Dogs with jobs

Why are the ewes sporting pink stripes?

Good question.

Once in a pen several tasks are completed.

Lambs get ear tags (color is associated with their sire, number identifies individual animal, and ear with tag is associated with gender) and this information is recorded.

Ewe gets a dose of deworming medicine.

Ewe’s hooves are trimmed. I mark the ewe once I have trimmed her hooves. The mark tells my wife this ewe can be turned and it makes it easier for us to identify new mothers (no mark) from other mothers.

We use this marking method whenever we are doing something to all the sheep (vaccination, deworming, etc) and we want to make sure not to miss a sheep. Marking crayons are available in several colors and we might change colors for the next treatment if the previous color is still visible.

My wife and I have been streaming shows on BritBox and have been watching This farming life. It’ll give you a nice look at livestock farming in Scotland and Ireland. The scenery is spectacular and they don’t gloss over the hard parts of this lifestyle.

The pace of new births has eased a bit.

Ewes lambed: 37
Singles: 9
Twins: 27
Triplets: 1
65 lambs

Lee, Wendy, and I sat down to watch the lambs while the ewes got their grain.
Feeding time for ewes

Training session with Fern working on driving a few of the ewes we didn’t breed.
Fern Driving


Ewes lambed: 52
Singles: 17
Twins: 34
Triplets: 1
Died: 2
Lambs: 87

Wow, that's a lot of twins. Is that normal, or just your flock, Mark?

For our breed, katahdin hair sheep, with good nutrition (lush grass) twins are common. Our breeding goals include selection of ewes that deliver and raise twins.

Ewes that are raised with less ideal nutrition, less lush grass (think western range grass vs eastern pastures), are more likely to produce singles.

Our ewes are allowed to have 1 single in their first 2 breedings, after that if they deliver a single they will be removed from our flock.

Thanks.

Our ewes are allowed to have 1 single in their first 2 breedings, after that if they deliver a single they will be removed from our flock

Vewy intewesting! I wasn't aware you could control this but I suppose if you can breed labs to get specific colors anything is possible.