After reading all the replies I have decided Bob is not that bad. Like this weekend I popped him on the butt with the whip when he tried to be pushy and he decided that was tooo much for him. He went off with his girls and did his own thing. I do keep a whip or stick with me to be safe but he seems to be learning I am not going to be easy on him. Thanks for all the responses. Happy Holidays to all. OJ
-----Original Message----- From: Mary Swindell [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, December 17, 2004 4:03 PM To: [email protected] Subject: [blackbelly] Ram Aggression and Ram Shields Oneta and Barb, I'll be honest, my older ram Teddy (who is 2 1/2 years old) is as mean as the dickens. He CANNOT help himself. For instance, he recently "pretended" to be preoccupied while I was setting out hay, and when my back was turned for an instant, I saw him coming out of the corner of my eye -- fast, on a full charge. I ALWAYS carry a big stick when I'm in his paddock, and I ALWAYS watch my back. Teddy knows this, and as soon as I turn to "attack" him with my stick, he becomes a big coward, winces, squints his eyes, and turns his head away. But I almost always hit him pretty hard on the nose with the stick anyway. I want him to know that EVERY time he does this, he will be smacked painfully. Anyway, what I was meaning to say is that it is a Fact of Life that Teddy will be aggressive. Sometimes he is aggressive to some of the ewes too, if they don't do his bidding. I think most of the aggressiveness to the ewes has to do with his desire to breed them when they're not quite ready, and he wants them to know that he's the dang boss. But he gets along fine with the wethers, because they've established their pecking order (with Teddy at the top). And fortunately, he is good to the little lambs, and causes them no trouble. In fact, many of the lambs will go stand by Teddy for protection if they become nervous for some reason. I do not think that breeders should get rid of a ram just because he is becoming somewhat aggressive. This aggression is a part of nature. Every ram will sooner or later become aggressive at approximately 2 years of age. This testosterone and power is part of their strength as a breeder -- exactly what you want and need for your flock. You should simply be prepared to deal with it, and be able to protect yourself, your family, visitors, other livestock, and domestic pets and animals when this aggression shows itself. If you get rid of him, your next, younger ram will eventually be just like him. But now that I have said that, let me step back and make some exceptions: 1) If you are through with him as a breeder, and you have plenty of his wonderful genetics available to you, as well as younger, replacement rams available (who are not yet as aggressive), perhaps you will decide that you have the luxury of getting rid of him. That is a hard decision to make, because there is always a chance that some part of his great genetics will be lost forever. Later if a group of breeders approaches you to see what has become of your wonderful legendary ram because they would like to buy or use him for his genetics, you'll have to decide whether you made the right choice in getting rid of him "early". 2) If you have had a particular incident where you or one of your family, visitors, livestock or other charges have been hurt by him, and you feel that you cannot be emotionally objective around him anymore, perhaps it is time to get rid of him. I say this because (although it has never happened to me), I can envision a situation where you are literally so exasperated with him that you may end up "beating him to a pulp" out of a sudden burst of outrage one day when he acts up, when this is really not necessary, and may be somewhat cruel. These rams can definitely "tick you off" from time to time, and that's putting it mild! But they do not deserve to be tortured because of their nature, just because we humans happen to reach the end of our rope with them. 3) If you or someone else has raised the ram improperly and become too friendly or cuddly with this ram as a baby, then as a result you may find that as the ram matures you will have an unusually aggressive and dangerous ram. In that case, I would recommend getting as many lambs from him as possibly quickly, and then getting rid of him before he hurts someone. Remember, when raising a ram lamb, do not talk to him, do not look at him, do not pet him or hold him, particularly on the head. The best thing to do for a ram lamb is to ignore him. He won't need ANY help in becoming confident. He's hard-wired for confidence and pushiness. If you will keep your distance and remain aloof from him, it will help him be hesitant around you, and a little fearful of what you might do. You will benefit from his hesitancy and uncertainty around you later, just as you will benefit from carrying a big stick. Oneta, I understand very much how you value your lovely ram, and I sympathize! I also hope to breed Teddy for several more years, if possible. And I may have to eat my words (above), if Teddy raises his levels of aggression to the point where there is just no safe place to keep him. He has already bashed in the side of a 9 x 12 sheep shed, has rubbed all the paint off one side of the barn, and has bent in a 16-foot tubular steel farm gate so that it looks a little like an archery bow. All by himself. But heck, every one is still alive, no one has any broken bones or bruises, so we don't worry about a few cosmetics (ha ha)! And those three things are isolated incidents, and they certainly don't happen every day. So for the time being, I'm OK with "His Bruteness". I'll let you know in 12 more months if I feel the same way -- (smile)! And Barb, here is the update on the use of the Ram Shields: This fall I put ram shields on each of my two polled Barbados Blackbelly rams, since I wanted to re-introduce them to each other and take them away from their two groups of breeding ewes for a little while. I bought the ram shields because the two rams literally tried to kill each other when I first put them together without shields on. They had just been removed from their respective groups of breeding ewes, and after we realized how combative they were, we pulled them apart quickly. We were very lucky to get them apart without hurting ourselves, our dogs, or the rams in the process. I tried two sizes of ram shields on the rams. I ended up using the small size polled ram shields for both rams. I purchased one shield from Premier, and the other from Midstates Livestock Supply. Both are good and are almost identical. The shield is a leather mask, for the front of the ram's face. It fits on their head and buckles snugly in two places. It prevents them from seeing directly forward, and thus inhibits their confidence and aggression. I very much recommend these for introducing (or re-introducing) rams to each other. It is extremely important that if you put a shield on one ram, you must also shield all the other rams in that same paddock, because otherwise the unshielded rams will attack the shielded ram, and possibly seriously hurt or kill him, even if he is not aggressive to them. We put the shields on both rams, but did not immediately introduce them. We allowed a short time (a half-day) to make sure the rams could function with their shields on. But we didn't want to allow too much time, because we wanted the rams to be more or less stunned by their sudden partial blindness, and not yet able to recover their self confidence by compensating in some other way. When we were ready, we put the two rams in a very small pen (16 x 16 feet square) together with a few wethers, so that they could move around, but not charge from a distance. They immediately became nervous in each other's presence, but after a little snorting and dancing around, they seemed to decide that it would be better if they didn't bother trying to attack each other. We left them in that pen for 1day. Then we moved them into the regular barn corral and feed lot, but did not give them full access to the pasture for about 2 more days. When I was convinced that they were not going to hurt each other, I opened the gate to the main pasture so that the wethers and rams could graze openly. I left them like this for about 5 or 6 days. Then, one evening when they were standing in the barn corral and feed lot, I quietly removed their masks. I closed the gate to the big pasture, and watched them that evening. Nothing happened. The next morning everything was still quiet, so I let them all out into the big pasture. They never had a problem after that. However, we needed to remove the two rams from the group later for a short while, and we put them together in a small pen. The pressure of the move caused them to immediately start fighting. I quickly put a few wethers with them and took the whole group into an even smaller area where they were pretty packed in. I left them quietly in this area. When they had settled, I moved them back into the slightly larger area, where they remained quiet. Later we returned them into the larger group of wethers, with no problem. Also, we noticed that when one ram needed to be removed briefly (such as when we split the wether group to sort off a few for herding practice), the rams started fighting again immediately when we put them back together. My conclusions: 1) The rams need to become comfortable with each other (with the masks on) in small spaces where they cannot get back to charge at each other. My smallest area is about 4 x 6 feet. 2) After they have become familiar and comfortable with each other, the masks can be taken off. This may need to be done in stages, increasing the pen size over periods of a few days. 3) It helps to calm things down if you have some wethers with the rams. Use enough to fill the pen so that the animals cannot walk around very much. Wethers have very dependable temprements and act as gentle padding to keep the rams from getting at each other. They almost never get involved -- they just stand there and watch whatever is going on. 4) Do not EVER place ewes with the rams in this situation. Also, for their safety, small lambs should not be involved. 5) All ewes should be well out of the area, and hopefully should not be seen nor heard. They should never be in adjoining fields to where the rams are kept. 6) If the rams are removed from each other, (even for a few minutes!!!!), you may have to start the process over again. If the rams have been apart for several days, it is almost guaranteed that you'll have to repeat at least some of these steps. 7) If the rams are placed under any pressure in their present situation together, it will very likely stir up their aggressiveness to each other. Examples of this pressure might be a) a person with a dog comes into the area b) a person attempts to separate some of this group off for various reasons c) someone attempts to move this group from one area to another d) the rams become aware of ewes close by If you follow the above procedures, the ram shields should work very well for you. I am very pleased with how they worked out for me. Please note that I do not keep ram shields on my rams on a continual basis. So far, I've been successful using them only as an intermediate stage, to introduce rams to each other. Once the rams are comfortable with each other, the shields are taken off. However, if you should need to keep the shields on for an extended period of time (more than a week or 10 days), please remember to check every day to make sure that the masks are still on the ram properly, and that the rams can breathe, and eat and drink, normally. Also, it is probably a good idea to take the mask off periodically to check for dirt and sores which could possibly develop on the ram's face. My rams are each back with their individual breeding groups of ewes now. But when I'm finished breeding them, I plan to get out the shields again, and use them to reintroduce the rams to each other all over again! I know this is a lot of blabber at one time, but I hope it helps! Sincerely, Mary Swindell Mary Swindell Bellwether Farm 815 Bell Hill Road Cobden, IL 62920 (618) 893-4568 (home) (618) 453-1697 (work) [EMAIL PROTECTED] =============================================== This message is from the Blackbelly Sheep mailing list (http://www.awrittenword.com/listserv/index.html). To respond to this message, send e-mail to [email protected] To unsubscribe or change your membership options, go to http://lists.coyotenet.net/mailman/listinfo/blackbelly To search the archives, go to http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ =============================================== This message is from the Blackbelly Sheep mailing list (http://www.awrittenword.com/listserv/index.html). To respond to this message, send e-mail to [email protected] To unsubscribe or change your membership options, go to http://lists.coyotenet.net/mailman/listinfo/blackbelly To search the archives, go to http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
