Breeding

The Rideau breed was developed to be early maturing with a long breeding season. This allows producers the flexibility to select a production system best suited to farm production needs whether they choose an annual system, or an accelerated system of 3 lambing’s in 2 years or an advanced system of 5 times in 3 years. Choose the dates that best work for your family, your farm operation and when you want to market lambs. Be consistent year after year around those dates and only leave the rams with the ewes for a maximum of 30 days. A marking harness is good to know if the ram is working properly. After breeding have a secure ram holding area where the rams are kept away from the ewes until needed again. This will help ensure a successful accelerated system. The accelerated system will produce more lambs weaned per productive ewe and will also help better spread out the use of your facilities & labour, providing a more even cash flow from your operation. To efficiently increase breeding during the March to August period, synchronize the ewes with either CIDRs and PMSG or MGA. and PMSG. The ewes will also need to be kept on a rising plane of nutrition during this period to improve the around 60 days it helps to ultrasound the ewes to tell if they are pregnant so they can be separated and fed differently than the open ewes. Ewe lambs should be bred at 6 to 10 months of age to lamb between 12 to 15 months of age at the latest. The economic benefit derived from early lambing results from the shorter interval days between lambing’s during the life of the ewes. Pure Rideau lambs make good carcasses with strong loins and low fat cover. This can further be improved by using terminal sires such as the Suffolk, Texel, Charollais or other terminal breeds to produce a higher yielding carcass while still keeping the fat at an acceptable level for the buyers.