The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: Moleskins on April 03, 2011, 08:32:36 am
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I've copied this from my reply to 'What about the afterbirth' but thought it was worth a listing of it's own.
Crow problem, don't start me on that one. I went up to check my ewes which aren't due for a few days yet to find two had given birth, one lamb ( ram ) was fine but the other ( gimmer ) was dead with everything pecked away that could be.
I'm convinced it was born live but the crows killed it, there was blood everywhere.
Trouble is I rent that field and the owners wife doesn't like the idea of anything, foxes, crows, anything being shot.
To say I'm annoyed is an understatement !! I was out with the gun on my field yesterday, just let them try it there.
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You could always try a crow trap - even crueler than shooting!
I watched a buzzard come in and take a new born lamb yesterday at my friends place. I suppose it is just nature but it is so cruel sometimes.
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there was a picture of a golden eagle with a live lamb flying off in the scottish farmer a few weeks ago.
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We shoot them and then hang one or two on the fence - seems the only thing that keeps them away >:(
I hadn't thought about buzzards - there are loads around here :o
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We have lots of buzzards here but they have never taken a lamb, alive or dead. They did clear up the Muscovies which had insisted on staying out all night once years ago - the fox had conveniently killed them all ready for the buzzards' feast. But mostly they don't land on our fields - possibly because we are usually out there.
I hope the Scottish Farmer pic isn't going to set off a whole lot of Golden Eagle killings. Surely we can spare a lamb or two to help such iconic creatures to feed their young? It's the corvids which are the problem, Ravens and Crows. We have a lot of jackdaws but I don't know if they would attack a lamb - they wait patiently for the sheep to be fed each day so they can finish up any missed bits and they nick bits of wool straight from the sheep for their nests. I haven't seen a rook go for lambs either. Magpies which are also corvids might I suppose but they rarely come here, except to tear apart little birds nests and kill the female and eat the eggs. But I think all corvids are scavengers rather than killers - with a sickly lamb they will start on it before it's dead and that is horrible - when they did that to my lamb I really wanted to shoot every one of them.
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the conservationists rubbished the crofters when they said the eagles fed on lambs but now with proof they cant ignore it
if farmers get compensated for geese feeding then the same should be done for the eagles
it all comes back to lions led by donkeys :wave: