Fed for sheep

[freewheat]

I have been trying to find info on what
grains can be fed to flush ewes. I find
little info on wheat feeding for sheep. I
do have some oats, but could I use wheat
as well? Any limitations as to % of
ration, etc...???

Hope someone shows up on this slow forum..

[DogPatch]

Whichever grain you use, don't grind it. Whole works best. If I had my choice, I would choose barley myself. It has a better balance of fiber, energy and protein than the others. Oats, are high in fiber, lower in energy. Wheat is higher in protein, energy, but lower in fiber. Sheep don't need a hugh amount during flushing. They just need to be at a plane of nutrition higher than what they were at before. Like fall pasture-grass grazing, coming into a bit of barley and a little better hay.

[Smithy]

Great answer, Dogpatch. I feed mine 1/2 lb. of barley for 3-4 days, 3/4 lb for the next 3-4 days and then a lb. a day for the last week before breeding. I keep feeding about 1/2 lb. a day for the next week or so depending on how fat my ewes are. They get the grain on top of their normal ration of hay. I have finn cross ewes and my lambing rate is always over 2. (2.46 last year)

[freewheat]

Thanks guys! I have only wheat and oats,
maybe I will blend them a bit. I will not
roll it either. Reading these things in a
book is one thing; Hearing from real life
sheep guys is so much more comforting. I
will need to find some barley. Thanks.

[Smithy]

A blend of wheat and oats would probably work just fine. Like DogPatch said, the idea is just to increase their plane of nutrition a bit for a few weeks.

[kato]

Interesting. I gave mine oats, since that's what I have. I also bought a lick tub two weeks ago, which they're loving. A friend told me that keeping the minerals up is pretty important right now, and they pay a lot more attention to the tub than they did to their boring old sheep mineral.

The ram's been out for three days now, and as of yesterday he had three out of thirteen bred. I guess in the spring we'll see how well it worked. They're all ewe lambs, so I'm not expecting a lot of twinning, but my smallest one was bred yesterday, so that's looking good for the bigger ones. So far so good.

Now here's my question... With our cows, it's a routine procedure to give them all Vitamin AD shots in the winter. I've never seen anything written about sheep getting them. Should they be having an injection?

[Smithy]

I free feed a winter mineral mix with A, D & E in it and don't give them an injection. My ewes are out in the sunshine all day and have access to bush and trees that they do nibble on in the winter.

[kato]

I'm pretty sure there's vitamins in the lick tub. I'll have to check my minerals.

Thanks.

[freewheat]

Where do you folks get your mineral from?
I am using a small block from peavey mart
for sheep specifically.

[kato]

Local feed mill. It's made by Eastman Feeds in Manitoba. The lick is Feedrite.

[Smithy]

The mineral I use is a custom formula for our area from Champion in Westlock. It has no copper and extra selenium because our soil (and hay) has very little. It also has the A, D & E added.

[DogPatch]

Keep an eye on your Ca to P Most sheep minerals for some reason are pretty close to 1:1. Grass hays, and grain are both in excess of P (compared to Ca). In combination you will experience problems during lambing especially if you have other stresses like the weather happening. Keep your high alfalfa content forages for around lambing time. Since a sheep's stomach capacity is greatly reduced if she is carrying twins plus, you might have to expect to supplement with another high Ca food.

[DogPatch]

Kato...... since you have a good starter flock, a good way to get Vitamin ADE into them, is through a water trough. Liquid ADE should still be available at your local outlets. Some sheep might not drink water, as most ewes I know would prefer to eat snow.....

[grassfarmer]

Interesting for me as a former sheep guy. All the talk
of mineral supplements and lick tubs and such. We
had 5-600 ewes a year over my and my fathers
lifetime and we never fed minerals - millions of other
sheep in the UK would be the same and the soils are a
lot more leached and mineral deficient there than in
Western Canada. Only thing we supplemented was
cobalt put in the worm dose for fattening lambs in
the fall and copper injection to the pregnant ewes 2cc
x 2 doses two months apart to prevent swayback.
Copper doesn't poison sheep if you are on copper
deficient land.
Lick tubs for sheep are the same as cattle lick tubs -
a real expensive way to supplement energy.

[kato]

The lick tub is short term, for a pre-breeding flush, so to speak. I guess we'll find out at the end of April if it worked or not. All thirteen ewes seem to have caught on the first breeding, and considering half of them were bottle feds, and the ram is the same age as them, I'm pretty happy with that. I wasn't even sure if they'd cycle in time, but I guess I must have done something right.