The American Black Welsh Mountain Sheep Association and Desert Weyr, LLC are pleased to announce an intensive two-day seminar on non-surgical sheep artificial insemination taking place on December 5th and 6th of 2018. Dr. Philip Purdy from the USDA National Animal Germplasm Program will be teaching our class. The class will cover important AI topics,… Continue reading
Black Welsh Mountain sheep in North America are highly inbred. Our founding population was very small, so we do not have much variation from which to select. The USDA’s National Animal Germplasm Program performed a cluster analysis study on the population. This study looked at individual pedigree information and the population as a whole, then… Continue reading
Warning: wide loads ahead! One of the Wide Load sheep still hasn’t lambed yet. We’re both anxiously waiting! I’m sure she’ll be more comfortable once those lambs are on the outside. Continue reading
Our expected start of lambing is April 22nd. Normally, we’re out on pasture by now, but the grass hasn’t grown enough yet, so I’m holding the sheep on hay for longer. These two sisters are some of our top-producing sheep, with great EBVs. They and their other relatives always carry their lambs like this. I… Continue reading
I’m behind in posting here, as per usual. We spent a week in October working with the USDA NAGP to collect and freeze semen from our rams. Some will be used later this year in our flock as part of their AI experiment. We’ll be using it to fine-tune the insemination timing of synchronized ewes… Continue reading
Gretchen just lambed the last lamb of 2016. He’s a very large lamb by Sterling. He was a bit stuck, but both are okay now. Continue reading
We’re now officially in the lambing lull. It’s the break between when the AI lambs and the secondary lambs are due. It’s been a busy and somewhat difficult lambing so far. Our AI experiment was a rousing success this year! Of the 44 ewes we bred using the AI cervical procedure using frozen semen, 22… Continue reading
The ewes aren’t due to lamb until the last week of April. However, they’re already getting quite round. I always tell people that our sheep are wider than they are tall when they’re heavily pregnant. Most folks don’t believe me, though. Here’s the proof! Continue reading
We are once again doing research with the USDA National Animal Germplasm program. This year, we are collecting blood samples and other data on the ewes to evaluate their ovulation stats. The experiment calls for blood collections every hour, so we have a lot of work to do. We had our vet put catheters in… Continue reading
I use a variety of characteristics to evaluate our flock of Black Welsh Mountain sheep each fall. I also look at their NSIP EBVs for important traits. Every year, I evaluate them to determine who stays, who will be for sale, and who will go to the butcher. We’ve sorted the rams, ewes, and yearlings,… Continue reading