sheep
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| Sheep are pretty easy. They prefer to graze over being fed, so if you aren't trying to push them toward rapid growth for market, they really don't need grain either. They are pretty efficient ruminants. It is helpful to have a decent quality pasture. If it's not grass or grass/legume mix, they will need supplement. Weeds aren't that nutritious. How big is your pasture area? That would determine the amt of sheep. It is better to have less and maybe mow it a bit (they prefer and do best on the more nutritious fresh growth), than have what seems like a good balance and have a dry spell hit (and the pasture stops growing), and find yourself needing to supplement. And then you will need hay for over the winter. Grass growth is slowing down about now, and here in MN it's not really going until May. And fresh water all the time. We have a big water trough outside, refilling it as needed. Goldfish live in it year-round - they keep the water clean. Plus they are fun! We have a tank heater plugged in it in the winter to deice. Protein and mineral blocks made for sheep are good too. When we are getting ready to breed, we up the protein with blocks and add in some corn to their ration. Labor is needed at the minimum of yearly - shearing. We also vaccinate, worm and trim hooves at that time. If you are just running adults, that pretty much is it - unless you have some get sick. Good fencing is important too. If they figure a way out and you don't fix it, they will keep working it and getting out. Quite frustrating! Shelter - as long as they can stay dry and get out of the wind, they are good. We have a barn, but they do well in lean to's or loafing shed type buildings that have an open side to the south. Our barn has a dutch door on the south side, and we leave the bottom half open all the time. We only pull it shut when we need to do something (and catch them) or if it is the very bitter cold and storming. |
| we have two large pastures each over 5 acres I guess. It is a 3 board fence with a wire at the top. We could add one lower for them if needed. We have talked about putting in a run in shed for the horses (3). Do you think that would be ok for winter or bring them in??? The other option is we have a bank barn used for storage above but below is empty. That could be converted for sheep. It is wide open on the east facing side so it would block most of the wind. We weren't really thinking of breeding or anything we just thought that this might be something fun to get into. I am not sure what we would do with the wool that we sheered. Do people take that kind of stuff off your hands???? |
| Gail, contact your Cooperative Extension agent. They have people trained in animal husbandry who can fill in info Dawn can't provide. It would help if you county has a lot of rural land otherwise try the neighboring rural county for an agent. |
sheepiegail wrote: we have two large pastures each over 5 acres I guess. It is a 3 board fence with a wire at the top. We could add one lower for them if needed. We have talked about putting in a run in shed for the horses (3). Do you think that would be ok for winter or bring them in??? The other option is we have a bank barn used for storage above but below is empty. That could be converted for sheep. It is wide open on the east facing side so it would block most of the wind. We weren't really thinking of breeding or anything we just thought that this might be something fun to get into. I am not sure what we would do with the wool that we sheered. Do people take that kind of stuff off your hands???? Pasture size sounds good. We have ours split in 2 also, with about 2 acres in one, and about 7-8 in the other. We did run our horses with the sheep (don't have the horses anymore, just a pony). It went mostly well. The horses did get a bit rough and spunky with the lambs when they were young and running around. Never had fatalities, but a few lambs were injured.  If the horses are OK with a barn or shed, sheep would be too. We did give both separate barn areas. They seemed to like that. The dutch door kept the horses out of the one barn. They used the small pole barn instead. We had a barn like you mentioned when I was a kid - like a walk out basement. Machine shed on the top, we kept our pigs in the lower level.  Our barn at home (we raised sheep when I was growing up too) had an eastern entrance, it worked well. After being out in the Rochester area, it seems to be pretty darn close to MN weather. I know we get more bitter cold, being in the center of the continent....and you usually get more snow. But otherwise, I would think stock raising would be very similar. Summers seem pretty close.  The pole barn - last year we had round bales for awhile - and made the doorway into a self feeder -  Shearing - Todd shears ours now, but we used to pay someone to do it. He and a friend actually did it for other farmers too - until Todd needed back surgery. Now he just does ours. Wool buyers are out there - we drop off the wool, they write us (a very small) check. Most years the gov't wool subsidy check is much larger than the wool check.  Last year was the 1st year I can remember where there was no wool subsidy. But still not anything to get rich on. More a case of the sheep needing to get the wool off, so they get sheared.  There are more and more crafters out there, so that's a possible market as well. If you want to pursue that, ask around what breeds of sheep the crafters want wool from. getting sheared -  wool from one ewe -  stomping down the wool bag -  Fence - adding a wire probably won't be enough. I would add a round of 4 ft woven wire inside it. And sheep don't respond well to electric fences...they may seem dumb, but they soon learn to use their insulated wool and walk right thru it  |
| I'd agree Dawn, sheep may seem dumb but really they are a combo of flighty/silly and crafty. The huge stock runs in outback Aust. use cattle grids in the gate ways. That means they dig a pit between the gate posts and then roof it over with metal bars spaced close enough for motor tyres to drive over but too far apart for livestock to walk over. There's been lots of cases of sheep getting through the gates and the farmers not knowing how. Finally someone hung around and watched from a distance to find out. The sheep are lying down and wriggling across the cattle grids!  |
| damn aussie sheep are smart. |
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