which ram to use on ewe lambs?

farm14

Have 100 speckled face ewe lambs am keeping for breeding for lambing next spring would suffolk & texel be to hard on them. Opinions please.

razor8

Getting the feeding right before lambing is more important than breed choice IMO. I have used a Suffolk on my own last year and no major problems. The majority of people are most likely using a Charolais, better than a Suffolk to get up and suck and generally easier lambed

AnFeirmeoir

had a beltex on mine last year and they lambed very easy. I'd recommend one.

Had suffolk before and had a few visits to the vets. When it goes wrong it can go very wrong

rangler1

farm14 wrote: »

Have 100 speckled face ewe lambs am keeping for breeding for lambing next spring would suffolk & texel be to hard on them. Opinions please.

Use vendeen here on 120 ewe lambs every year, one caesarean last year, first in about five years

razor8

Beltexs just take too long to finish IMO especially if you were anyway heavily stocked

AnFeirmeoir

razor8 wrote: »

Beltexs just take too long to finish IMO especially if you were anyway heavily stocked

would have to agree as i'm firing feed at them at the minute... but ewe lamb & Lamb alive = success in my book

Green farmer

I think the charly might be the easiest terminal sire option on the ewe lambs all right, provided you don't intend on keeping any resulting ewe lambs as replacements, and your not lambing in early in year. Other then that, its hard to knock them.

farm14

rangler1 wrote: »

Use vendeen here on 120 ewe lambs every year, one caesarean last year, first in about five years

Think I heard somewhere that they were easy lambed alrite.

farm14

Thanks for replies personally I think texel & suffolk would be risky enough on them & if I used suffolk on them wouldn't the lambs be black & they'd be soft then & I dont want that.

ganmo

the traditional advice is don't put a black face ram on a black face ewe (or white on white). No idea where it came from but lots of lads follow it

Sheep breeder

Use a charollais ram for them, quick finish lamb, good seller as a store, quick to get up and suck before the hogget runs off and leaves the lamb,Very easy to lamb.serious ram to mate ewes if you want them to lamb quick,
The father always used a Suffolk with the ewe lambs and I bought the first Charollais and let him out with the two suffolks, they spent the day looking at the ewe lambs and the char was running around like mad after them and when it came time to take up the rams we could not keep the char in the paddock kept breaking back,then lambing the char had seventy five percent in lamb and we sold super store lambs compared to the Suffolk, result only char here now.

Green farmer

I got a belclare recently for replacements. On the day another old boy semi retired, bought another one out of the same batch as me. Said he has Suffolk cross ewes and wouldn't use anything other then a belclare on them. Says they spit the lamb out no bother. I was thinking about it and the average ewe these days usually has a high % of terminal blood running through herself,quiet often 75% so using a belclare would still give you a fleshy lamb. Also the bonus is the daughters should be good sellers, with their maternal genes through them as well.