Lamb to Mutton

There are a lot of things that take place in a lambs life that effect how it turns out.
Firstly when they are born they must drink their mother's milk which contains the vital colostrom.
Colostrom is the first milk that is rich in antibodies, energy and vitamin A. This protects the lamb from most neonatal diseases for the first six weeks of life.  As the lamb is born he will live his first weeks with his mother usually in a lambing jug or small pen.  This allows for the shepherd to observe and allows the lamb to bond with its mother.  As the lamb reaches an age of around 4 weeks they are released into a larger pen with other lambs around their age and all of their mothers.  When they are put out they usually play around until they are castrated, docked and tagged.  As they reach a larger size and are very stable on their feet they are released into a even larger pen with the rest of the herd and lambs.  We have a set up with a creep feeder for the lambs and a fence feeder for the ewes.  The lambs are usually around 20lbs when they first go outside and meet many other lambs.  Creep feeding is very effective if you have lambs you are sending to market since only the lambs can eat the grains and feed.  As the lambs are eating the ewes also get hay fed through the fence.  Now the lambs are putting on a lot of weight and should be around 3 to 4 months old.  As they are now around 80lbs as well they are ready for market.  If they are lucky enough to have been a nice ewe lamb or a good ram then they will be kept on the farm for many more years.  If they are market lambs then they are put into a pen and then shipped off to either a processing plant, an auction mart or even kept at home for a private buyer to come and get.  Now back to those lucky rams and ewes.  Now that they are old lambs they should have been weaned from their moms and around 5 months and 100lbs.  They now have a bit of wool on their backs that can now be sheared or left on until next year.  Each year farmers get a shearer to come to their farm and remove the wool off of their sheep.  Some select few sheep turn into show sheep.  If they are one of those V.I.P's they can go to shows that are usually quiet large (ex. Agribition, All Canadian Classic).  Each show usually is 2 or more days of the sheep taking a vacation in a air conditioned indoor pen.  Not only are they away from the stress of the farm but they also get to be washed and cleaned, carded, trimmed and be praised by a judge.  After a show it's back to a regular sheep life on the farm.  Once they are back home they are usually let out with the ram unless the owner is looking to have the ewe grow another year to reach her full potential.  If not then the ewe is hopefully bred and 5 months later out comes little baa's! While the ewe is in with her lambs she is usually pampered for her good work.

If the ewe only has 1 lamb she may be sold or culled since you want to have at least 2 lambs to replace the ewe in case she came down with a sickness and had to be put down.  Once she gets her lamb to a market weight she will be released into a pasture for a relaxing time until next breeding season.  This repeats for another 10 or so years until the ewe is too old and has no teeth to eat grass with or until she is unable to have lambs and must be culled or put down.  On our farm we have had only a select few ewes live their whole life on our farm because they were extraordinary mothers and produced many lambs each year.  Currently we have my sister's breeding ewe she started in her first year of 4-H 9 years ago still on our farm.  If a ewe gets to live 10 years on your farm they become quiet friendly and nice sheep that will come up to you in the pasture which is always a treat since you can have the opposite ones that just run away from you till they can't see you anymore.