The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: Womble on December 20, 2014, 10:26:16 am
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When we moved here, we inherited a couple of rickety old wooden troughs, which I repaired to remove the sticking out nails etc etc :o . These are the traditional v-type design (http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j216/Blutack/TAS2011/Sheep/trough.jpg), but I've found them to be heavy, slimey, difficult to turn over and generally unpleasant to use!
So, enter Womble's improved design! ;D
(http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j216/Blutack/TAS2011/Sheep/Trough/IMAG2202.jpg)
I've made a couple of these now, and they're working really well. They're lightweight, self-draining, have no sharp edges to hurt the sheep, and they can also get right to the bottom of the trough to eat all the food, unlike with the 90 degree vee design. The other bonus is that they only cost £10-£15 each in materials, and can be made in about an hour if you have powertools available :thumbsup: .
Their weakness is that they aren't robust enough for anything larger than sheep, but since that's all we have, it's not a problem!
To make one, you will need:
- A 3m length of squareline guttering (£6.99 from Screwfix (http://www.screwfix.com/p/square-gutter-3m-black/62710))
- 2" x 4" softwood, approx 4 metres in total (mine was wombled from a skip at work).
- 3" woodscrews
- 1" screws for attaching the gutter. I used 'flanged' (http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j216/Blutack/TAS2011/Sheep/Trough/screws.jpg) screws, which worked really well and left no sharp edges to hurt the sheep
Assembly Instructions:
- Start by cutting the guttering in half - an angle grinder works really well (or use two lengths to make a 3m long trough I suppose!)
- Cut a length of timber 2cm longer than the pieces of gutter.
- Cut four 37 cm ish lengths of wood for the feet. I cut these off at an angle because it was really easy to do with my circular saw, but if you only have a jigsaw or hand saw, just cut them off straight
- Cut two 27.5 cm pieces of wood for the ends. These are sized so they will cover two widths of gutter plus the middle piece of wood.
- You should now have something resembling this:
(http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j216/Blutack/TAS2011/Sheep/Trough/IMAG2172.jpg)
6. If you want to paint any preservative onto the wood, now would be the time!
7. Screw the feet onto the long support plank. Note that the end feet should be flush with the ends of the support.
(http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j216/Blutack/TAS2011/Sheep/Trough/IMAG2179.jpg)
8. Turn the whole thing over and screw the wooden ends on. Note, the top of these should be level with the top of the gutter.
(http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j216/Blutack/TAS2011/Sheep/Trough/IMAG2180.jpg)
9. Now drill pilot holes along one edge of each of your lengths of gutter, just undereath the rim, then screw them into place onto both horizontally into the long plank, and vertically downwards into the feet. There should be a gap of about 1cm at each end of the gutter (which doesn't show well in the photos), to let rainwater drain out.
(http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j216/Blutack/TAS2011/Sheep/Trough/IMAG2183-1.jpg)
10. Add a handle if you happen to have a spare one or two lying around :innocent: .
And that's it! - easy eh? In actual fact, it's taken me as long to write this post as it did to make the trough! ;D
(http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j216/Blutack/TAS2011/Sheep/Trough/IMAG2203.jpg)
If you decide to make one, do let me know how you get on! :thumbsup: .
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Ingenious :thinking: :thumbsup: now if you could just turn your skills to world poverty please. :innocent:
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I made something similar out of 6” perforated drainage pipe cut along its length to make a ‘U’ and screwed it onto feet. I like your design better especially being a double trough. So yep, it’ll being a project after Xmas to make one like yours. thanks
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Ingenious.
We only pay £10-£12 per trough for a 10' wooden one, mind.
One question, can it be turned over after feeding? We find it necessary to do this even with free-draining troughs. It knocks any poo off, any remaining feed drops off too, rather than sitting there and getting caked. It also prevents scavenging birds' poo contaminating the trough. And if it snows, the trough doesn't become (a) full of snow/ice and very unpleasant for the sheep to have to eat from, and (b) iced to the ground and unmovable!
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LOL, you're doing way better than me then Sally - I couldn't buy the materials for a 10' wooden one for that little. Actually, the best price I could find locally for wooden troughs was £35, and since I need three in total, it was worth going to the trouble of making them.
They are actually very easy to turn over, as they are very lightweight. Since the base of the gutter is 2" above ground level, you can just put a hand underneath and lift.
Ingenious :thinking: :thumbsup: now if you could just turn your skills to world poverty please. :innocent:
LOL, if solving proper problems were as easy as screwing bits of wood and plastic together, the world would indeed be a better place. Besides, I have a hay feeder, pig ark and sheep footbath to do first ;) .
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:excited:
This is just what I've been trying to work out for ages.
Thank you.
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idea stolen, i will report back in due course...
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Just as I've been wondering about troughs - great design and really clear instructions - thank you for sharing this!! I think even I can dare to attempt this :thumbsup:
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Here comes the party pooper :celebrate: :celebrate: :celebrate: when it's windy here, even the lumpen wet wooden bought bakies/troughs move around in the wind. Yours being lighter wouldn't last a week here. Sorry Womble - it's ingenious though.
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Our local wood merchant/saw mill sells the troughs for 15 pounds plus VAT - really not worth for us to make our own... and yes ours need to be sturdy too....
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Well I think it's great and am going to try and adopt a smaller version raised for my goats. Although as they tend to stand in everything I'm not sure whether they might break the gutter. Will give it a go, especially if I can pinch some out of a skip!
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I see the 'Mad Loaghtans' are appreciating their new trough!.... I think I will try one too for my Castlemilk Moorit ram as he then can't get his horns stuck in the crosspieces on a metal trough and turn the whole thing over in a panic!
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A few years ago I bought plant troughs from the garden centre, OH put wooden legs on and bob's your uncle. Works a treat for sheep and the pigs. Also use for their water.
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wow nimbusllama - wouldn't want to be messing with Arthur! :o
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Wow, those are some serious horns. Do you dare even let him near wire fencing?
Re the blowing away thing, we're pretty exposed up here too, and it's been very windy for the last week (quite a bit of next door's roof ended up in our field on Friday night for instance). However, the troughs have stayed put ok.
The guttering won't be nearly as strong as a heavy wooden trough (and if you can buy one of those for £15, why wouldn't you?). However, our Zwartbles (including big Mr Ace) have been jumping on the plastic one for a month now with no sign of issues, so I'm not too worried. I just wouldn't use it for anything bigger than a sheep.
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admiring your thrift and recycling skills, but more so your lovely sheepies. brilliant! are they manx or castlemilk or other? whatever they are they are nice. One thing, does the edge of the gutter not fray and become a hazzard to the mouth. i hope not cos i think its a winner otherwise
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Your instructions are perfect. I will give them a go.
Many thanks!
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Ewesaidit.... I try to avoid it if possible, although he has shown no sign of aggression apart from the day I collected him and he was a bit angry! Since then he has been to a show and behaved very well (came first!) as shown in the attached photo.
Womble .... he has a knack of scratching his ear on the wire and then unraveling his horn like doing a metal puzzle... without any panic! although he does test the wooden fencing posts to see if they 'bend' sometimes!
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Womble... forgot to ask, have the Mad Loaghtans settled down yet?
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Hi Graeme, I don't think the plastic will fray, but will keep an eye on it. Yes, the sheep are
Mad Manx Loaghtans.
Nimbusllama - Despite my best efforts, they're still pretty wild I'm afraid. Despite feeding them a very small amount of coarse mix daily in a pen, they won't go in and eat it until I'm at least half a field away, and not looking at them! Lovely sheep, but as long as they view me as a predator, things are never going to be easy :( .
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Here comes the party pooper :celebrate: :celebrate: :celebrate: when it's windy here, even the lumpen wet wooden bought bakies/troughs move around in the wind. Yours being lighter wouldn't last a week here. Sorry Womble - it's ingenious though.
Extend the end two feet by 6 inches, drill half inch holes in the ends of the feet and hammer 2 feet of rebar (in the shape of a walking stick) through them. :thinking:
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OK, having finally had some wind, I reckon I'd better report back!
I deliberately put the two troughs on our most exposed spot at the top of the hill. On Thursday night we lost one tree, a quarter of the greenhouse and a section of dry stone wall. The sheep shelter also broke one of its tie down ropes and swung round through 90 degrees (probably whilst full of sheep!). Thinking positively, we gained plenty of firewood and half a dozen of next door's licky buckets ;D .
HOWEVER, the two troughs were still exactly where I left them, so I consider that test passed! :thumbsup:
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They look the mutts nuts - and an idea to be stolen - thank.
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Well, I made one! :excited:
Thank you to Womble for the onspiration, and the detailed instructions!
(http://)
Mine looks not quite as neat but still quite happy with it, taking into account that I'm pretty much clueless with DIY.
So it took me the best part of 3 hours, plus it turned out to be rather expensive... ::)
Entirely my fault: local builder merchants only does square profile guttering on order. But I wanted to get on with it, and saw some fat grey round guttering standing there in the warehouse, and said 'I'll have that then'. Only when I paid did I realise that this is 'industrial guttering' and 4 times as expensive as the normal stuff :o
Makes for a bigger and heavier trough, but I don't really need that with my Soays.
Oh well. I'm still rather pleased with it, and I learned a few things making it too :thumbsup:
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I use big garden cane .....the really big one the size of 2 gutters glued together,available in garden centres. I cut them down the centre tacked/nailed one to feet and can be turned upside down or hung upside down off the fence. I made it high so they can not jump over it all the time ...or at least less :) To use the other half I made two shaped brackets that the cane trough sits into, & screwed them to the shed wall (out a bit to allow space for horns) . These work great as the cane has cross pieces inside it so these act as stoppers, it prevents the greedy from just hoovering down along the feed. It also can just be turned over. Really really pleased with them
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Hey Womble
don't know how I missed this, but we have some guttering, lots of wood lying round, goats that fight over the diddy trough, must try this, copied your info. thanks.