The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: andywalt on September 07, 2010, 11:37:21 pm
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would I be correct in saying that now is the time with this new fresh growth of grass from the recent rain? Maybe a little too early if you want later lambs?
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just limit access to a lot odf fresh grass. and when you want them to be ready give them extra feed for a few weeks before hand. wetried this for the first time last year and we nealy had double the number of lambs as normal.
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I've never managed to do this, despite my best intentions and a basic undestanding of the principle. But I'm going to try again this year - God loves a trier ;D
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We keep our ewes moving on :D
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Fat ewes do not concieve well.
Ewes are better kept on mediocre grazing from the time their lambs are speaned until about three weeks before going to the tup. Then they should be put onto good grazing so that they are on a rising plane of nutrition prior to the tup going in.
That way their conception rates should be higher, and their returns to the tup should be minimized.
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Hi all, I put my ewes onto fresh pasture a couple of weeks before tupping for the first time last year. I had more twins that I'd ever had in the past, I think it does pay to do this, my neighbour's view is that if the ewe thinks there is plenty of grazing available she is more likely to conceive twins/triplets!!! Clever these sheep!
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Yup, all well and good in theory, but we're coming down with grass. Still, I'll keep trying!
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Yes theory's great but we have no areas with poor grazing so I am just going to have to carry on as normal and leave them on good grass and
hope that when I wean they don't get mastitis.
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Yes theory's great but we have no areas with poor grazing
Lucky you! Don't knock it
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Been thinking about this and we're having a move round tomorrow to get the ewes on the area with least grass! The only bit with NO grass is where the ponies are and I've no way of confining the sheep there.
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WE have in the past used hurdles across a smaller area/one corner in a triangular field. Worked well. Mine are now in a fairly small field, grass fairly low and will stay there until 3 weeks prior to tupping. Then go to good field. We have done this now for two years and lambing % is 180%.
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you can also use sheep nuts/corse mix to give the ame boost.
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Henry (inventor of meatlinc) Fell says that there is no evidence that rapidly rising condition increases fertility. The ewes should just be in good condition (2.5-3). I dont bring my ewes down in condition before "flushing"and I dont give them concentrates before tupping. I get a lambing percentage of about 170 which is perfect because I dont want triplets.
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Why does everyone do it then?
I've got mine on the poorest grass we've got - at least it will help them dry off. I never seem to get much condition off them.
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We put our ewes is a new field about 2 months ago and they are all like barrels now. We're going to have a go at splitting off the field so they've got some poorer grazing, but like Daisy's Mum, we only seem to have good grass! I don't know how pleased they'd be about this! We've just bought 15 store lambs to put on a 4 acre plot and the farmer that delivered them said we would only have to feed them if the winter was hideous as the grass was so good!
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Ours are bleating their heads off. I resorted to giving them a leaf of hay to shut them up. They were doing my head in. They'll go on to good grass on 15th October - none of us can wait ;D
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You could also give them some good dry straw - they will eat it eventually. Mine get it for drying off as well, but don't like it. Good for fibre and not got much in the way of proteins in it... so should be slimming but keep the rumen going.
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When I suggested feeding straw to dry off ewes I was called HARSH!
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I feed it to both ewes and goats!
Right now my ewes are ignoring it and skimming the last bit of grass of the fairly bare field, but the goats eat theirs (also drying off) in the middle of the day (hay at either end of the day)!
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Mine have pretty much resigned themselves to starving to death ;D