Hi Billy, re: the teepees, my primary purpose is to put the ewe with the hypothermic lambs in the tent. Not every lamb requires shelter. Although yes, ewes will volunteer to use them! but I would not count on that as a strategy. Chances are the ewe who's big strong single will dominate the tent while the young ewe with triplets that really needs the tent is left outside. So as a rule I keep them zipped shut until needed, and then I choose who gets to go in. If you live in a really wet climate, I have seen in NZ where they have on the edge of every paddock a row of 'outhouses' or at least that is what they look like! These are lambing cubicals with a slatted floor to shelter newborns and their dams during inclement weather. They were found in the higher rainfall areas where the terrain was more open (more wind speed).
Bill, my lambing is similarly strange. It is more strung out than normal, and more singles (although it just dawned on me that 60 out of 160 ewes are lambing for the first time
). I was blaming it on the heavy liver fluke infection we picked up last year and the relatively poor nutrition all year long from moving to the new farm. But maybe there is something else? Some say the hay last year was very poor from all the rain.
Incidently the poor nutrition is hopefully behind us. The forage on the rental farm responded beautifully to mob stocking last year, and I now have a very nice crop of grass
janet
