[Jacob-list] Lobster Claws

[Heather Hettick]

In my 4 years of breeding Jacobs I have not had any fused horns until this
year.  Of our 8 lambs, 4 had very close or fused horns on at least one side.
Most of them have grown together and actually look sort of nice now, but all
are different.  The messiest set is the ewe lamb who is only fused on only
one side.  The lateral one by itself broke off once and regrew but her other
horns have different curls and seem to go in different directions.  Two, a
ewe and ram, now look to be two horned except for the "lobster claw" tip on
one of the ram lamb's sides.  The ewe's double horns are very flat and close
to her head and you can barely tell they are fused anymore.  The 4th looks
two horned except her horns come out closer to the top of her head and stick
up straight like a 4 horned sheep but with telltale double tips.

The 4 are sired by 3 different rams, 1 4H and 2 2H, but only one has a
grandmother who is fused on one side - with the lobster claw look, but
otherwise big strong horns for a 4H ewe.   Her whether lamb has very nice
widely spaced 2 horns as did her son last year.  None of the others have
fused or lobster claw horns in their background that I know of.

Heather Hettick
Moonstruck Jacob Sheep
Creston, OH
hettick.1 at osu.edu



-----Original Message-----
From: jacob-list-admin at jacobsheep.com
[mailto:jacob-list-admin at jacobsheep.com]On Behalf Of Pavel314
Sent: Saturday, August 25, 2001 9:44 PM
To: Jacob List
Subject: [Jacob-list] Lobster Claws


Royal wrote:

> An equally frustrating problem I had this year was "lobster claw"
> horns on ewe lambs.   It  happened on three  (out  of 16) ewe lambs.
> Each lamb was sired by a different ram.  I have never had this before
> and all of a sudden,  three!   And here I thought I had prefect Jacobs!

Although I prefer four symmetrical and distinct horns on my Jacobs, I
consider the lobster claw an interesting variation on the theme. It
seems hard to predict their offspring; if anyone has been keeping notes
on their lobster claw ewes, I'd be interested in hearing their breeding
patterns.

Diana, one of our ewes, is a lobster claw. We've bred her twice to
Sheridan, our four-horn ram. In Spring of 2000, she produced Molly, a
symmetrical four-horn ewe. For 2001, she produced Nimrod, a two-horn ram
(now wether), picture at  http://members.home.net/rbfarm/jrams.html .

Paul Intihar
Rainbow Farm
Joppa, Maryland



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