Hampshire ewes and lambs
It’s that time of year again. We shed lamb our purebred Hampshire and Rambouillet ewes in March (mostly) at Powder Flat. This year we are blessed with good weather and a great crew. Our crew includes three Peruvian employees who have each worked for us for more than 20 years. The sheep are all in good hands!
pregnant ewes waiting
“Ayuda” ewe (“Help” in Spanish). She looks green due to the translucent green panels in the ceiling.
guardian dog and pups on the job
new mom with twins
LGD puppies with pregnant ewes
Anthony and Meghan
Rambouillet ewes with their lambs
Anthony, Oscar Tiarnan and Modesto
wild horses on Racetrack at Lookout Rim
Jeep after looking for sheepcamp on Lookout Rim
Tiarnan with a new lamb
Tags: Anthony, Border collies, Edgar, ewes, Jeep, lambing, lambs, livestock guardian dogs, Meghan, Modesto, Oscar, Tiarnan, wild horses
Lambs in the sunshine
Rams in October mean lambs in March. Even though we still have record amounts of snow on the ground, the lambs are arriving right on schedule. We raise our own rams–Rambouillet and Hampshire–and the moms lamb in March at Powder Flat. Our Peruvian crew is doing a great job at getting live lambs on the ground. It is a reminder that spring will actually arrive, someday. We did see birds migrating north. We saw geese in the sky and Sand Hill Cranes on the alfalfa feed line with our ewes.
Alejandro pulling a lamb
Alejandro bringing twin lamb #2 into the world
Pat and Edgar
bum lambs
guard dog on straw, cows on feed
cows on the feedline
Geese heading north
Alejandro supplementing a lamb with milk
Tags: Alejandro, cows, Edgar, lambing, Pat, sheep
Hampshire ewe with comfy lamb
Each March, we lamb our purebred ewes, Hampshire and Rambouillet, in the sheds at Powder Flat. We raise our rams for the commercial range ewes from these two farm flocks. Luckily, we have a good crew and the early weather has been mild.
Pat and Edgar with pen for outdoor dining
guard dog hard at work in a circle of ewes
guard dogs on the job
Hampshire ewe and twins
bum lambs in warm straw
Leo feeding the bum lambs
Meanwhile, Maria is hanging out with the bucks
Tags: bucks, Edgar, ewes, lambing, lambs, Leo, livestock guardian dogs, llama, Pat, Powder Flat
Pregnant ewes waiting
We have started lambing the purebred ewes at Powder Flat. They are the moms of our future bucks and many replacement ewe lambs, and we lamb them earlier so these lambs will be older when it’s time for them to become working sheep. Our hard-working crew of Peruvian employees are supported by frequent visits from Meghan and her crew.
Rambouillet ewe looks after her twins
Here’s looking at ewe.
Tiarnan with a Hampshire lamb
Hampshire ewes and lambs hanging out by the heifers
Tiarnan and Siobhan playing in the corn
Antonio, Meghan, Siobhan and Oscar
Tags: Antonio, ewes, Hampshire, heifers, lambing, Meghan, Oscar, Powder Flat, Rambouillet, Siobhan
Squaw Mountain
Sure enough–as soon as we finished shearing and started lambing, a cold, windy, snowy storm moved in. While we are happy to see the much-needed moisture, we have scrambled to try to save lambs. We estimate we lost about 150 lambs due to the severe weather. Our lambing grounds on Loco got a foot of fresh snow and we couldn’t get in there for several days. The herders were well-provisioned but couldn’t do much except get the ewes into sheltered areas.
This is the first year we have lambed ewes through our new shed on the private land on Cottonwood. We had preg tested the mothers of the replacement ewe lambs in March, and we sorted the mothers of twins into a bunch to be shed lambed. Our crew piled the straw bales to create wind breaks at each end of the shed, and were able to save most of the new lambs in the shed. We lamb later than most of our neighbors, and it is always a gamble.
Lambing shed with straw windbreak
Ewes pregnant with twin lambs sheltering in the shed
Ewes huddled behind tarp windbreaks
Baker’s Peak
Battle Mountain
Sheep Mountain
Horses at the lambing shed, with Muddy Mountain
Siobhan and Tiarnan in the mud
Tags: Bakers Peak, Battle Mountain, ewes, lambing, lambs, Muddy Mountain, Sheep Mountain, spring snow, Squaw Mountain
Lambing shed–getting ready for action!
Tags: lambing, shed
Ladder Ranch
