Tupping Troubles - Getting Native Sheep Pregnant
It’s Autumn on the farm. The hedgerows are alive with colour and at this time of year it’s with the vibrant tones of fire as opposed to spring’s neon greens. Berries are abound. Spiders webs glisten in the morning dew. And on the rewilded pastures, sheep hormones are flying. At this time of year sheep, like deer with their rut, are tupping; a term coined for the mating of rams and ewes. Here at Brimwood Farm where everything is left to go a little wilder and sheep are allowed to be a little more natural, there’s the grunting and guttural purring of rams as they size one another up before crashing horns. They stamp their feet, and lick their upturned lips in a bid to assert themselves to one another. Once a dominance hierarchy is established they take to the herd of ewes, gently sniffing each girl to determine whether she’s in heat and ready to mate.
But this year there seems to be a problem. Whilst the Jacob sheep seem to have been covered once and not again (suggesting they are now all pregnant), the Norfolk Horns just keep coming back into season. Initially I wondered whether this was a problem with the ram. Could it be he was firing blanks and so going through the process without pregnancies occurring? Montague went in with a green raddle (a coloured powder mixed with oil that is applied to the chest and rubs off on the ewes when they’re covered) and quickly proceeded to mate everyone. But over the following 17 days, they all ovulated again. So Monty was removed from the field and Baa Baa went in with an orange raddle. He preceded to cover all but two of the ewes. And now, the orange has been replaced by red … and to my dismay, red bums have begun to appear!
A third raddle colour is going on
The unfortunate appearance of a red bottom
At this point I’m holding up my hands and telling Mother Nature just to do her thing. I must be honest; this is the first time I’ve properly raddled up my rams, really, really watched numbers and used multiple colours. I’ve been hands-off in the past, initially raddling the boys, popping them with the ewes and just leaving them in a nice mixed flock all winter. The raddle quickly dries out unless it’s topped up every few days, making it difficult to see whether ewes have been repeatedly tupped. So it isn’t without possibility that my Norfolk Horn ewes have always cycled late and I just haven’t realised. Looking at potential lambing dates now and we’re mid March - the same as this year when I hadn’t raddled. So, perhaps, despite my ewes coming into heat early September they never actually fall pregnant until mid-late October. And with that in mind, I’m giving up worrying about it and will just let nature takes its’ course. I’m sure there will be some lambs. But my entire ethos here is NOT to become a lamb-making factory but to use the sheep more as natural grazers and landscapes. Nor do I make a huge profit off lambs. Looking at business performance, therefore, it really is of no real consequence whether there are loads of lambs or not. As long as there are a few so that I can open my barn doors for lambing next year, I’ll be happy!
Lovely lipstick, Jock
My least favourite raddle colour; it’s looks like they’ve injured themselves!