The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: dyedinthewool on July 14, 2013, 09:43:24 pm
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We 'eventually' took four girls to the breed sale. Now I know they didn't want to go and really I would have liked to keep them but we don't have enough room/grass.
We got them into the barn (with the rest of the small flock) penned them at the end - with the door closed. OH had placed the trailer outside the door with hurdles either side of the ramp. I should say here that our trailer is a bit makeshift...being a (builders) Iflorwilliams base with sides and full ramp, with a made up/lift off ply box on top so not as high as a full size cattle/horse/sheep trailer (I have to double over to get in side) but still room for a sheep to stand up with some room over their heads. There is a window in the ply at the front..
We got the girls into a smaller pen directly in front of the door - opened the door and all hell!!! let loose. They refused to go anywhere near the ramp(strawed) every time we shoo'd them forward they shot back - tried to jump the gate back into the main barn....***** heads on the ground when we tried to turn them round to face the trailer....*** we then used another hurdle to slowly push them towards the ramp and after a lot of grunting/sweating and swearing and that was just the sheep..... we got them in the box and they went of to the sale. Having got there and backed up to the unloading bay they then wouldn't come out....****** I got in behind them and pushed and shoved but one of the market lads was very good and pulled them out an bit unceremoniously but at least they were then out . But it made me feel bad that I had taken them...
Anyone got any tips on how to get sheep into a trailer when they don't want to go or just any loading tips. How do you do it.?
We will have 4 rams to go later in the year and I really don't want to go this again.
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Bucket of food to entice (obviously carried in by a dwarf :roflanim: )
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Ramp angle and dark to light.
The nearer to horizontal you can make the ramp, the easier they will travel along it.
They move more readily from dark to light.
We have a building with a raised floor, and it's dark inside. We set the trailer up backed up to the door, ramp onto the step so it's almost level. Hurdles and side rails to stop escapes - but to let the light flood into the trailer and onto the ramp. Then we open the door into the building and shoo the sheep in the direction of the trailer. 7 times out of 10, they just walk in, because it's lighter out there, and no scary climb or descent, and it's away from the bothersome 'shooshing' 2-legses.
Oh - and make the trailer and ramp smell of sheep. So don't use clean straw, use used straw. ;)
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We sometimes load our tups individually through the small door if there's just a few and they're not used to the trailer. Our adult sheep, and sometimes the lambs too, tend to be familiar with our trailer as we move them around the holding in it sometimes, partly just to familiarise them with the trailer. They tend to associate it with fresh pasture.
Sometimes if you get one in first the others will follow, or you can shrink down the pen they're in by removing hurdles one by one, until it's so small they find they are in the trailer before they realise.
We do though still have one Soay who we tried to take to slaughter three times but she evaded us each time (by jumping over hurdles and fences and disappearing off into the distance) so now she just lurks about unobtrusively hoping we don't know she's there, and has now got too old to go :roflanim:
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Put the trailer in the field and give some nuts in the trailer for a few days / week before? Otherwise if they are small, just lift them inn as suggested.
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Our ewes pretty much follow a bucket but a few always need to be huckled on.
We leave the trailer in the field at lambing time as extra shelter and the lambs (mainly) sleep in it so when it comes to loading the tup lambs for the abattoir, we enclose them in a small pen round the open trailer ramp the night before and usually they have loaded themselves by morning
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Put the trailer in the field and give some nuts in the trailer for a few days / week before? Otherwise if they are small, just lift them inn as suggested.
We already have an old trailer in the field(no cover though) that they all jump in and out of for playtime.
Sally; that is how we had the trailer dark in barn light outside - though the ramp is slightly slanted and it was clean straw.... hurdles either side to stop escapes but we just couldn't get them through the open barn door(wide stable type half door). Feet were firmly planted with heads down....
Will try the nuts in the trailer for a few weeks before they have to go. No small door in the trailer and lambs are/hopefully will be to big to 'pick' up.
Pedwardine - :roflanim: :roflanim: :roflanim:
But thanks for the input. :wave:
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It sounds like you are trying to get them into a dark, confined space, which they won't like. So really it would be better if you could get a bigger area trailer. They really need space about their heads to feel comfortable to go in.
If a new trailer isn't a possibility, then you may just have to haul them in one at a time.