breeds

[kato]

My husband, cattle guy through and through, was not convinced when I said I wanted sheep. He humoured me though, mainly because we have a lot of wasted potential grazing around the yard, and he saw the benefit of making use of it. We were amazed when we measured the farm yard, and it was 13 acres. And that's without even looking for pasture that the cows were using. Lots of room to expand around here. This first year is small in order to find out if we even like having them.

What surprised him the most was that he actually likes the sheep. He was prepared, and planning not to, but the little critters won him over. If I can turn a profit with this crop of lambs, then he will be convinced totally. Then the flock can grow.

Coyotes are not a worry with five donkeys (my other sideline) in the yard. The local coyotes know where the fences are, and stay on their own side. My jack has them trained. LOL

[tweaker101]

Kato... I keep getting asked by my wife when can
we get some sheep by reading some of the posts
on here I think we can proceed... Just need to
attend a sheep class? And throw up some fence.
As I read the posts about fencing I'm guessing
just spend he money and put up page wire
fence?. I think I would have the sheep separate
from our cows ...could only imagine what the area
folks would say...lol....they thought I was crazy for
bale grazing this winter...so ya back to the sheep
an cows together... Na I'm thinking it would be
one big shit show.....cows and sheep doing figure
eights around the wife and I...and her yelling at
me....separate pastures is the plan..

[Bez]

Breeds - well, we run a main family of Rideau Arcotts. These are pure bred registered. Familiy #1

We cross them with registered Dorsett to get the second family (F1) - We keep all the females out of this group to provide replacements and we sell the ram lambs. Once we get to where we want to be - somewhere around 400 breeding ewes, we will sell everything except the replacements. Family #2

We keep the F1 girls and breed them to Texel. We sell everything we get from this family. Family #3

While I do not care what breed you run, I do believe you need to count upon a multiple birth scenario or you will simply carry on and not make the profit you would like to make.

We do breed out of season and for that reason we went with Arcott - known for that ability. There are others that do this as well. If you do want to make money in sheep, I believe you need to have this ability - it allows you to have anuimals for sale year round.

We routinely have triplets and sometimes we have quads. This does mean a little more management - but (ducking!) what are wives and kids for anyways? LOL

If a first timer gives us a single - she gets a diagonal line drawn through the box beside her number. If she gives us a twin or better the next time around she is forgiven. If she gives a single the second breeding the next diagonal line means she goes to the big pasture in the sky.

Breed for multiples and you will make money

Finally - they go well with cows. We run them together at times with no trouble at all. When we want to catch them we go and put a pail of grain in the middle of a panel pen and they all come in through an opening that is too small for the cattle to enter - we cut the bottom off of one panel - run them into the trailer and away we go.

Best to all

Bez