The Accidental Smallholder Forum

Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: Eastling on March 29, 2011, 11:14:26 am

Title: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: Eastling on March 29, 2011, 11:14:26 am
How much room do you need to keep two sheep?
Title: Re: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: Rosemary on March 29, 2011, 01:01:54 pm
Never mind, WG, open questions give us a chance to explore other issues around sheep keeping with Eastling  ;D and that's always interesting.

Agree with WG, Eastling, have you thought about the questions that WG poses? Fattening a few lambs over the summer would be most straightforward; keeping a flock of wethers or unbred ewes as lawnmowers would be next with breeding sheep the most complicated.
Title: Re: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: Shawn on March 29, 2011, 02:20:16 pm
Good stupid question Eastling it saved me asking it also a good answer WG so if prepairing to bread this autumn i guess you will still only need one acre but have  options to expand it for the new additions?? we are planning to bread our two sheep this year and expand the flock over time and send some for slaughter. we have two sheep and two goats on 2 acre at the moment but we do have an option to increase the grassing how is all this best achieved. can they have too much grassing ?????
Title: Re: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: sjw on March 29, 2011, 04:02:45 pm
Thanks for this advice, cos I've been pondering the same question! If I were to split up a 1 acre paddock as suggested, could this be done with electric fencing for sheep, or would I need to put up more permanent stock-fencing to divide the two half-acres effectively? Not sure whether electric fence is any good for keeping sheep in or not!
Title: Re: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: Eastling on March 29, 2011, 04:08:59 pm
The reason I asked is we are doing a landshare and the person interested in having the land originally wanted to keep chickens and grow veg, then to keep 3 goats and now has said she wants to keep two sheep!!! I don't think there is enough land for all.
Just wanted peoples opinion as we don't have any experience with sheep. So that was the reason for the generic question!!
The whole area is about  60 x 20 metres
Title: Re: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: Eastling on March 29, 2011, 04:11:04 pm
Thank you for your replies this does help and I shall now say no to the sheep as I was concerned for thier welfare.
Title: Re: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: SussexRanger on March 29, 2011, 05:26:54 pm
I wouldn't keep 2 sheep on that space :) good decision
Title: Re: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: Freddiesfarm on March 29, 2011, 06:22:47 pm
In reply to the elctric question bit - all my sheep are fenced with electric - 2 strands or three if there are some naughty sheep in the field!

I rent about 100 acres and can't afford to sort all the fencing out for someone else so electric works a treat but it can depend on your breed and also how much fleece they have as we all now what a good insulator it can be!
Title: Re: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: sjw on March 29, 2011, 06:41:13 pm
Thanks FF. I'm looking at getting Ryelands, which I hear are not as prone to gymnastic-antics as some others, but they do look pretty well-fleeced!
Title: Re: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: cheryl on March 29, 2011, 06:43:59 pm
sjw - a friend of mine keeps ryelands, they seem to be experts at getting underneath an electric fence, probably because of the wool on their head - she shaves the naughty ones lol!
Title: Re: Minimum amount of land for sheep
Post by: sjw on March 29, 2011, 06:51:10 pm
Oh dear... That sounds like it could be a bit epic. Thanks for the warning! Guess as long as the fencing around the whole perimeter was good and I just used the electric fencing to sub-divide and strip-graze, I could take my chances...!