[Connor]

How do I keep them warm atm they will be lambing in a polytunnel so should I put them in the polytunnel at night or just put them in it when they are lambing??

[bizzielizzie66]

Hi !

Sheep on the whole are very hardy so don't worry too much about keeping them warm - their fleeces do that. .
Polytunnels don't have the best ventilation (and can be humid) sometimes and can therefore cause respiratory problems - so I wouldn't bring them in at night as a matter of course. Keep it for lambing and only then for as short a time as you can. 

Do they have access to natural shelter (a good tree line) or a field shelter? Some sort of shelter from constant rain and heavy snow is good - but there are plenty of sheep out there that do just fine up on the hills where shelter is in short supply.  Mollycoddling them can cause more problems than just leaving them to it.   Have fun with your sheep 

[SallyintNorth]

The worst place for sheep is an enclosed unventilated space.

The second worst is a flat fenced field with no natural or other shelter.

Sheep on the hills can use the natural terrain for shelter; rough pasture affords a great deal of shelter until well-meaning smallholders / farmers destroy all the rushes and other natural shelter.  Walls and hedges are good shelter too, provided they offer a face to each likely wind direction.

If you have only a flat fenced field with no natural or other shelter, you can provide shelter in a number of ways, including:

• straw bales to shelter behind
• corrugated panels attached to the fences as windbreaks
• old tractor tyres

and, at risk of labouring a point, it if has rushes, don't remove them all, they're great shelter .

[Anke]

Put a long fence post in the ground and make a cross out of pallets, with another fence post at each end. All well wired together of course. Protects from all directions.

[Marches Farmer]

You could house at night, or not, depending on the weather.  Are they biddable enough for you to get a ewe inside if she looks like lambing during the day?  I'm a big fan of lambing under cover, not being fond of crawling around a wet field in the middle of the night stopping the first of twins wandering off into the gloom.  I view my job as ending up with as many live ewes and lambs as possible.  I know all about the "My ewes lamb outside at 1500 ft in temperatures of -15" school of thought.  What they don't tell you is that they routinely lose 22% of the lambs.  Lamb 'em inside and put the lambs out as soon as you're sure the ewe has mothered up, has milk and the lambs have been ringed.  Keeping them inside is pneumonia waiting to happen.

[Rosemary]

I bring mine in about a week before the first is due to lamb and they go out with the lambs 12-48 hours after lambing. As long as they have plenty forage - digesting it creates body heat - and some shelter they will be fine.

Don't bring them in wet - they warm up, start to sweat and steam then you get respiratory problems - hence the difficulty of bringing them in at night and out in the day. Inevitably, you'll be bringing them in wet some nights at least.

I agree with MF for exactly the same reasons - lamb indoors if it's an option 

[moony]

You certainly wont have to worry about keeping your sheep warm in a poly tunnel. Quite the opposite. You will be surprised how warm they get inside. Agree with everyone else that ventilation is the key. If there is limited ventilation bringing them in will cause more problems than it saves. We personally lamb outdoors and have found it much more successful although it does involve more walking from a management point of view than having them all together inside.. We have dry stone walls that they use for shelter and also place a few small bales of straw in an L- shape that they can use as shelter if they so wish. If there is a problem we put the ewe and lamb(s) inside somewhere, if not they stay out. Find the ewes are much less stressed outdoors and as a result the lambing process seems to be quicker and easier. If you do want them inside to lamb bring them in a week before so they settle and put them out as soon as possible afterwards.

[goosepimple]

Yes ventilation, and it shouldn't be warmer inside, it should just be out of the wet and the wind.  Get yourself Tim Tyne's sheep book for Christmas, it tells you everything you need to know about woolies   

[jaykay]

I make pallet shelters, as described, for during the winter. They can shelter from the wind and the worst of the driving rain like this.

There are some very nice drystone-wall Y or X shaped shelters up on the fell that do the same job. One day maybe.

I bring my ewes under a roof for lambing, they're in a couple of days before and then in pens with their lambs for 3-4 days, and then still with access to the barn after that for a couple of weeks, depending on the weather. Barn very well ventilated, and door always open.

Someone down the dale rigs a 'dining shelter' ie a large tent roof, with no sides, but hay bales around the perimeter, for lambing.

[Victorian Farmer]

It's very difecult to no when in the end of march the forecast was for snow and wind not to bad I thort .The snow started at dinner no problem .8 pm 80 miles an houre wind it was that bad that if I went out I wouldent get back .By 6 pm the drifts were 10 foot it took till 11 am to get out the croft .in the field there were nothink no sheep nothink I thort haw meney should be there be 60 for sale 40 im keeping the dog found most 60 dead but there was 1 berried for 7 days and lived .so you never no Whots right or wrong .

[lachlanandmarcus]

I use pallets in fields without shelter and make a noughts and crosses board, using stakes and baler twine to secure. This is very stable and the wind can get through the little gaps so it doesnt get moved by the wind, it also provides shelter from all directions.


I lamb outside always but bring in mum and lambs as soon as poss afterwards to allow lambies to get dry and castrate the boys. However if it's ewe lamb or twin ewe lambs and the weather is great I sometimes leave them out.


If brought in they are in our stone steading which due to being a bit decrepit has 'ample' ventilation opportunities! However this is due to become part of the house (has PP, it's attached to the house) so this year we got a 25x12 field shelter with big ventilation slats for use for lambing. There's a central partition but this swings back flat against the back wall if you want it as one big space.


Our sheep are hardy Shetlands tho and never happier than when outside, even in dodgy weather.

[Marches Farmer]

Another thing you need to watch for when lambing outside is the predators. Foxes, of course, and badgers are just as bad.  A few years ago ravens were coming down when my neighbour's ewes had the first of their lambs and tucked it away under the hedge while having the second.  They pecked out the eyes, tongue, umbilicus and anus of the first born.  No choice but to end their suffering.

[SteveHants]

Another thing you need to watch for when lambing outside is the predators. Foxes, of course, and badgers are just as bad.  A few years ago ravens were coming down when my neighbour's ewes had the first of their lambs and tucked it away under the hedge while having the second.  They pecked out the eyes, tongue, umbilicus and anus of the first born.  No choice but to end their suffering.

My landlord has a massive outdoor pig unit next to the downs where I lamb - there are thousands of crows who will take a lamb, and yet my losses were nothing like the 22% you mentioned earlier. I wonder if you have to have the right ewe, I have known mine to be pushing the first to suck whilst having the second. They also don't seem to have them under hedges/in copses much, although there are plenty to lamb in, they lamb on a vantage point often, right out in the open.


Laming outdoors in April seems to have similar mortality rates to indoor lambing earlier in the year - its just that you can see the things  that kill your lambs when you do it outside. Having said that, I think you either do one or the other properly, half measures dont work; ie if you are going to lamb inside, do it when it is cold enough to minimise microbial problems, bring the ewes in for a good while pre-laming for immunities etc. If you are going to lamb outside, do it in April/May, do it extensiveley, don't panic and shove the ewes in a small field, give them space and try not to touch the lambs (All my terminal lambs now don't get bothered by me at all until they are a month old, unless they are stuck/sickly etc I just look from a distance NO POKING).

[lachlanandmarcus]

We have lots of crows but no problems to date from them. However I have lost a small twin lamb soon after birth to a golden eagle (!). None to foxes but I do try to lamb in a field with a 7 foot fence. However I don't think that is a complete protection as foxy took a gander from inside it. However the Shetlands are excellent mothers and protect both single and twin lambs fiercely, they really love their lambs.

[SteveHants]

Never lost a lamb to a fox - here crows are the only things that will outright kill a lamb, we have ravens (a lot of them), buzzards, badgers but they will only take a lamb when its down its crows that will actually knock them down if they look a bit slow.