yippee....breeding time!

Wow is it fall already?
What happened to that hot summer?
Let it go....fall will do for me.
Yes, I seem to have lots of sheep left after all. I did lose some friend this summer....but I still have some daughters and grandsons....in this sheepy flock.
First chore of the fall will be looking at the condition of my ewes I want to breed and my rams.
Then I have to consider which rams are mild enough that they can have breeding groups within sight of other breding groups. I do have a couple of fences that were hard used last year, and I need to add some posts and secure them this month.
Last year I did a harsh cull in October, and removed every ram lamb that was not being used for breeding. This year I have to keep a few for naile, and there are a few more I want to have the luxury to watch until spring. They either have good spotting, or wonderful fleece....or amazing horns. Some are small, like my triplet smirslet ram lamb....who must weigh less than the cats.
I admit, I do principally breed for spots. I have collected my own rams for several years. I do have enough different lines that I am not breeding back children or grandchildren.
I am still using Pan...a black yuglet sokket with amazing forward curling horns. Spots, a triplet yuglet flecket in black....also has nice regular curved horns, but mostly because he was my bottle baby. Hopalong...a medium sized yuglet sokket in moorit, and Captain....a darker moorit smirslet with some white on his ankles...but not a sokket. Captain has not yet gotten iset fibers....and doesn't seem to sun-bleach. Last year, I added another bottle baby, Two Spots....he is a moorit yuglet flecket...small because he was a bottle baby, but has the most amazing horns....he also managed to have great spotted lambs. Cupid...another yuglet flecket in moorit....half brother to captain.... was kept and tried and he seems to have added another feature to his lambs...an amazing fleece....I can't complain about that, when he also produced spots. I am also using two sheltering pines boys...Merlin, a katmoget and Kyriakos....an emsket.
Let me go look at places to put these boys for breeding and I'll talk about my ram lambs from 2006.