We have started a mob and have 20 ewes and our ram has been seen matting them and then leaves them but goes back a week latter also gos for one we thought where pregnant ....when they all lamb we are butting hom in away from them and then putting him in at same time, all the ewes have come from different homes so its all gessing.
Udder a 3yo ewe lamb weaned has a uders baged up and has hard udder tisue with another has a big weaned lamb with baged up udders but its not got the hard tusue the other has both of there lambs are like 8-9 months
We just got 10 drama x ewes and put them with the dorpper x merino but there not mixing and rams not to keen on them
This time of year a ram's approach to everything it to either bash it up or mate with it [the preliminaries look about the same], so the telling behaviour is the ewe's...if she stands still and lets him mount, then she isn't pregnant. Otherwise, it's just another sex-mad male!
White sheep do not like black things amongst them. This is why a black or dark coloured sheep dog will be able to muster sheep easier than a white dog. We were given a black sheep many years ago and did not know about whites preferring whites. The poor black sheep saw our white sheep and rushed off to join them ..... but our white sheep ran away, and stayed away from the black sheep for quite some time.
Sheep from different flocks tend to stay with their friends. It can take many months for them to get friendly with a sheep from a different flock. We got 6 from a neighbour about June, and they were run with ours from them, including close together in the lambing and shedding paddocks. The neighbours have gone back to their own little flock.
How do you know that the ewes are pregnant? Most of the ewes in NZ will only just be pregnant or not yet pregnant even if the ram has been running with them all the time. Most sheep in NZ only ovulate between late December and late June.
I'm not certain if Demara (or what ever they are) are all year round breeders, but they very possibly are. With my seasonal breeders, some bag up a couple of months before lambing and others don't bag up until after they have lambed.
A big but firm udder indicates the ewe is in milk, and will soon or has lambed. A hard lump, from the size of a pea to the size of a fist indicates that the ewe has had mastitis or an udder injury. Depending on the position and size of the healed wound she might or might not make milk again in that side. If she does make milk then she is likely to get mastitis again. Watch carefully for mastitis after lambing.
How do you know that the lambs are weaned? One year we took the lambs away from their mums for a month, then put them back together. The lambs immediately tried suckling their mums, and about 1/4 of the ewes came back into milk.
I've had similar experiences to Longridge's. I have a photo of 187 Romneys crowded into a small paddock with an empty circle in the middle occupied only by two South Suffolks. Ditto, too, with the 'coming back into milk" business, with sheep -- and even with my Afghan hound, Tank, back in the 70s. She spontaneously produced milk when she saw her kennelmate Beagle's puppies. Our vet said, "Separate her, and she'll dry off." After howling for three days she did, but came right back into milk when we brought her back from our long-suffering [former??] friends' house!
Also .... I take the rams away from the ewes before lambing is about to start, because I have found that some rams interfer with the ewe when she is lambing, and/or try to separate the ewe from the lamb/s just after lambing.
