so, when will you be starting stockpiling I wonder?

I didn’t like to show my ignorance and just assumed it was a genetic throw back but thank you for explaining it Elegran there’s something extra sweet ( and I don’t mean the taste) of a little black lamb .

Gily I thought you might ask why the lambs were black, when Daddy was white. Apparently, Jacobs are basically black with white patches, not white with black patches, and if they are crossed with all-white sheep, the all-black gene dominates the all-white one, so the lambs just have the basic black.

What a lovely story Elegran thanks for sharing

I haven’t eaten lamb ( or much red meat at all to be honest) for many years and to settle an argument with my DH I once (very naively) asked the village butcher in Rothbury ( Northumberland) what was meant (age wise) by the “spring lamb” he was advertising on his board outside . He pointed to the fields across the way where little lambs were happily jumping around and very proudly said “them next week” I was quite upset .

The fence would also keep out next-door's tup if he was a bit quicker than you at sensing that Tonight's The Night. It would keep the ewes from sneaking over to join him too. They have their own ideas about suitable genetic partners and the timing of their pregnancies.

We used to keep two Jacob ewes on half-an-acre of fairly tatty rough grass, We got two fleeces a year, and in Novenber they went for a nice holiday with a flock of aristocratic Jacobs at a castle a few miles away, producing cute black-an-white Jacob lambs in due course. I am sure they looked forward to their hols, they never objected to being rounded up and transported off.

Next door to us they had sometimes kept sheep (ordinary white type) and they still had an nice old tup with arthritis, kept on as a pet. He could hardly get up if he lay down, and they kept saying they would have to get rid of him soon, he was so old and doddery.

In mid-October one year, one of our Jacob ewes was discovered to have somehow got through the wire, and was peacefully grazing beside the old boy. "No harm done", we all said, "He is too old and too decrepit for any shenanigans."

Come March the evidence appeared - two lovely pitch-black lambs. To old my eye!

We'd have to build a fence around our garden though.

For a while the subsidies on lambs made it worth lambing early, but then the system changed and most lambs now arrive a bit later in the year.

Gilly The ewes come into season in October/November and the tups are put in with them for three weeks or more at that time ( their cycle is about two and a half weeks, so any who were missed the first time get lucky second time round) The tups have a marker block strapped to their chests, which rubs a coloured mark onto the back of the "done" ewes, so the farmer can see which ones are still white and possibly barren. Sometimes the colour is changed after each week so that the ewes can be separated into "due this week, so watch her" or "due next week," or "not due for a fortnight".

Gestation is five months and a week. The timing of the births can be predicted to a certain extent.

Jalima An acre of grass can provide food for four ewes and their lambs, with some hay added in the winter, plus access to water. They need a bit of shelter from the worst winds and heavy rain, but not elaborate housing. Some breeds are better than others at roughing it.

We could all stockpile a couple of lambs/sheep to keep the garden grass short and for woolly jumpers.
I'd need a spinning wheel though, not sure I could handle one of those.

Well there you go then, later lambing is the way forward.

Although I do love seeing those little lambs gamboling around the fields in their little carrier bags.

I don't know how anyone could eat them and I would never have lamb in the house.

I think that Adam (Adam's Farm) said something about that on Countryfile, gillybob, some of his sheep were lambing at a different time to give them a better chance I think.

Some do lamb very early, though, which doesn't help

Maybe looking into later lambing could be the way forward MazieD Although I have no idea about the productive cycle of a sheep and whether this could be altered in any way.

There has been nearly two years without much rain in some NSW sheep/cattle farming areas; the situation is critical.

they complain every season every year
It's anxiety! Until the crops are in or the livestock successfully reared they can't relax at all.

And they can tell more by looking at the sky than looking at the weather forecast.

Maybe because winters have been very mild over the past few years.

Some do lamb very early, though, which doesn't help.

If your livelihood was intimately linked to the weather I think you'd probably talk about it a great deal.

Mind you, one person's 'discussion' is another person's 'moaning'. Think we'll have to agree to disagree on this.

Not misplaced Maizie, they do complain every year, I do think they have cause to over the snow last winter it was bad for lambing but why do they no longer bring the ewes down

Alice in Wonderland, gillybob. 'I can believe in three impossible things before breakfast'!

It has been a dreadful year for farmers, though. There are a lot of sheep in our area and many farmers lost far more lambs than usual because of the cold and very wet weather at lambing time. And cattle were late going out to grass because fields were too waterlogged.

Now there will be a shortage of hay for winter fodder because the lack of rain meant the grass didn't grow as much as it should have. We have wonderful hay, but not much of it.

I'm wondering about the cereal crop yields too, no rain to swell the grain...

I think the impression that farmers are always moaning about the weather is misplaced. In good years they just keep quiet and thank heaven for a respite! But there haven't been many good years of late...

Apologies if I misunderstood Annie and thought you meant I was being unkind to farmers.

You are right! I remember as a child having really cold winters with plenty of snow and ice followed by proper springs and lovely warm summers. Isn't that the way the seasons are meant to be?

Gilly, I meant I wasn’t being unkind not you x

they complain every season every year. I feel smug, when we discussed the snow last winter I posted that we were in for a very hot summer, they work the land surely if I could see the signs they could.

I didn't say he was being unkind Annie I was just confused as to what it was he actually wanted?

I think you are probably right MazieD and this year has been exceptional with a prolonged harsh winter and a "real" summer (we rarely get one at all North) .

I don't think one year is enough to completely change farming practises but maybe if our weather pattern is changing year on year then farming will need to adapt. I was confused how the farmer on the radio thought he could have heavy prolonged rain to grow the grass together with a long dry spell to enable a good harvest.

Gilly, this isn’t unkind just the truth, every year I hear farmers complaining about the weather , too wet, too dry, too heavy a frost, too mild a winter , bless them it’s part of their lives to complain about the weather.

I sound like Hyacinth Bouquet, i hsve room for a goat. ?

I don’t like chickpeas PECS.

Wonder where Ensure is made.

I wonder what they do in countries like Spain, Italy etc. Where prolonged dry spells are the norm?

I think they have adapted to it over possibly 100s of years of the same weather patterns. Our agricultural processes are geared to our quite different weather patterns. Exceptional weather causes problems.

Listening to a farmer on local radio this morning . He was complaining that the lack of rain means that there is a lack of grass for the livestock and they are having to substitute their feed. The interviewer suggested that a prolonged period of rain would solve the problem and the farmer said “ well no not really as we need it to stay dry for harvesting” I wonder what they do in countries like Spain, Italy etc. Where prolonged dry spells are the norm?

annie we may all be forced to become vegan as the land will be needed for quinoa and chickpeas ( I like both!) so maybe no room for chooks or goats!