Author Topic: Feeding (Read 1413 times)

NewLifeOnTheFarm · « **on:** December 17, 2019, 08:13:25 am »

Hi all, hope you are all well.

So my growing flock now consists of 40 hopefully pregnant ewes, a mixture of Shetland, NCC and 1 fat Ryeland. And 40 of this year's Shetland lambs.

All now have hay adlib. My plan was to give the lambs a combined mineral/feed bucket through Jan/Feb, they will be being finished as hogget.

A few people locally seem to have mineralised feed buckets out now, and I know they aren't due lambs until April. I wasn't intending to give any feed buckets of nuts to ewes until 6-8 weeks pre lambing. So now I worry I am underfeeding.

Should I be putting buckets out now and supplementing with nuts closer to lambing?

I am doubting myself a bit. This year our lambs were pure Shetlands and pure cheviots, the Cheviots had no extra feed at all as they were bought in as empty Hoggs, supposedly. All did well. This year we have used a beltex X bleu du Maine ram, so I'm cautious about oversized lambs.

Sorry for rambling! All advice welcome.

Thanks
Cx

twizzel · « **Reply #1 on:** December 17, 2019, 08:19:39 am »

What’s your grass situation like? If there’s plenty of grass you shouldn’t need to feed April lambing ewes for a while yet. My ewes are lambing mid feb and have a hard Crystalyx energy bucket as the weather has been pants and they normally scan quite high (will find out Thursday). They don’t have oceans of grass as just coming to the end of a field, will be moved after scanning.

Ewe lambs have plenty of old permanent pasture grass and an energy and protein feed block. They are maintaining condition on this. It’s difficult to tell with lambs but you might need more than a bucket to finish them in jan or feb. Might be worth putting them on some hard feed as well or instead of the feed bucket.

NewLifeOnTheFarm · « **Reply #2 on:** December 17, 2019, 08:44:18 am »

Thanks, pregnant ewes have just been moved onto oceans of grass, so sounds like they will be fine for a while yet.

Ewe lambs are being kept as breeders, so as long as they are healthy they don't need to be pushed. Have decent grass, 19 lambs in a 8 acres. Ram lambs are on 16 acres of mixed grass, some lush regrowth, other rough pasture, and will be kept on until August time ish so plenty of time to finish on good grass?

I always get nervous at this time of year, that I'm going to make a terrible mistake that will have major ramifications for the year ahead!

Thanks again

twizzel · « **Reply #3 on:** December 17, 2019, 08:55:49 am »

Sounds like they will do just fine as they are until the grass runs out

shep53 · « **Reply #4 on:** December 17, 2019, 09:23:04 am »

From your description they should all be fine , you have breeds that can put on condition very easily and have been bred to live on grass ( hill northies not park northies ? yes ) Are you scanning ? IT would be good if you learnt to condition score ( you can find charts on line ) then you can easily recognise any that are losing condition and treat accordingly .

NewLifeOnTheFarm · « **Reply #5 on:** December 17, 2019, 09:41:41 am »

Yes, hill northies, thank you both for confirming my thinking, just a momentary freak out!

Bramham Wiltshire Horns · « **Reply #6 on:** December 20, 2019, 04:59:31 pm »

ive had a lick bucket in for a while but moved ewes onto 10 acres shared with Horse so plenty of grass

i suppose just keep an eye on there condition if they look like they need owt then do so

any gimmers should be ok on the bucket and hay when the weather hard and ground frozen,

i went mad on feed last year as i was new to the game but this year ive cut my costs down to a 3rd of what i spent last year, if im honest they dont look much different to last year