RSS

Tag Archives: rams

Checking the bucks again

bucks waiting in the corral, Edgar, Jose

Our intrepid friend, Geri Parsons of Optimal Livestock Services, is once again making her rounds to make sure the bucks are ready for their annual duty of impregnating the ewes. They have one job and  most winters they are with the ewes from mid-December to mid-February to make sure the ewes are exposed through two heat cycles. Usually, we take them out after a couple of months. The winter of 2022-2023 was so severe that we didn’t take the bucks out until shearing in early May–not because that is a new normal for management. It was just so cold and snowy for so long we didn’t want to further stress the sheep by working them, and we didn’t really have a better place to care for the bucks separately, since every critter was on full feed anyway. Our weather prognosticator friend assures us, using very complicated explanations, that he expects the winter weather in our neck of the woods to be fairly normal whatever that is. El Nino will strike elsewhere, according to him. No matter what, we want the rams to be in tip-top shape. Any buck with less than optimal testicles or sperm has gone to the “train station (see Yellowstone TV show). Sorry guys, but that’s the way it is in the ovine world.

Meghan, Chandler and Geri checking the rams in the chute.

Chandler working the chute

Meghan marking the rams

rams at Powder Flat, with our new yard ornaments, the Pacificorps Power lines

 

 
 

Tags: , , , , , ,

Checking the bucks

Edgar and Robyn testing bucks

Each fall, Geri Parsons from Optimal Livestock Services LLC comes to test our rams for health and fertility. This year she was assisted by our intrepid crew of ranchhands. The rams give up a semen sample into a test tube.. This is passed to Geri in her mobile lab where she checks the semen for viability. In addition to the ram-handling crew, this year she was assisted by our grandson Seamus, who helped with the techinical parts of the testing. The whole process involves flesh and blood bucks, and microscopes and computers. When we get the results, we cull any bucks who are not promising as future fathers, and keep the others fat and happy until it is time to go in with the ewes in December. A lucky few go in now with the purebred ewes, Hampshire and Rambouillet, so they may lamb in March. We raise future replacement rams and ewes from these purebreds, completing the circle.

our crew hard at work

Geri checking the microscope

Seamus reading results, with the help of Good Dog Tony

Seamus and Geri after a long day of good work

At day’s end, the buck testing groupies showed up to encourage the crew

 

Tags: , , , , ,

Winter Romance

Leo with his herd of Border collies

It’s that time of year again. December rams mean May lambs. A sheep’s gestation is five months less five days, and usually we put rams into the ewe flocks on December 15th. A big snow storm was predicted for the 15th. Since some of the roads are scary, especially I80, we decided to haul bucks on the 14th.

The rams wait all year for these winter weeks. A ewe’s heat cycle occurs every three weeks, so we leave the bucks in for six weeks or so. The rest of the year, they are bachelors (except for the lucky few who get to hang out with the early lambers in October). For a few weeks, it’s all romance, all the time!

ewes on the Red Desert

loading the trailer, llamas supervising

rams in their working clothes

Meghan and Pepe unloading the Hampshire bucks

Meghan with Leo’s horse

looking for the ladies

ready to go to work

Guillermo watching the sheep

Guillermo, Meghan and Pepe

Pat, Pepe, Leo and Meghan

 

 
2 Comments

Posted by on December 15, 2021 in Dogs, Family, Folks, Horses, Llamas, Peruvian sheepherders, Sheep

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

Conversation Between Buck and Rambo

Looking for the ladies

Conversation between Buck and Rambo
or
Breeding season on the Ladder Ranch

There’s a rumor goin’ ‘round, ‘bout some ladies to be found–
the boss is hookin’ up the trailer, gassin’ up the truck
(The trailer lights aren’t working, again, but oh well.)

I’m hopin’ that you’re right, and it seems that time of year—
they’ve been pourin’ out the grain, dashed red powder on our backs,
lots of hay, and we all look fat and ready—well, you know.

 

Last year all the ladies loved my tuxedo vibe.
My black face is debonair, my moves make me look fine.
I jumped out of the trailer, and I think they liked my leap.

Ha—that woolless blackface face can’t compare with wooly charms,
and HOW ABOUT these curly Rambouillet horns. They love those!
I’ll rub them on this hay bale and that will make them shine.

We have to wait all year, just hangin’ with the guys—
they keep us in buck prison, and we KNOW how that can be.
It’s the ladies that we want, with their pretty ewey charms

YES! The boss says time to get to work, but it’s not work at all,
we can whisper those sweet nothings, but you know they’re loved and left.
raisin’ lambs on grassy meadows, while we move back to bachelor digs.

BOTH: Time to get to work!

Which one of these is not like the others?

 

 

Red bucks in the middle

It’s time to get to work!

 
1 Comment

Posted by on December 13, 2020 in Animals, Events, Poetry, Sheep

 

Tags: , , , , ,

Winter Romance

Bucks in the chute

 

 

December romance
Sweet nothings from powdered rams,
lead to lambs in May.

 

 

Cora bringing them up

off to find the ladies

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on December 27, 2019 in Animals, Dogs, Poetry, Sheep

 

Tags: , , , ,

Shearing 2019

ready for the shearers

 

 

heading up the chute


Alejandro helping ewes up the chute

bucks ready for a fleecing

shearing with skill

 

down the ramp

Ten pounds lighter!

shorn sheep

 

Cora with wool packer

wool ready to pack

Oscar and Meghan

Pepe processing ewes

all hands and the cook

 

 

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Winter Romance

bucks in waiting

 

 

 

December rams
bring May lambs

Put me in, Coach!

Maximiliano and Timeteo

Meghan loading bucks in the trailer

Love at last!

 
 

Tags: , , , , ,

Jumping for joy

ram heading for work

The rams hang around for ten and a half months, waiting for the day when they are called to go to work, fathering lambs for the next season. We put the bucks in over a period of days and weeks. We figure that the first bucks to go in with the ewes are getting tired, so we send reinforcements. They sometimes resent being worked through the chutes, but are happy to jump out of the trailers to join the ladies. When we were loading them, I said, “Hop in boys–all the corn you can eat.” Meghan said, “All the ladies you can breed!” I added, “…and all the wind you can tolerate.” Such is the life of a buck in the winter.

through the chute

Siobhan and Sadie facing a reluctant ram

Avencio

guard dog on the job

guard dog watching his ewes

Avencio, Pat and Oscar

Guillermo and Pat

Leo

Oscar with the dogs jumping for joy

on his way!

Oscar too!

 
1 Comment

Posted by on December 28, 2017 in Dogs, Family, Folks, Horses, Peruvian sheepherders, Sheep

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Romance on the ides of December

Avencio unloading the bucks

 

The ides of December means that it’s time to put the rams in with the ewes. Romance in December brings lambs in May. A sheep’s gestation is five months less five days. I wish we could predict now just when the shearers will arrive and what the weather will be like on the 10th of May.

on their way…

Bucks in their working clothes

romance is in the air

Guard dog checking out his new charges

 

 
 

Tags: , , , , ,

“Preg Testing” the bucks

Dr. Cleon Kimberling at the microscope

Each fall, before the bucks join the ewes, we ask Optimal LIvestock Services to fertility check them. Renowned, and sort of retired Dr. Cleon Kimberling and his partner Geri Parsons bring their traveling lab to ranches around the West. Dr. Kimberling started this service when he was the extension sheep vet for Colorado State University. Back in the day, Dr. Kimberling would arrive with a crew of veterinary students. Dr. K would bicycle over the mountains from Fort Collins while the students drove the van. CSU no longer offers this service, but luckily for us, and others, Dr. Kimberling and Geri Parsons are keeping up the good work. He is still an avid bicyclist, and a working vet. Rhen was fascinated by the whole process, and told his parents that we had “preg tested” the rams.

 

bringing in the bucks

Modesto holding the foot securely

Oscar and Geri

Geri testing, Rhen learning

free at last!

Rhen checking the results with Geri and Dr. Kimberling

 

 

Tags: , , , , , , ,