The lambs this year have been driving me crazy. I have had this feeling I am one lamb short since June but for the life of me I cannot figure out which one I lost. To make matters worse my Mother kept insisting my count was off and her's was right so I took her word for it. Yet the numbers are still coming up one short for the year now that I am getting ready to place them in the Winter configuration.
I have the whole crew listed with numbered tags of course. I wrote down the ones we took to market already and I should have eight yearling ewes and six yearling whethers left but I keep coming up with only five whethers.
It's driving me crazy.
I suspect I am getting a tag number coming up twice because it is close like a 246 being read as a 248 or something like that but the yearlings especially do not trust me from the market separation yet and my records do not show any tags that should be that close. The remaining yearlings pretty much head for the hills whenever they see me coming.
The only option I have to finally get to the bottom of this mystery is to lock the flock up in a stall and let them out one by one in the morning but that is not as easily done as it is typed. It goes fine at first but then when you get down to the really nervous ones it becomes chaotic. Which is the real problem to begin with they won't stand still and even the brightest tags with the biggest numbers I could buy become hard to read properly.
Then there comes the final question if I did lose one where and how?
At this point I will be putting the breeding ewes into the ram paddocks in a few weeks and then I will try and get to the bottom of this mystery.
When ya have 38 lambs running around and all the attending issues that come along with them mistakes will be made. For instance I had three lambs this year catch their tags on the fence that needed replaced. Two bottle baby whethers that were sold as babies and then the market run fiasco that almost made me load the entire crew up and sell em they were being such a pain to separate.
As soon as I get these never ending fence projects finished I am working on some movable panels to help close the sheep up into smaller temporary pens when needed. The problem now is the barn lot and the main barn area allow them too much room to move away when I am trying to verify tag numbers.
Keep Prepping Everyone!!!!
Years ago, when we were raising a hand spinners flock, all the ewes and their lambs went out to pasture one morning....well, range land, actually and in the evening one lamb came back without its mother. Our place is slightly hilly and the ewe was coated so we figured she would be easy to spot, in case she got hung up on something. We searched for that ewe for days and never found a trace of her, ever. Now it is 15 years later, and we still wonder about it.
ReplyDeleteTewshooz - That is odd to lose a full grown ewe without a trace. As I said I suspected I was missing a lamb back in June but never found signs of any mishap anywhere. When I counted I always came up one short but then my Mom always came out even. I never actually checked each number though and then there was a clerical issue with the market lambs. Those damned ear tags are hard to read even when you capture them one by one and of course the occasional missing tag causes problems too. Before market day and counting the moms and useless invalid flock members I had sixty some odd sheep milling around but at this point I cannot be sure which actual tag number I am missing either because it might have been an issue from the market batch.
Deletedid you think maybe there is a human rustling a lamb here and there?
ReplyDeleteDeborah - I don't think it would be a human. The only lambs that would come to a human would be the bottle babies and they were all accounted for. If someone had run one down I think we would have noticed. If I was right with my count back in June it's possible any number of predators got one back then they were so small but I didn't let them out of the side lot until July I think.
DeleteA few years back a farmer in my county found two guys gutting his horse. Seems they though it was a moose.
ReplyDeleteIf you do have a big game cat in the area they can haul kills a long ways from the kill site.
Exile1981
Exile - We do have Mountain lions. The one they have stuffed in the Mo Conservation Museum was killed only about two miles from us. We also have Bobcat and I have seen Eagles take small lambs too.
DeleteI wish someone would mistake these horses we got for deer :)
We had to worm our sheep yesterday. It was a battle. They were all frisky and fought every step of the way. We also need to get a better system of catching them...at the moment we get them into a smaller pen, then Lester does a rugby tackle on each one to catch them!
ReplyDeleteWe switched to diatomaceous earth in their feed and treats and are getting better results with much less drama and risk for critters and humans. And with bazillions fewer flies, as well. :)
DeleteA.
Vera - I hate worming. I hate it. When we had less than 20 lambs it was not such an issue but since I been expanding the flock and getting so many it gets harder and harder. I need a gate chute and a dog now I think.
DeleteA. That's a good idea. Food grade Dia earth would be good. I used to feed the sheep a lot of Pumpkins each year that helped worm them as well but it the D earth helps keep the flies down too!!! Well the possibilities are endlessly happy :)
Headcounts are a pain, that's for sure. I do hope you solve the mystery and that the missing lamb is simply invisible for the count and not truly missing.
ReplyDeleteLeigh - I am really hoping it is a miss read tag. I will know more shortly when I put the ewes out and every body will be in more easily manageable groups.
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