How to use ‘Ram Effect’ correctly?

Western Pomise

Hi all,
part time farmer here and if practible am considering using the ‘ram effect’ this year.
Will be putting around 80 ewes to the ram.
Would be running them in two separate bunches of 40 ewes with 1 ram.Have mainly Cheviot,Suffolk x and Mountain x ewes.
Run two separate bunches as put a Cheviot ram with hoggetts (first time lambing) and good mature Cheviot ewes to breed replacements and then a Suffolk ram with other bunch of mature ewes to breed Suffolk x lambs.

Couple of ?’s regarding ‘ram effect ‘......
1- Can it be done with just two rams and ratio of 1:40?.....or would rams be worn out and too tired from a lot of action in a few days if ewes were cycling together.I wouldn’t be interested in ‘borrowing’ rams to use for ram effect as run a closed herd.
2- If above plan isn’t practical could you run a strong squeezed ram lamb with the ewes premating time and might this tighten up the lambing period?
I wouldn’t be interested in sponging the ewes....just want to try and get down to a 7-10 day lambing spread if at all possible.

Thanks for any replies from people who have experience of using the ram effect.

Hard Knocks

Western Pomise wrote: »

Hi all,
part time farmer here and if practible am considering using the ‘ram effect’ this year.
Will be putting around 80 ewes to the ram.
Would be running them in two separate bunches of 40 ewes with 1 ram.Have mainly Cheviot,Suffolk x and Mountain x ewes.
Run two separate bunches as put a Cheviot ram with hoggetts (first time lambing) and good mature Cheviot ewes to breed replacements and then a Suffolk ram with other bunch of mature ewes to breed Suffolk x lambs.

Couple of ?’s regarding ‘ram effect ‘......
1- Can it be done with just two rams and ratio of 1:40?.....or would rams be worn out and too tired from a lot of action in a few days if ewes were cycling together.I wouldn’t be interested in ‘borrowing’ rams to use for ram effect as run a closed herd.
2- If above plan isn’t practical could you run a strong squeezed ram lamb with the ewes premating time and might this tighten up the lambing period?
I wouldn’t be interested in sponging the ewes....just want to try and get down to a 7-10 day lambing spread if at all possible.

Thanks for any replies from people who have experience of using the ram effect.

I used the ram effect last year for the first time & was happy enough 25 ewes mated in 20 days including 2 repeats
Put ewes on good aftergrass no harm is giving a dose of vitamins, let in ram 1 week later, remove fam after 7-10 days & let back in after a week
Not all will come in heat immediately but you are speeding it up. I think 1 mature ram to 40 ewes will work

Dinzee Conlee

Hard Knocks wrote: »

I used the ram effect last year for the first time & was happy enough 25 ewes mated in 20 days including 2 repeats
Put ewes on good aftergrass no harm is giving a dose of vitamins, let in ram 1 week later, remove fam after 7-10 days & let back in after a week
Not all will come in heat immediately but you are speeding it up. I think 1 mature ram to 40 ewes will work

I didn’t think the ram needed to be in with them for a week or so - surely you’d have ewes lambing after that week?

Plan to put ram and ewes into shed with the ram next week for a day. Keep the ram the other side of a gate, but they can chat through the gate
Then will put him in for good 2 weeks after.
Not sure it’ll work very well, bit early maybe - but won’t lose anything by it...

Also, will put the ewes on a bare-ish field next week after their introduction, and then when the ram is put in for good, put em into good grass... again, unsure if it’ll have a huge effect given the year that’s in it (and no field is very bare) but nothing to lose by doing it...

Birdnuts

Speaking of rams 2 of our lads are over fat due to exceptional grass growth. Something to keep an eye on in the next few weeks. Currently the 2 lads are inside and being feed on a bit of hay and ration to restore condition. Neither are happy about and have spent the last 2 days bawling at anyone or anything that goes past:rolleyes:

Western Pomise

Thanks for replies but slightly confused Hard Knocks as to why you would let ram in for a week initially?....as Dinzee Conlee mentioned would that not lead to ewes being served in a normal manner iykwim.

I had thought that in a simple way of summarising the Ram Effect you keep the rams totally away from ewes for a month,then introduce them to the ewes without giving them a chance to have their wicked way,either by parking them in a trailer in middle of field for example and let ewes into ‘see’ them for a day or as Dinzee said let them into a shed or a field where the ram is separated safely from the ewes but can ‘chat’ to them for a day.This helps to encourage all the ewes to cycle.

However from reading up on it on internet it seems that there is less chance of ‘the ram effect’ working with ewes going with the ram in March when ewes would be more naturally cycling than ewes in January or February iykwim.

Would be interested to hear thoughts of anyone else who has thought of or actually used the Ram Effect.

wrangler

Western Pomise wrote: »

Thanks for replies but slightly confused Hard Knocks as to why you would let ram in for a week initially?....as Dinzee Conlee mentioned would that not lead to ewes being served in a normal manner iykwim.

I had thought that in a simple way of summarising the Ram Effect you keep the rams totally away from ewes for a month,then introduce them to the ewes without giving them a chance to have their wicked way,either by parking them in a trailer in middle of field for example and let ewes into ‘see’ them for a day or as Dinzee said let them into a shed or a field where the ram is separated safely from the ewes but can ‘chat’ to them for a day.This helps to encourage all the ewes to cycle.

However from reading up on it on internet it seems that there is less chance of ‘the ram effect’ working with ewes going with the ram in March when ewes would be more naturally cycling than ewes in January or February iykwim.

Would be interested to hear thoughts of anyone else who has thought of or actually used the Ram Effect.

You're correct, it's the same with sponging, It's less of an advantage the nearer you go to their natural breeding season.
We always use it here and it definitely tightens up the lambing. we proved it this year when we bought ewes that were within smell of rams all summer and they didn't lamb until 4 - 6 weeks after start of lambing.
There's two or three reasons for doing it
1, It costs nothing to do it .you just have to keep the rams away from the ewes for the preceeding six weeks before you tease them.
2. It has been proven that ewes will have more lambs if they are served on their second cycle rather than their first .
I advised a neighbour to try it last year after he telling me he had to take six weeks off work to lamb the ewes. he used the NO MATE harness on the teaser.
I met him during the season saying that he'd never do it again but he got away with only taking four weeks off work....... he wasn't set up to lamb them that fast. We'd always do it by the book and we'd lamb 90 - 95% of the batch of 200 in 17days, but we'd have to, as there'd be another 200 due to start then, we just could not have one batch running into the other.
The NO MATE harness is a good idea if you haven't a teaser, it clips on the the ordinary ram harness and the ram can go smelling through the ewes which has to be more effective. we got on alright though putting them in the next ''well fenced'' paddock

roosky

This should help !

Western Pomise

wrangler wrote: »

You're correct, it's the same with sponging, It's less of an advantage the nearer you go to their natural breeding season.
We always use it here and it definitely tightens up the lambing. we proved it this year when we bought ewes that were within smell of rams all summer and they didn't lamb until 4 - 6 weeks after start of lambing.
There's two or three reasons for doing it
1, It costs nothing to do it .you just have to keep the rams away from the ewes for the preceeding six weeks before you tease them.
2. It has been proven that ewes will have more lambs if they are served on their second cycle rather than their first .
I advised a neighbour to try it last year after he telling me he had to take six weeks off work to lamb the ewes. he used the NO MATE harness on the teaser.
I met him during the season saying that he'd never do it again but he got away with only taking four weeks off work....... he wasn't set up to lamb them that fast. We'd always do it by the book and we'd lamb 90 - 95% of the batch of 200 in 17days, but we'd have to, as there'd be another 200 due to start then, we just could not have one batch running into the other.
The NO MATE harness is a good idea if you haven't a teaser, it clips on the the ordinary ram harness and the ram can go smelling through the ewes which has to be more effective. we got on alright though putting them in the next ''well fenced'' paddock

Thanks for reply,was that neighbour lambing a big number of ewes as taking that much hols from work would be impossible for most people.
Perhaps I should have mentioned but I would be lambing the ewes out in sheltered fields which doesn’t lend itself perfectly to fostering on lambs but ewes in general are good mothers and far less work than indoor lambing.The key is to watch them well,I employ a neighbour who is up to check his own ewes anyway to check them at daylight and again twice before I do the evening shift till nighttime.Usually start lambing around Paddy’s Day.
So I wonder would the Ram Effect be less suited to outdoor lambing in March?
As regards introducing the ‘aproned’ rams for two days would there be any danger rams would get ‘overheated’ running around through ewes or would it be equally effective to separate them from the ewes via a fence or gate?
In terms of lambing spread I looked at last years
Diary and 100 ewes lambed over 19 days from start to finish with 3 dry.Would typically take 3 weeks to lamb every year and I was hoping that the ‘ram effect’ would shorten this by at least 7 to 10 days.
Would appreciate people’s views on some of points I raised above about overheating the rams,practicality of trying the ram effect for Mid March lambing etc.
It’s something I would be willing to try for a year to see if it would tighten the lambing pattern down to 14 days or less.

wrangler

Western Pomise wrote: »

Thanks for reply,was that neighbour lambing a big number of ewes as taking that much hols from work would be impossible for most people.
Perhaps I should have mentioned but I would be lambing the ewes out in sheltered fields which doesn’t lend itself perfectly to fostering on lambs but ewes in general are good mothers and far less work than indoor lambing.The key is to watch them well,I employ a neighbour who is up to check his own ewes anyway to check them at daylight and again twice before I do the evening shift till nighttime.Usually start lambing around Paddy’s Day.
So I wonder would the Ram Effect be less suited to outdoor lambing in March?
As regards introducing the ‘aproned’ rams for two days would there be any danger rams would get ‘overheated’ running around through ewes or would it be equally effective to separate them from the ewes via a fence or gate?
In terms of lambing spread I looked at last years
Diary and 100 ewes lambed over 19 days from start to finish with 3 dry.Would typically take 3 weeks to lamb every year and I was hoping that the ‘ram effect’ would shorten this by at least 7 to 10 days.
Would appreciate people’s views on some of points I raised above about overheating the rams,practicality of trying the ram effect for Mid March lambing etc.
It’s something I would be willing to try for a year to see if it would tighten the lambing pattern down to 14 days or less.

You won't improve on lambing them in 19 days, would it be the same over the years.
I always put them in a field beside the ewes and my neighbour used the nomate harness, there wasn't much difference. he had 220 ewes.
Maybe mine would lab in 17 days without teasing but it costs nothing . if the first 200 ewes here didn't lamb in time there'd be chaos if it clashed with the second 200

joe35

Hi.
Just a taught about using the ram effect.
Would dipping the sheep have any negative effects on their heat cycle. I was thinking of putting the ram out for 3 days (harnessed), then dipping before I let the rams out again. TIA for any replies