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Goals & Management 1. Biosecurity A. Closing the Flock I have made the decision to officially close the flock in Fall of 2010. This means that I will no longer be buying in new sheep from other farms and will be limiting exposition of my stock at off farm events. Closing the flock is a major step towards minimizing exposure to outside pathogens and parasites. By doing this I intend to REMAIN foot rot, sore mouth and scrapie free and will continue to ensure that my buyers get what they pay for: quality and healthy stock. Thanks to the VAI process, I will be able to maintain genetic diversity by importing semen from Iceland’s top rams. B. Visitor Protocol All visitors are now required to sanitize their footwear AND wash and disinfect their hands before entering the barn and pasture areas at Ledgewood Farm. If a visitor has recently visited another country, we ask that they do NOT wear shoes they wore during their trip. No dogs are allowed. This is both in the interest of disease management and protecting our animals from stress and potential harm. Also, with 3 dogs of our own, we have our own established pack dynamic. Introducing a new dog disrupts the routine and means babysitting 4 canines as they get to know each other. 2. Breeding Program A. Breeding Goals For ALL of our sheep: · Hardy, healthy constitutions. · Broad, meaty conformation & general structural soundness. To read the official breed standard click HERE · Soft, well-balanced and lustrous fleeces. · In-born resilience to parasitism to avoid frequent use of chemical dewormers and to prevent the development of resistant worms. · We also like to see docile, laid back temperaments… This makes the sheep infinitely easier to handle when they need hoof trimmings, shearing, medical care etc. It also makes them easier to train as milkers or tame as pets, if desired. · Finally, we like to maintain a variety of colors and patterns in our flock. For our EWES: · Independent, “easy lambers” who consistently give birth on pasture with no required shepherd assistance.*** · Attentive mothers who readily accept and nurture their lambs · Ewes that reach a suitable size for breeding their first fall · Consistent twinning (or better) after an ewe’s first lambing. · Respectable milk yields to support births of twins and triplets and to maximize the health and growth potential of lambs. For our Rams: · Masculine looking, with strong libido · A strong maternal line: See our ewe specific goals above. · Non aggressive (!!!)
B. Culling Culling is a vital component to the success of any serious breeding program. Each year, a MINIMUM of 25-50% of the lambs born here are culled… At many farms, breeders offer all of their lambs for sale and only the ones that people don't want to buy are processed… OUR culls are chosen based on our breeding goals above; if they are found lacking in any of the areas listed, they are considered for the cull list. By culling these lambs, we prevent undesirable traits from persisting in our flock (and the flocks of our clients), and gradually create a DNA strand that is more and more loaded with all of the strengths we like to see in our breeding stock. I do NOT sell any breeding stock that I wouldn’t use myself. What happens to our cull lambs? Most of them become meat lambs, but those with particularly exceptional fiber and/ or temperaments may be offered unregistered as pet or fiber sheep. We also cull our adults. Every year when we put together our breeding groups, the ultimate goal is to pair rams and ewes that will negate each others’ weaknesses and/ or consolidate their particular strengths. The hope is that the resulting lambs will be better than BOTH of their parents. This is where keeping replacements comes in. When an ewe in our flock has a daughter that is noticeably nicer than herself, we usually decide to keep the daughter and sell the ewe to another flock where she can offer someone else a beneficial genetic impact. In some cases, (for instance if an ewe were to prolapse, contract mastitis, or if her lambs consistently ended up on our cull list) she would be offered up only as a non-breeding pet-quality ewe… Or she heads to the freezer. No sheep is perfect; Culling is a never ending process! For the Wikipedia entry on culling, click HERE. Our particular method of culling most closely fits the “Total Score Method” described on the Wikipedia page. C. Line Breeding Intro: Used responsibly, and paired with a solid culling program, line breeding is an invaluable and widely used tool for serious breeders of all animals: horses, dogs, cattle, sheep etc. and has been for a long time. Why? Line breeding (NOT inbreeding) provides us with the means to retain valuable genetics in our flock, long after the animal who originally expressed them has passed away, while simultaneously and systematically eliminating the negative traits of that animal that existed in any recessive (“hidden”) genes it carried. By crossing 2 related animals, we increase the chance of homozygous (alike) gene pairs for any number of traits –whether they are good or bad. Anytime an animal has a homozygous gene pair, the trait the particular genes code for will be displayed. In other words, no other traits are hidden that could be passed on to subsequent generations. If homozygous gene pairs are achieved for a favorable trait, that animal will display the desired characteristics and pass that trait on to all of it’s offspring. In cases where we achieve homozygous gene pairs for an UNFAVORABLE trait, the animal will display that unfavorable characteristic and can be culled, thus eliminating the gene entirely from the line. So even when line breeding goes “wrong” it succeeds in weeding out undesirable genes that would otherwise remain “hidden” in the genetic code of your animals and would be passed on to countless offspring and descendants. Line breeding at Ledgewood Farm: While we recognize genetic diversity as a vital component to a healthy ecosystem and hail its preservation and maintenance as an ongoing goal for our flock, we do use line breeding to a certain extent in efforts to maximize the potential of our animals and to preserve and improve upon some of our best lines. If you have any questions about our current line breeding projects, please feel free to write. All sale animals that are products of line breeding are noted as such in their sale descriptions. 3. Lambing Time Management In past years we have begun the ewes rotating on pasture as soon as the grass begins poking up, and have allowed them to lamb on pasture. Given the projected number of lambs being born in Spring 2010 and the size of our adult flock this year, we have decided to try something different. In 2010, the ewes will stay in a large enclosure on hay rations. As they lamb, they will be wormed and moved to another large “nursery pen.” This will give the pastures time to well-establish themselves for the greater stocking density this year and will also allow us to more easily synchronize worming and hit the population before the eggs hit our pasture. Once lambing is completed, the flock will resume it’s typical spring/summer/ fall pasture rotation. ***A Note About Lambing: Never listen to anyone who claims that Icelandics “never need help lambing.” Long term selection has made them, in general, an easy lambing breed, but selection for this trait must be ongoing if that is to remain the case. If any of our ewes need help at lambing time we DO and HAVE intervened. If the complication is due to tangled lambs or a malpresentation (most common in one-winter mothers and ewes bearing triplets), we do not cull the ewe unless it continues to be a problem every year. We DO cull ewes that prolapse, have poor pelvic width or other significant issues that could indicate ongoing lambing issues with the ewe or her line. That said, the incidence of assisted labors is very low in my flock. None of my current ewes have ever needed assistance here, except for one, who needed a little extra help pushing her lamb out when she was lambing for her first time.
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