# Rams ramming each other question



## InHisName (Jan 26, 2006)

brought in a new ram today- and he and our other ram are going at it. I do not have the facilities to keep them seperated. What can I expect? Will one be the dominant ram, or should we do what we have to to seperate? (as in butcher, or give away)


----------



## eieiomom (Jun 22, 2005)

They need to be put in a stall or a penned area so small that they cannot back up and potentially do serious harm to each other. I know people who have put tires in their pen or bales of straw to tighten the area and distract them, even more. I put a bucket of water on both sides so they can get water, without a problem. I feed them lots of hay to keep them busy eating. After a few days you can move the panels out more or make the pen slightly larger. After a couple weeks they will smell like each other and be ok to let out in a larger area. Before you know it, they will be best buddies, except when the girls are close by. Everytime you put them back together (after breeding or shearing), you'll need to repeat this process. Rams are strange creatures and seem to get bothered by any changes (moving them) or things tied with twine, garden hoses etc...This applies to polled rams, I don't have experience with horned rams. Are they about the same age/size ?

Hope this helps,

Deb


----------



## Slev (Nov 29, 2003)

well being of about the same size would be a fair bit to deal with by its self. If I were you, I think I'd buy 2 pair of ram shields, I think they are leather and creates a blind spot in front of them so they don't go after each other. I'd try doing what Eioeio said, and order these things right away..! good luck. (I prefer to keep as much of my flock as I can myself, including a couple of rams.) lucky for me the Border Leicester rams are considered some of the more gentlemanly of the species...


----------



## Ronney (Nov 26, 2004)

Personally, I wouldn't worry about it. It's part of the pecking order and the establishment of who is boss. Cows do it, hens do it, ewes do it, bulls do it and rams do it. The thumping of those two thick heads coming together is horrendous but rarely do they do any damage and if there is, it is accidental rather than intentional as they do not set out to kill each other, only establish dominance.

I had a new ram delivered three weeks ago. He's bit younger and lighter than my old boy but they went at it hammer and tongs for a good 20 minutes before they exhausted themselves and went to opposite ends of the paddock for a breather. They had another 20 minute stint, another breather and the next time I looked they were grazing side-by-side. And that's the way it's been since. I've worked on stations where anything up to 100 M/A rams would be grazed in the same paddock.

Cheers,
Ronnie


----------



## eieiomom (Jun 22, 2005)

A few years back I sold someone a mature ram. The new buyers put him into a paddock with 2 of their mature rams (against my suggestion not to).
The new ram ended up dying from internal injuries.
I really think it''s better to be safe than sorry, when introducing new rams into a flock. 

Just my two cents,
Deb


----------



## LibertyWool (Oct 23, 2008)

I used to worry about this a lot too, but no longer. I just keep an eye on them. As long as they are holding their own, it shouldn't be too much of a problem. This year there was a little blood. I checked it out, and it was a small spot on the flat spot of the head. Nothing to worry about. 

Another thing you can do is bring the old ram to the new ram. Rather than adding the new ram to the existing area (territory) of the old ram, move the old ram into a new area with the new ram. After a few days, you could put them back in the old area....


----------



## PNP Katahdins (Oct 28, 2008)

What Deb said. We almost lost a good ram last spring when we combined the breeding groups after shearing and left the rams in as we always have. I thought Mike was going to die. Took him a long time to recover but he did. The offending ram is gone now to a new flock.

This year Paul plans on being more careful. I hope he listens to the breeder of our new ram Uno on how to put the boys together. We certainly have enough old tires to spread around.

Peg


----------



## redroving (Sep 28, 2005)

A friend of mine lost two registered rams to fighting. One died in the fight, the other a day later from his injuries. We never put mature rams together. We had another friend that had several young ram lambs together for months and suddenly two ganged up on the best and biggest ram lamb and killed it instantly with two hits to his neck simultaneously.


----------

