Breeding Groups in!!

I am SO sick of going back and forth...trying to decide who goes to who, who should be bred at all, who goes pure or cross, yada yada yada. So today, while I was out watching the sheep I decided to separate the ewes from the ewe lambs. Seemed the most logical. In the end however all the ewe lambs are STILL with the 17 ewes I'm going to be AI'ing.....at least until the CIDRs go in on the 23rd.

This year I for the most part ignored pattern and color on the breedings. I went for fleece improvement (duh) and conformation. Pattern and Color are nice, but are not my priority. IF I get something that I want...like an moorit gulmoget ewe or an emsket, then that is just a bonus!!

I was like Theresa, where I could clone several ewes to put with every ram. I've made great strides I think with my flock and my goals and am very happy that I have this dilemma!

I did end up using 2 F1 ram lambs, both Heights Orion's sons. And Jazz and Angus.

Wintertime Jazz - smirslet gray katmoget F1 Jericho - 87.5% UK. AbAa, BBBB, SsSs.

His ewes:
RYL Rachildas - white illget ewe F4 Lightning. She's been bred to Heights Orion and an F1 Orion son with both amazing results. We'll see what she can do bred to a Jericho. I was going to put her to the BFL but needed one more year from her pure (I'm greedy I know). She is homozygous black and carries Ag (AND SPOTTING!)

WhitePine Rush - white ewe - Rachildas daughter out of Aman (F1 Orion) She has really come into herself this year. Gorgeous ewe, perfect tail and conformation. Her ear set is slightly high if I have to be picky about her :). She carries solid and moorit.

ShelteringPines SnowCloud - smirslet gray katmoget. This ewe is Suzanne Nevada's ewe. I"m hoping she wanted the lambs this coming year as I got to keep Salome (yuglet sokket ewe lamb from this year). I was going to put her with the BFL instead if she didn't want the lambs but decided even if she didn't Salome was so nice I'm hoping for a repeat :) Carries solid and modified.

WhitePine Candance - fawn katmoget smirslet - F1 Holly F3 Minder. This is one of the 5 ewe lambs I'm going to breed. She's already 65 pounds. She has a higher CV in her lamb test so breeding her to Jazz in hopes of bringing that down AND spots! Carries solid and modified.

Sommarang Emerald - black flecket ewe - She's a huge ewe...over 100 pounds and is going to be three and never bred. I obviously want loud spots, and hoping that Jazz softens up that fleece. She's one of my coarsest ewes for my purebred breeding and wild and all get out. She managed to sprain my thumb today so just adding to the long list of body parts she's damaged or bruised while I'm working the sheep :) At least the babies will be pretty :) Hopefully carries moorit!


FirthofFifth Angus - emsket gulmoget ram gets the following ewes:

WhitePine Sedalia - smirslet sokket gray katmoget ewe. Carries moorit. She is one of my finest ewes, hoping to pass that on to her lambs out of Angus, who has a higher CV. Anything gulmoget would also be helpful :)

WhitePine Bethany - F1 Orion - fawn ewe lamb. She is my nicest of the three AI girls that I have, and lowest CV so that is why she went with Angus. Angus 'may' carry moorit and if that is the case, I could get moorit gullies out of any of these girls! :)

Sommarang Eva - gray katmoget - She has one of the lowest SD and CV in my flock. She could carry moorit also. Big girl who hasn't lambed yet and will be three. I'm eager for maybe a gulkat or something fun. She carries spots too....and Angus could also :)

WhitePine Naomi - fawn katmoget ewe lamb. (Blues x Nirvana). She carries spots too, and a double patterned lamb wouldn't be so bad, would it? She had lovely fleece.


WhitePine Ephraim - F1 Orion mioget ram lamb gets the following three girls:

Minwawe RedBud - shaela, domestic ewe. I wouldn't call her fleece primitive, but it has no crimp to it. Its very soft and a gorgeous color. Her fleece is already reserved for next year. I'm hoping for an emsket out of this breeding! (one of my only color breedings), but I'm also hoping for fleece improvement (she has a higher CV)

FirthofFifth Booto - F1 Timothy - fawn katmoget ewe. She had a gorgeous ram lamb out of Orion this past year and so I thought I'd breed her to an F1 Orion to see if I can get a ewe lamb out of it. Will be moorit based lambs...which are rare here thanks to Jazz and Barish :)

Wintertime Galina - black gulmoget ewe. Now I'm sure you are thinking...you did another color/pattern breeding! Well in truth, if I get a moorit gullie or modified gullie that is wonderful, but Galina needs a lot of help in the fleece department. She's a big girl, near 100 pounds already and she is solid sided too (no side dusting). Let's hope, right?


WhitePine Roman - white F1 Orion ram lamb (carries spots and moorit/solid) gets these four girls:

WhitePine Castle Rock - I think she is homozygous katmoget, so any white lambs will carry katmoget (which is nice to know!). Her numbers came back quite nice, so I am putting her an F1 Orion son (last year was F1 Timothy, Barish and her daughter was stunning!)

ShelteringPines Myra - fawn katmoget ewe. She had dynamite ram lamb out of Jazz last year, and am hoping for an equally nice lamb out of her next year, bred to this lovely boy.

WhitePine Eve - fawn ewe lamb F1 Orion - she goes to Roman in hopes of white or moorit lambs. All lambs will carry moorit if they are white...and I'm hoping Roman brings Eve's CV down.

White Pine Neriah - smirslet gray katmoget ewe lamb (Blues x Nirvana) Thinking maybe spots if Roman indeeds carries them like I think he does. Fleece wise they will be nice and hopefully have their mothers rock solid hind end!


That is 16 ewes bred to ground breeding, one is not mine. That is up from what I said I would breed, but I added two back from the BFL breeding and 5 ewe lambs :) I couldn't resist! The lambs are all 60+ pounds already and I've put the groups together a month earlier than normal.


The sad thing is my AI group will be the very LAST to lamb, although only a week later than last year (and they were a month earlier to lamb than my ground breedings). I'm going to separate all the groups the weekend of AI and put EVERYONE back together again in one big group. I'll then put a clean up ram in with the entire group, as I'm hoping they'll all be bred (both ground and AI girls). If I do get any late April lambs, it will be the clean up boy. I think I'll use Levi, my polled F1 Jamie to do those honors. Yes he's 'only' black, but he has a krunet and his fleece and conformation are just amazing. I wanted to use him this year but ran out of girls, so he'll get the whole flock as a clean up ram. I just need to remember he's in there :) :) If something doesn't catch with him, I'm certainly OK with that too

Now I can sit back and dream about lambing season again...and stop worrying about breeding groups! Less stress is good :)