[Jacob-list] feed

[Betty Berlenbach]

Okay, okay, here's what I do:

I weigh out the hay...

Full schedule:


>From about May 1 (sometimes May 15th, depending when snow melts!) the sheep are on pasture.  Nov. 1-18 is breeding, so lambing is March 25 through April 15th, roughly.  On Nov.  1 they go in winter quarters, since there's not much grass left (I have limited pastures); the rams get 3 lbs. of second cut hay a day, period (though I do give them a tablespoon of grain on Christmas and EAster).  I through minerals on top of it a couple of times per week.  The girls get two pounds of second cut hay a day each (I serve it in flakes, each 5 feet apart on what is usually fresh snow, but they eat off the ground all summer, so why not in winter. By then the ground is mostly frozen and worms mostly dead, if there are any.  (Only had fecals taken a few times, and always come back negative).  (Five feet apart, means they don't eat over each other, keeping the fleeces clean. Clean fleeces sell for $10-$12 a pound, dirty ones for $3 a pound, if at all.)  Also the girls get about l/4 c. organic whole grains, and I mix a bit of minerals and kelp in with it, working up to about l/2 c. o.w.grain for the last month of gestation and first month of lactation, and then back down to none by oh, June  15-30, just on grass for summer. (This summer, I have way too many sheep, so they have gotten a bit of grain as well to help the pastures last.)  I don't flush, on pasture, they have no barn or shed, but a big tree with shade in each pasture.  They get showers when it rains, which keeps them clean.  In summer, once a month, I throw a sweet lix in with the boys, which lasts most of the month.  When the girls are NOT eating grain, ditto.  (I use organic whole grains for two reasons: one:  I believe in good food.  two: one bag of organic whole grain, though it costs $15 a bag, keeps them in the same condition as 2-1/2 bags of conventional commercial pellets (mvcdonalds for sheep, as far as I'm concerned) so it is CHEAPER to feed them this "expensive" grain.  And on much less grain, and less grain, it seems to me, is always better for sheep than more, given the functions of the rumen.


At lambing, I check at 9 p.m., ask them to raise their hands if they want me to stay, and are having difficulties, or think they might.  If any respond (not with raising hands, of course, but if they look a little crosseyed or something: I spend 15 min. or so observing) I stay up a bit to see how things are going. Otherwise I go to bed and check again at 6:30 a.m.  Some of my ewes know I won't come out, I think, and they DON'T want me there while lambing.  During the day for that three weeks, I stay home and check every few hours during the day, not because they need me, so much as I LOVE to see the lambing...and some of the ewes want me there. Interestingly, the ones who don't seem to want me or any other humans around, and consider us scum, tend to lamb at night, where the pattern seems to have shown them, they are "safe" from prying eyes.  The ones who demand that I be there (caterwauling, etc.) tend to lamb during the day.  I even have one who basically told me where I was to sit, and what I was to do.  They are very capable of making themselves understood. In this case, I was to stay there, on a chair, but 10 feet away. I was not to interfere, but the other humans watching were to stay behind me, and not come any closer to them than I was.  I offered assistance at one point, and she went to butt me.  I got back in my chair, as told.  In ten years, I lost twins, dead and malpresented, not noticed labor since mother was shivering, I thought cold, and I had thrown a wool blanket over her after shearing...three days later, it warmed up to above freezing, took the blanket off and realized she was in labor.  Pulled dead lambs.  This year, one of triplets was born dead. Other than that, there have been no lamb losses in ten years, so I must be doing something right.

That said, I will give a ewe one bad year: if she needs assistance one year, that's fine. If she needs assistance two years, she will be culled.  I'm not raising inferior sheep.  Fortunately, I've never had a ewe who needed assistance more than once in her lifetime, and only three or four of those.
 Betty, in Vermont,who now has a blog, thanks to help from Walter and Linda.  See Betty's blog at http://sheepwoman.wordpress.com.
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