all adult health stuff, including ram issues
Every year at the winter solstice, usually December 21st, sheep horns (and for that matter all heritage sheep and other mammals’ horns as far as I have been able to determine) begin growing, a process that lasts for about three months and then tapers off through the spring and stops until the next December. To […]
I spent much less time than usual in the bullpen this fall, so I missed the gradual “bulking up” of the rams that happens every year as they go into rut for mating. Earlier this week on New Year’s Day, I went out for my first 2013 look at our flock and was startled to […]
In my last post, I talked about how sheep horns grow and what shapes they can take, and I touched on the issue of when horns need to be cut for health reasons. Here I will walk you through a more detailed horn evaluation of two rams and then provide a pictorial demonstration of how […]
Soay sheep horns come in all sizes and shapes. The rams may have tightly spiraled horns; thick horns of varying diameters; horns tilted at an angle before turning back in a corkscrew (or remaining in a flat plane); open, wide-angled spirals in the shape of a Celtic “M”; and everything in between. There’s more: the spiral […]
There’s no need to mark your calendar to remind yourself that it’s breeding season for your Soay sheep – the rams will let you know by their appearance and their behavior. As usual, a few pictures tell the story best. Eight days ago we taped the horns of rams going to new homes this fall, including […]
Does one of your sheep have a cloudy, bluish-looking eye, what you might call a “walleyed” look? Is the animal behaving as if it might not be able to see well or is bumping into things? If so, it probably has scratched its eyeball or gotten poked in the eye and injured its cornea. There […]