Keeping a Ram

Are you going to keep a ram for breeding, or hire a stud? You'll need to think about this and make plans for it.

Rams can be a bit of a pest once they reach an age of between 24 - 30 months old. Their hormones are in full swing which take over as the strongest driver in their life. They want the flock as their own and many begin to exhibit aggressive behavior to anything that the ram considers a challenge to his dominance

-- That may include YOU.

It doesn't matter if the ram was bottle fed or raised with the herd. It doesn't matter if you have one ram and that's all you ever had or if you've had several rams being raised together. It also doesn't matter if you've been friends and handfed it its entire life. The behavior could show itself at any time.

Some of the Do's and Don'ts

The simplest recommendation toward cutting down the amount of agressive behavior toward you is simply this, "Don't be the ram's friend". Even though rams are by far the most friendly, trusting, and loving when young, allowing a ram to become familiar with you will later put the thought in his head that you can be challenged and he may make a bid for dominance when he's older. Think about the fact that the ram has 24/7 access to your flock and you're only stepping into the pasture for an hour or so a day. He thinks you're intruding on HIS territory.

Then what do you do to keep a ram from butting you? 

Answer: Keep him scared. Chase him off and don't hand feed him.

I realize, it seems unfair. After all, you've raised the ram, it likes you, follows you around, and it's so cute to have him come running up to you when you bring th efeed bucket when friends come over. Keeping him scared isn't what you want to hear. 
 
What are the other options?

Firstly, don't scratch a ram on his nose, forehead, or just above or between the horns -- in other words, stay away from the front face. You'll notice he tucks his head when you do.

Next, stay low and move slow. A lot of times I like to hand feed my flock for fun. I enjoy having them all surrounding me and eating out of my hands. But the males will always demand first position once they get the idea there is food. It's their right as the strongest animal in the flock. So give the male attention and don't let them get angry. By only giving them attention when they are angry you reinforce the bad behavior. Try to give them attention before they ask for it and keep the aggression low or non-existent. If they get aggressive, end the feeding or scratching immediately and leave.

I have one male that when I try to feed him he immediately lowers his head and tries to butt while another will lazily walk up and eat right out of my hand. The more aggressive one was raised in an environment where competition was necessary for food. Try to avoid a competitive food situation with the ram/s. Don't feed a group of rams, just one that might be with the flock. A group of rams will automatically compete unless you are generous with food and perhaps just after a normal feeding (When they're already partly full). 

Scratching and patting - keep yourself LOW to the ground (not showing dominance or aggression) and pet low on the animal. Scratch the chest and chin, or pat his front flank. If he lets you, scratch the sides of his face and up to the ears, always making sure his head doesn't lower in defense and you should never reach from the top of his head as it's a sign of dominance.

Those are all the basics I've seen to keeping the animal docile. The ram deserves the lead role, give it to him. Walk slow, be submissive, and give him all the attention - he'll love you for it.

Keeping More than One Ram

As you'll see from the pictures below, keeping more than one ram may have its challenges. 

I keep my rams separated from the rest of the flock until I want to breed them. They seem to like each others company better than they do with the ewes once they're all pregnant. The females aren't aggressive and lack assertiveness most of the time while the males seem to be much more curious and attentive to what is going on around them. By keeping multiple males in the same pasture, they will stop taking their boredom out on fences, gates and barn walls.

The bad news is what you'll encounter when you re-introduce the stud back with the other rams (see below). The lighter colored ram has been with the females for nearly four months but always nose to nose with the other rams through the fence. Since the ewes are all about ready to give birth I thought it was time to move the ram.

I should have thought to put this male in a pasture by himself or with one of the two young rams but instead I placed him right back in with the older male -- who took only seconds to begin his posturing. For about 15 minutes these two rams backed away (~20-30 feet) and fully galloped at one another at full speed. Each had their moments but in the end they knocked each other silly and the more tired, younger, and lighter male lost (The light colored ram).

It was an awesome display of power and I was afraid someone was going to be seriously hurt -- and there was no way in the world I was going to get in the middle to stop it.

Injury -

Rams will want to keep a pecking order and they do this by fighting and showing agression and this especially happens when the rams are near the females when they go into estrus. The few times I've seen injuries were mainly the result of an older ram taking a cheap shot at another younger and less experienced ram. That typically only will happen once and thereafter they remember the pain the older ram caused and take special care after that. Normally, but not always, the damage is sore muscles from the blunt trama of being hit. But on occasion the ram being accosted will take a hit to the midsection causing internal damage and possibly resulting in death. It's a risk to keep the rams all together.

HeadButt Prevention

There is a way to prevent the head butting between rams; Ram Shields. Blackbelly would use the SMALL shield if you intend on purchasing them (You'll need at least two !! ). Leave these on the rams until they get familiar with one another's scent, then you'll be able to remove them in a week or so. If head butting is a regular problem perhaps you'll want to leave it on.

This simple band around the head allows the ram to maneuver and see what's going on around him and eat, but when fighting the ram loses sight of his opponent when they are in close range. They'll suddenly stop -- assuming they BOTH have shields on their faces.

These shields are found at a reasonable price from Premier 1 Supplies  

Using a Stud

Ideally, having more than one ram is best because inbreeding can be a problem over time. By carefully controlling who breeds with whom you'll have fewer genetic issues and increase the productivity of the flock. But having the space to keep the rams can be a problem. One possible solution can be to hire a stud.

As is common today in the cattle industry, artificial insemination has removed the need to keep bulls and careful selection of semen produces a healthier herd of cattle. With sheep this idea holds true so long as you have access to good quality rams.

If this seems like an option for you, the there are some things you'll need to know about the stud. Ask for health records. Accidental introduction of diseases from other herds can be costly for a small flock and for that reason it's important to know what might be introduced. Accepting a stud should come with the understanding that you'll need to quarantine the ram for several weeks, slowly changing his diet, and watching for symptoms of illnesses. This also gives you a chance to get much more familiar with the stud's physical nature and his manners.

You should physically inspect the stud before you take it to your ranch/farm as well as during quarantine; looking for skin diseases and parasites, problems urinating, foot rot, worms or other intestinal parasites, genetic flaws and anything abnormal that your flock may not have been exposed to. You're paying for a service so make the most of it.

Feed him well during his confinement. A healthy and happy stud is going to perform better and he won't be thinking much about food once you turn him loose into the flock. A single male can easily service 20 -30 ewes and when he's that busy, there's not a lot of time for eating. If he's not at his peak performance then you may not get the results you'd like to have.

Ewes go into estrus about every 17 days; this is a fairly fast cycle. As I've witnessed the majority will cycle together but not necessarily everyone will cycle at the same time. The window of "opportunity" may be very short for the ram to service all of the ewes. And even when in estrus, the ewes may not accept the ram the first cycle as they're getting to know him. I wanted to include these statements to basically just say, ' Be patient' with studs and try to keep them for two months to ensure good results and allow you some time with the stud. 

A Single Ram

The nice thing about having a single male is that there is no need to worry about a separate pasture. The ram can run free with the ewes. the downside of this is that you don't have any control over breeding times and babies can come at any time. Multiple males will make this even that much more complicated as you won't know who has bred with who. 

What I've experienced is that a productive flock will be well managed; and I've mismanaged my sheep the first few years. Lambs are weaned at a certain age and weight, rams are introduced at a known time, and births will all happen in a certain window. When a ram is "turned loose" then there is no control, weaning is difficult or impossible, the need to spot ewes (meaning you need to watch them all the time) is increased significantly, and if weaning isn't managed properly then the length between reproduction cycles are increased.

There are some challenged with a single ram in the pasture but it's not a bad thing; it just depends on your goals. It's neither healthy or unhealthy to keep the ram with the flock but if there is a ewe who is consistently having triplets, be careful, she needs time to recouperate and regain body weight. 

Gates, Fences, & Butt Boards  

It's hard to appreciate the power that a ram can throw when he sets his mind to something. In the earlier pictures (above) these rams really went to town on each other and there was nothing I was going to do to get in the way. When two rams back up and take a full gallop at one another it's the equivalent to one animal, 120 lbs or so, taking a 20 mph charge right at a wall. And then geting up and repeating the exercise another 15 to 20 times.

I hope that illustration can give you a little appreciation for the stubbornness and stamina of an adult ram. As a young ram, Blackbelly are very gentle and friendly but when they get into their equivalent "Teen" years, which is at about 8 - 12 months old, they start to want to back on things; that includes some wire fences, all wood fences, barns walls, gates, and sometimes trees.

While the rams may not take a full gallop at these things he will be repetitive and unrelenting. Image a 10 year old kid jumping on a gate day after day with the intent to bend, distort and destroy and you have a good picture of the damage that can be done given enough time.

A few helpful things:

1) Barrels are cheap compared to gates and are easy to move. Placing a barrel on one side of the fence cuts their line of vision and makes a lot of

noise (Steel drums)

when it bounces against a steel gate. It doesn't really matter what side of the fence it's on.

I also use this little trick when weaning lambs so that the lambs can't see over the barrels when they want to go crashing into the metal gates.

2) Butt Boards (At least that's what I call them) offer an easily replaced alternative for your rams and ewes to hit and rub themselves on. This not only protects your structures and wood fences, it offers additional structural support. These are nothing more than treated 2x4's placed 18-inches off the ground.

3) Placing guards, a board, across the front of the gate, exactly like butt boards, will remind the rams that the fence is solid. If you're consistent, butt boards on barns and fences will bring to mind similar thoughts when they see the board across the gate. The problem I find with this is generally inconvenience when I need to go through the gate every day. But the alternatives is simply twisted, banged, and bent up gates.