[Blackbird]

Am new to sheep (had them 3 weeks) and waiting for my copy of  Tim Tyne's book (hopefully on its way for my birthday in a week or so) and my Sheep Husbandry course on 1st September. Daffodill, my 10 year old GFD ewe has an overgrown foot (nearside hind), but only on one half of the foot - the inner half as it were. The rest of her feet are fine so not sure why just half of one foot has overgrown. It's also slightly cracked but doesn't seem to be troubling her at the moment.

Daffodill is roughly the size of a hippo and has a similar temperament. Turning her over is out of the question so we will need to tether her to treat her in any way. I'm wondering whether to treat her foot as a novice, lifting it as if paring a horse's hoof and very carefully taking away a small bit of overgrowth at a time or wait until after my course (which covers foot trimming).  It's mainly the cracking that concerns me - if it cracks a lot, I guess it could let infection in? Like everyone else, our ground is wet and soggy in all the rain.  Any thoughts welcome 

[SteveHants]

Personally, I don't trim if the animal isn't limping.

[Foobar]

Current research is suggesting no trimming unless very overgrown.  So, I'd trim, a little, just to level the bottom of the foot out a bit. Don't go mad, you can always do more later.
and yeah, do it like you would a horse, if she's as big as a horse .  I do it this way sometimes. It helps to get a knee under the bent leg (or brisket, depending on front or rear) too to give a bit of support on the lifted corner if they seem unsteady or are wriggling, mind tend to stand better for me if I do that.

[Dougal]

The best advice I could give is it is time to learn how to drop a heavy sheep on its backside! It's actually not as difficult as first you'd think. If you get your left arm around her brisket in below her chin so you can lay the palm of your left hand on her shoulder and wit the right hand reach around and in below her. Grip the slack skin in front of her teats, bend your knees a little and straighten up bringing your left arm up further than your right. She'll be sat on her backside real easy. You'll be able to get to all her tootsies nice and easy. This will will work well on lighter sheep as well.
If her foot is over grown then it would be better trimmed a little to make sure bigger problems are prevented. If that claw is over grown it will alter the weight distribution throughout her hips and legs and can cause problems later especially since tupping is not far away.
Hope that can all be of a little help to you. The method I've described here is the one that I use for tipping rams. I can drop pedigree suffolk rams weighing over 170kg and I'm not an olympic weiht lifter for strength so I'd encourage you to give it a go.