out these sometimes squirrelly girls without going squirrelly yourself!
Barbara Webb
Jager Farm Icelandics
barbara@jager-icelandics.com
www.jager-icelandics.com
Reprinted from Fall 2204 Newsletter, ISBONA, Volume 8, Issue 4
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