Breeding Ewe Lambs

Ness · #1 07/26/12, 08:24 AM

Anyone bred at 7-8 months? What were your experiences?

We've got an bottle lamb we picked up at auction this summer, skin & bones, just abscess over her eye, I could go on... but as far as we can tell she's purebred Jacobs, and with a little work we've got a really nice lamb on our hands!

I'd like to breed her early so we've got the lambs to sell, but I don't want to jeopardize her health either (although she's health as a horse & fat as a market hog now!). I've also got to find a ram, which may be the most difficult part.

ONG2 · #2 07/26/12, 08:41 AM

We have ABB and we wait until they are a year old to breed. They are larger and have more milk for their lamb.

KSALguy · #3 07/26/12, 10:09 AM

some like to wait to breed untill they are a year old, but most breed so that they lamb at a year, as long as they are at least 70% of their adult size and healthy, they will be fine, dont breed to a larger breed especially for their first lambing,

LibertyWool · #4 07/26/12, 11:29 AM

I do breed my ewe lambs. They don't always take, but I prefer if they lamb when they are 13 or 14 months. You do have to be careful to fed them right (not under and not over fed). Overfeeding can be worse than underfeeding, you end up with a big lamb that leads to lambing problems. My first year lambing, I didn't intend to breed my ewe lambs, but the ram had other plans. Needless to say, one ewe lamb got bred, and she looked like she was carrying twins so I fed her like she was. She had a 22lb lamb that didn't make it. She was fine and has gone on to have twins and triplets ever since (17 lambs at last count). But it could have easily have been worse.

Most years I don't have any issues with my ewe lambs lambing, but one year I had three ewe lambs that had twins. One did fine, but the other two I had to put in head gates for 7-10 days because they rejected one of the twins. It all worked out, but was rather stressful for them and me.

And I'll be breeding my replacements this year.

Ness · #5 07/26/12, 12:03 PM

It's also a question of how successful I'm going to be at catching her first, so we can take her to be bred (maybe I can find a ram to borrow, we'll see). I'm thinking if we can aim to get her bred around someone else's schedule for their own herd it'll make it easier to find a ram.

It wouldn't bother me to be bottle raising another. We had lamby this year & billy (who was wethered) last summer.

She's only around 2 months now, so I'm getting ahead of myself a little bit

Callieslamb · #6 07/26/12, 02:26 PM

I think it depends on the breed. My finns I can breed to lamb at 12 months with no problem. From what I understand, there are other breeds that grow and mature more slowly so they need more time before being bred.

**bergere** · #7 07/27/12, 04:42 AM

I had Jacobs for awhile and I would recommend waiting until they are at least a year old to breed.
Jacobs are also once a year breeders.
And I would aim for lambing to happen after your bad weather is over, where you live.
Noting worse that loosing a lamb when it is too cold out.

Sunmill · #8 07/31/12, 08:43 AM

All of our ewe lambs are bred to lamb out at 13-14 months. I held a couple runts back this year but they never took anyway. An extra year of growth (breeding them at a year) wouldn't hurt them, but even the smaller ones seem to catch up in their 1st lactation.

houndlover · #9 08/01/12, 12:47 AM

I sometimes breed my 10 month old big breed (suffolk size), but only if they're at least 120 lbs.

J.T.M. · #10 08/02/12, 12:16 PM

Mine has to be 120 lbs. and ready to breed by 8 months or I sell her off .