Friday, November 14, 2014

Using a Dorper Ram this year

Our ram above
Because we had some degree of success with this boy last year, we are using him to breed at least half of our ewe flock. Even though he appears quite wooly before he shed (see top picture) he had some beautiful lambs. They were definitely bigger than the Katahdins he was bred to. The only problem was that they were often singles, but then he did breed a lot of first time mothers. We were hesitant to use him at first as we only bought him as part of a package when we bought some Dorper ewes.
Fortunately, the ewes he bred last year were not wooly and had A coats for the most part, so the lambs all shed beautifully. They also fetched a higher price at the sale barn than the pure Katahdin lambs we sold.

The main advantages of Dorpers are that they are very stocky and have great back ends as you can see from the lower photo (not our ram). As the leg of lamb is the most important and heaviest cut, this is what you are looking for in a good carcass. As they are also a shedding hair sheep, they make a great combination with an existing flock of Katahdins.

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