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Weaning Lambs

Do you need to wean lambs, and if so, when?

It depends on what kind of flock you are running.  If you are running a Wild Flock, then you don't need to worry about weaning at all; the dams will manage their lambs just as they have on Soay for millennia.  If you are running a traditional flock, most breeders wean their lambs at 2 months of age, and some wait until 3 months, so that the lambs get more of a head start in nutrition and weight gain.  In a traditional flock, it is important to get those ram lambs away from their dams by 3 months of age, because they can begin breeding their mothers, aunts and other flock members shortly after this time.  We used to wean all of our lambs, boys and girls, but over the years have found that leaving our ewe lambs with their mothers causes no hardship on either one.  The ewe will wean her daughter on her own, and keeping them together causes less stress within the flock.

How to wean when you do decide to wean?  Put your ewes and lambs in a fresh pasture at least a week ahead of weaning.  Then, leaving the lambs in the same pasture, move the ewes (and any daughters, if you plan to keep them together) to a recently used pasture on the other side of the farm, out of sight of the pasture your weanling lambs are in.  If you keep the weanlings in sight of their dams, they will make every effort to propel themselves through your fences to get to their mothers, and will get injured the process.  This is something you definitely want to avoid!  Lock up the weanlings in a barn for that first night; and move the dams into a pasture completely out of sight.  Make sure the ewes are put on a pasture that has been eaten off pretty well; so that it does not have any lush grass in it.  Give them unlimited amounts of PLAIN GRASS HAY, and plenty of water, but nothing else.  This will help them "dry up" their udders, and prevent mastitis from occurring.  They will need to be on this diet for at least one week, preferably two.  Then they can be moved into normal pasture again.

As you can see, putting the ewes in this type of arrangement would be very inconvenient if you had to do it in stages with various lambs and ewes being weaned at different times.  It is much more practical to do this at just one time, which is one very good reason for keeping your breeding season short, and thus keeping lambing season within a certain time frame; it makes for easier management for the shepherd.