[Fieldfare]

OK- my 2nd problem is how to catch the last 3 sheep! They are very bright and wild! Anyone got any good ideas on how a catching trap should be designed? These last 3 are refusing come within about 20ft of me at the moment! My trapping pen is a 16ftx4ft Heath Robinson one-door affair. I'm thinking I should invest in some proper galvanised hurdles as I will get a ram later in the year (he would smash this one up I'm sure). How many should I get? Should I go for 6ft or 8ft long? 3 or 4ft high? I'm thinking that a permanent feeding pen placed in the middle of a field similar in design to the diagram below would be good ('I' being the trough) and then when I need to catch them close off one end and then calmy close the other end and 'walk in' the hurdles until I create a small catching pen (I plan to have 15 head at maximum capacity).
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Or make a small one square one with a door on catch closed by a piece of rope from a 'safe' distance?

I think these first lamb chops are going to be the most expensive and complicated meat I will have ever produced!

[Fleecewife]

I have copied this which I wrote for goosepimple a while back on setting up a hurdle pen: <<We took some Hebs and Soays over to Tarbert castle a few years ago to help eat down the rampant vegetation there.  The terrain is impossible to drive over so they had to have a way to catch them.  They set up a pen open on one side and put the food inside - gradually the sheep got used to eating inside the pen.  Then they got them used to people being present when they were eating inside the pen.  Then they slammed the gate shut    After a week or two they forget the betrayal and you can catch them again.  If your Soays are coming up to you goosepimple to be fed, just set up a pen of four 6' hurdles and reverse into it when you are feeding them.  It will take a couple of weeks, but eventually you will get so that you or someone else outside can shut the gate on them.  Some of the adults might jump out initially, but you will have the lambs (you might have to block off the bottom of the hurdles so the lambs don't get under - we use stobs)  Also tie all the hurdles together with rope or twine as the weight of a lot of sheep can push a hurdle pen over.  It's all a case of outwitting the sheep, using their own psychology against them so you understand why they react as they do>>
I set up my hurdle pen at the edge of the field, not in the middle and we have our sheep trained so that we drive them into the pen using electric sheep fencing (not connected up obviously, but set up temporarily each time we need to funnel them into the pen. Sheep which don't know the system are a disaster initially, but they do get the hang of it.  Buy the taller hurdles as they will try to jump out.  We can fit a couple of dozen ewes plus lambs into our pens, made with about 7 x 6' hurdles, with two standing open at one end, so when they are in you can reach to both hurdles and bring them together.  If your sheep are not used to having concentrate it will take a while to get this system to work, as you will need to get them used to the feed first, then start feeding them in a pen, then get to the point where they are comfortable in it with you there, so you can sneakily shut the gates on them.  All this has to be done without shouting and jumping up and down waving your arms, which just causes alarm.  
If you use the sheep netting method, once it's all set up, just try to walk them calmly down the funnel.  Sheep like to see an escape route, so if your hurdles have bars rather than solid sides, they are happier to go in as they think they can get right through.  Try to have enough people to help so that the sheep can't run back past you - once they've seen they can do that they will keep trying.  If they turn around to face you, stop driving them until they look away again - if they are eyeing you up then they are thinking of bolting over your head or straight through you.

[andywalt]

All good advice from fleecewife, I have a pen set up in the corner of the field with some troughs in it, funnelled shape with two sections within it, so you have flexibility with what you want to do, everyday with help from my dog who is not a pro but is a great help, we walk them into the pen to check them so they are very used to it, you find after a few days tey see you and just start walking towards the pen. once you have the pen in the right place and done it a few times it becomes easy, stick at it