Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Lambing is complete

After a 10 day hiatus of no lambs, the last ewe lambed yesterday. Sheltering Pines Amarige (fawn katmoget) gave me twin black rams out of WhitePine Christian.

We ended up having two ewes open, but we also did not have a clean up ram. This was the earliest I've ever had the majority of the ewes lamb (first week of April) and I'm pleased with the overall results. Lambing percentage was 140% with all crosses, Shetlands and BFLs. I had on average 12 ewes lamb every day for 9 days straight. It was pandemonium and I'm glad to have it over with AND I didn't have to use hormones to synchronize them :)

I've had quite an interest in lambs so please inquire about what is or will be available. I also will be selling about 20 purebred ewes this year, as well as putting more of my purebreds to the BFL for more Mules next year so purebred Shetlands next year will be limited.

Friday, April 13, 2012

A new blogger, and Shetland breeders! Please add!

Joe and Rachel purchased a bred ewe from me this early spring, named WhitePine Rush. She is my only FirthofFifth Aman AI lamb, and out of one of my foundation ewes, RYL Rachildas. She is a Grade 1 ewe (if my memory serves me right) and I wanted to make sure they got something nice. She was bred to WhitePine Barnabas AI (F1 Orion, F2 Timothy) that came back at 18.9 AFD for a 2 year old.

I got an email as well as some photos of what Rush produced at their farm:


TADAH!! Doesn't Rush look proud??! And naturally he has a PINK nose (my first) so i'm betting he carries moorit! He is coming back to me this fall as I don't have a white ram to use anymore since I sold Nastro and Roman last year.They will be getting more ewes from me when they bring Robb back :)

I wanted to introduce you to Joe and Rachel and their blog: http://rocky-top-farm.blogspot.com/. They are both very fun to get to know and I think they are going to be a welcome addition to the Shetland community! Stop by their blog and say hello!

Thursday, April 5, 2012

a few photos

Some of the lambs. Since these were taken i've had 6 more sets of twins and 4 more singles. *sigh*(!!!) of to work i go! Can't wait to see what I find when I get home! Oh yea, my first Leicester Longwool cross was born today English blue ram. NOW THAT IS CUTE! :)

This lamb below is a Shetland Mule. Mom is mioget, dad English blue.







The spotted badgerface below is also a Shetland Mule.
As is this spotted Engligh Blue ewe lamb.
A little mioget Shetland ewe lamb!


Tuesday, April 3, 2012

One week later......

I've had 33 ewes lamb now. I think. Delirious. Exhausted. Also very excited and happy!

I'm loving the Shetland Mules. I have 14 of them so far (only 6 ewes dang it!) Most of the 21 Shetland lambs are as expected. fine crimpy fleeces. lots of spots. still katmogets but lots of solids and modified lambs too. My BFL twins are growing and leaping (literally) by huge strides. IF only April was always this nice for lambing (last year we had blizzards and lots of snow and below zero temps.)

photos will come soon. Most of the photos are on facebook farm page (which is public) Just search Ramsay Farms and you'll find them. Not all the lambs are photographed. Too many to take!

Musical lambing jugs, musical nursery pens and moving lambed ewes to the jugs, jugged ewes to the nursery pens, nursery pens to the lamb/momma pen and then moving close up ewes to the 'expecting pen' versus the holding pen for those still a ways a away. Chaos in the best sense :)

I love it.

But 25+ ewes have all lambed in the past 3 days. Pandemonium out in the barn with ewes trying to steal lambs because they are in labor, or lambs getting lost in the crowd if don't witness the birth. Even with so many jugs this year I'm still finding need for more. Better to get them all done with at once than waiting for months like I did last year!

A long time coming!

 It has been a long time. Too long in fact. We lost access to our farm website and ebonwald website when WEBS.COM was closed by VistaPrint. ...