The Painted Desert Sheep is for YOU, if you want to raise meat for your freezer, and if you don’t want to be bothered with having to shear them, or if you want a LARGE lamb crop for the market !
We have a very small herd of the more hard to find and more rare, Sheep called ~Painted Desert Sheep~ This is our last black herd male almost 2 yrs old, and some of our ewes and babies above and also there are more pictures below. I have now brought in a baby ram lamb so will post him later as he grows.
I’m not a “Breeder” per say but I do have a few babies and year and they are mostly all for sale.
Painted Desert Sheep is known primarily for the ram’s ability to grow a trophy class set of horns. Rams will have different shaped horns according to the influence of other breeds. The size of these sheep varies due to the influence of other breeds. Ewes may range in weight from 60 to 120 pounds and have heights from 21″ to 25″ at the shoulders. Rams weigh from 75 to 200 pounds and may be 30″ or more at the shoulders.
The Painted Desert Sheep adapt well as they have resistance to disease, heat, and cold. Good immunizations and dewormings program help make it even easier with this hardy sheep.
They are great LOT CLEANERS as these sheep are great at cleaning fencelines and wooded or overgrown lots. These sheep will more commonly eat more of the weeds that some wool breeds of sheep may leave. With the slick summer coats these sheep will be less prone to getting stickers and thorns stuck in their coats as any animal you should keep an eye for a thorn or clump of wool matted as there maybe something stuck in there. Even when any grooming maybe needed, it is much easier to be brushing out thorns and stickers from at most, an undercoat of wool in the winter, then from several inches of full wool.
The Painted Desert Sheep is not a “woolless” breed (a misnomer, really), but actually a double coated breed that casts its wool in spring. They are adaptable to extremes in weather. In the fall, they begin growing their undercoat of wool which gets even thicker as the weather get colder. The rams will grow a luxuriant mane (another feature that makes them a favorite of trophy hunters) often beginning at the shoulders with a thick bib at the front of the neck. In the spring, the wool is shed in clumps along with some of the longer, outer guard hairs. What remains is a short, slick coat of hair. Most rams will completely shed their mane by summer while others will have a sparser version of one. Because of their short hair during the summer, these sheep will rarely be bothered by the external parasites that plague wool breeds. The tails of these sheep are not docked as there is no real need to. There should be no wool remaining on the sheep for the summer months. If so, then the sheep has obviously close wool breeding. The only exception would be lambs that don’t usually shed until the next year.
They have a strong flocking instinct when disturbed, but when at peace will scatter about the pasture. They can be very docile if handled from birth. A four foot mesh fence is adequate enough to keep them in your pasture, when not being pushed or preyed on, otherwise they can clear this with ease.
Due to the Barbados influence in some of these sheep, the Painted Desert Sheep will have two lambings a year with intervals ranging from 6 1/2 to 8 months (depending on how you manage your flock). Although the ewes will come in heat while lactating, and the ram will tend them, they often don’t get pregnant until the lambs are taken off. Most breeders will wean lambs between 2 and 3 months of age to get another lambing that year. These sheep, again due to Barbados blood, have been known to deliver up to five lambs in one birth! They also breed out of season (anytime of the year). Ewe lambs ideally should not be bred until one year of age, but they are commonly bred at seven months of age with no ill effects. Ram lambs reach sexual maturity early and have been known to breed as early as 4 months of age. For this reason, keeping juvenile rams in your flock will make determining paternity of your lambs impossible.
The Painted Desert ewe has a strong mothering instinct. Even with multiple births, she seems to count heads if one should wander off and is not happy until they are all by her side. They have excellent milking ability, even with triplets. Some of these ewes have udders to rival dairy goat breeds.
These sheep seem to prefer lush tender growth of grasses but are also partial to some weeds and shrubs. There are some things they just will not eat. However, they are excellent for keeping lots mowed and fence lines clean maintained looking.
Lambs are in growing demand for their lean carcasses that do not have the strong flavor or fat of domestic mutton.
Just in case you can not read the captions on the first set of pictures below THESE LAMBS ARE FOR SALE – Posted Jan 2, 2011 Top middle picture is sire of lambs pictured at one year of age.
Black ewe on far left side of pictures born Dec 20, 2010 $225.00 – sold
Set of twin more solid black babies on left is a ewe and right is a ram $200.00 EACH. – sold
Tri colored is a ewe lamb born Dec 25, 2010 $225 – sold
Top right picture is of a very loud black and white lamb (sex unknown as of yet) $250.00 – sold
SOLD Pictured below
These are some of my ewes pictured below.
