Shari's Gone Country

Sunday, March 4, 2007

Sheep Roundup Day!

As note earlier, Saturday was "Sheep Roundup Day" at our neighbor's little farm. She has graciously hosted our ewes for the last month, so her ram could do his work. While there, she's fed them, watered them, etc. When she asked for help with the roundup, it was kind of like... we owe it to you! Of course we'll be there.

So, yesterday with the temperature just above freezing and a north wind of better than 10 mph, we got into our farm clothes and went on a sheep roundup.

Now, Cindy and Bev and I have been pretty "citified" over the years, but with them being ex-cops... rounding up and taking down sheep for a last check before dropping lambs shouldn't be too hard.

I've caught my share of wayward rabbits during my years in the rabbit business, so figured I could be of some use.

Well...

The roundup went fairly well. Only our big ewe and one other one decided that the small pen wasn't where they wanted to go. After a few minutes of working them around (or was that them working us) we had everyone in the pen.

That's when Dixie explained the next step.

We'd capture each ewe, check to see if she's pregnant, clip around her bags and "private parts", check the ear tag, and then put her back to pasture.

Total ewes: 12

Total rams: 1

Total women: 4

Game on!

With 3 of us working to isolate a ewe, one watching the ram (he's not real crazy about Dixie), here's how it went down.

Dixie would kind of identify one... or say just catch whichever one we can. I would try to turn or head the ewe back. Bev worked to slow one down by grabbing a couple hands full of wool, while Cindy was the "dogger".

Her flying tackles were accurate.

The one time I actually lassoed one, the rope was so short, I was on my butt before I knew what happened.

Wouldn't you know it. The very first ewe we caught was the ONLY one not bred. Silly us, we left it in the small pen, and in the melee caught that damn ewe three times.

Once down, the ewe's were pretty quiet, only an occasional kick if Dixie got too close with the shears. Here's where we really got a good education.

We found both our ewes are pregnant. They'll be due sometime in July. She patiently explained what the "gunk" was... that's wax and it's how the lambs find the teats. There's also a waxy plug in the teats. Ewe's have two teats and they may or may not show much of a bag (to us that means milk) before they drop (give birth to) their lambs.

As you can see, we sometimes had to flip the Merino ewes as their wool is black and we couldn't see what we were doing. Of course flipping put the dogger under the lamb in the snow.

After all 12 ewes were clipped, checked and turned to the right pen/pasture, only one step remained... docking a lamb's tail.

Ok, before you go getting into a tizzy... we dock tails for sanitary reasons. You see, lambs are born with long tails, which collect manure, which attract flies, and all kinds of disease... so they have to be removed. All lambs, whether they're female or male, get their tails docked.

We use a banding system that slips onto their tails about 2 inches from their butt. It's quick, virtually painless, bloodless, and very humane. Any little boys that are marked for the meat market also get their little testicles banded. After a quick vaccine this little guy was done, and down running around.

Round up done, it was time to head for home. We loaded Chiquita and Merino into the back of the truck for the half-mile ride home.

Here's Cindy with Chiquita just before the roundup started... and then me with her in the back of the truck once we got home. If you look carefully, Merino is hiding behind her.