So paul and i have been looking for a few lambs to grow out. But VERY few people test. And fewer still test for cl. Most just do opp and johne’s if that. I know that cl in sheep is more often internal and if they do have external it is hard to see but when they are sheared comes the problem. We want hair sheep though so no shearing. Would i love the wool yep asolutely, but, there are too many cheap people in our area that wont pay for quality. So no shearing here. I do not have room in our tinny two bedroom home for lossa fleeces lol. Anyhoo..... found a farm selling all their sheep because farmer had triple bypass. He has hair sheep. And they are tested for johne’s, opp AND cl so yay! My question. His ewes are due to lamb march/april time frame. If we only got one do you think she would be ok without a friend? When she lambs she would have those as friends is my thought. But what do i know about sheep... no hands on with them it is just somethin we want to add to our farm and the research we have done on them. It is time for hands on now but i am just not sure how a single ewe would do alone for a bit. We would buy two but what he is asking is what we have saved for two or three bottle lambs. He is not asking a crazy price but it is what it is.
She should be ok if there are other critters near by. Does he have any cheap wethers (sheep, not goat) that she could have as a friend, then after she lambs, you could send him to freezer camp.
Can you expand a little on how you keep them together? My friend wants to sell me a bottle baby lamb In the spring, but I dont know if it could live with my goats with no other sheep. I have 3 does, 2 of which will be kidding in the spring. I'm a little worried about getting the goats their minerals without the sheep getting to them. Any suggestions?
I keep my bottle lambs and kids together. i have no problems. I have put my does in a stanchion and let the lambs suck on the doe. the interesting thing i found is the kids don't care who there mother is. they only care is there food. Minerals are tough. copper is the only mineral you will have to watch. sheep can take more copper than the books say they can. I feed a cow mineral to my sheep and goats. it is a happy medium. if you don't want to down grade your mineral goats are more agile than sheep. narrow stairs sheep just do not do.
Cool! Are you getting them for their fiber or is it another reason? (I assume you can still spin fiber from a hair sheep?) And what breed are they?
no wool no spinning Hair sheep are meat sheep if they are Barbato black belly pass they are gazelles. All hair sheep are docked $10.00 at the sales ring because there hide has no value.
They raise multiple breeds. Still trying to convince my dad to let me get one, so not sure on breed or when. Probably between March and April. I would like to try milking her if I can! That sounds fun. Not sure yet, just doing research
My ram lived with a buck for basically a year without another sheep in sight. Actually, he never beat up on the buck but he does beat up on my ewe.
It must depend on where your at on what they bring. Hair sheep being way more then wool sheep here. Well maybe thats not totally right. Barbs do bring more but it’s dorpers that bring way more money then any wool sheep. I am not a huge sheep meat fan but I can say I had a barb once and I could stomach eating it. I had some kind of wool sheep and I could not get past the first bite. It’s hard to explain but it had more of a musky almost game taste to it, hair seem to be more mild. So I’m assuming people around here are like me and would rather have the more mild.
