Sheep questions

I am a long time horse person.

I have also been bitten by the Border Collie/Sheep bug.

I need to get my little place ready for some sheep...I've never had sheep. I have no idea what to do with a sheep except one end needs to be fed.

I need a sheep primer....fencing, feeding, caring...

I have 5 acres and a barn. The perimeter of my 5 acres is fenced in...I'd call it stallion fencing but...it's the woven wire stuff, with big squares. No top rail. Completely grown over at the moment with honeysuckle and poison ivy, but intact. My neighbours cows are on one side.

Eventually I am going to refence the whole place with 4 board fencing and more of the same wire, so I can use it as emergency horse turn out, too.

The bottom of the bank barn is dirt floored, and too short for horses, it's about 6 feet tall. Do sheep even need that much shelter or would they be happier/healthier with a run-in shed in the field?

I do not intend to get in the sheep business...I am imagining I'll just keep 5 or so, enough to work...and swap them in and out as they get dog broke. Is that reasonable or completely stupid because of the potential disease issues caused by traffic?

Please hold forth, and thank you in advance for anything you feel like sharing.

I worked with sheep some on the ranches up in Wyoming and we did have a barn that was used especially when lambing. So, the barn is a good thing. As for the fence, it sounds like it is ok, especially since you only plan to have a few. One thing I would give you a heads up on is that you can't work sheep like you would cattle. Cattle (and horses) are worked from behind...you "push" them to where you want them to go. Sheep are worked basically from the front - for humans...it's in their nature to run past you. So, as you walk toward them they will run past you and - hopefully - to the area you desire. And depending on the area you're working them in - a large, long, narrow tarp strung across the portion of the pen helps to keep them from going back. They see that as a "fence" and if the wind makes it flap or if you have helpers that can make the tarp flap a little, it will discourage them from running back also. You still need to have someone at the front to get the lambs/sheep to move forward but the helpers with the tarp at the back can move closer to make the pen smaller as the sheep are worked.

It was also important to scrub down the water daily and shake down the bunks containing the food at least once or twice a day.

I'm by no means an expert on sheep but hope that some of this helps. I know the first time I tried to help work sheep I hadn't a clue of how to work with them and it drove me crazy until I learned that they need to be worked from the front. They're dumber then a box of rocks and it takes a bit of patience...but you can do it!

Good luck and enjoy your sheep.

It's my understanding that, while cattle and horses bite off the tops of the grass, etc., to eat, sheep pull the entire plant out to eat. I've never had anything to do with them outside of a petting zoo, so I could certainly be mistaken. But it's something better to know than not.

I've worked with sheep and have never met a stupid sheep in my life, they appear stupid to us when their flocking instinct is in full flow, man made them that way, but they are not stupid creatures!

I would not recommend sheep for anyone who has not worked with them, it's a big learning curve but a small group of a hardy stock might be OK for small holding or pet purposes. You need an excellent back, strong arms, quick reactions, a huge well of patience and a proactive mind to be successful. The vet books are large, sheep invent new diseases every year.

They are also dangerous, people think they are small and so easy to handle but they are often the same weight as an adult human and have a very thick front skull for butting purposes. I've been attacked by a ewe while I was prone and well she knew it. They read faces easily and gauge how quickly a human or other predator can move.

From a welfare point of view, small flocks of sheep can suffer from being worked with a dog, it can become stressful for them and they respond better to humans only.

Sheep don't pull the grass plant out entirely, although very sandy soils and poor rooting may see me wrong on that but they do crop the grass very close to the ground.

This message was edited Dec 20, 2006 3:04 AM

Thank you all for sharing your thoughts.

I reckon if I can keep myself in one piece around breeding stallions and race horse yearlings, I'm probably going to be able to work it out with the sheep. I have a LOT of respect anything that weighs more than me.

Fortunately, the man who is giving me my herding lessons is also tutoring me on sheep, to an extent. He is always careful to point out what I ought to be looking at in terms of stressing out the animals. My lessons are probably 30 mins actual work time and an hour or talking about it. : )

The farm is already set up for horses..the ability to move hay, feed, gates, get trailers and tractors and the vet trucks in and out....we're all good there.

Here is one question...with the square wire fencing running down the perimeter, could I use hot wire to fence off sections of pasture so as to rotate? Or does the wool just ground it right out? I meant to ask him this but he's away for Christmas now and I won't see him for a few weeks..I was going to put my husband to work helping me sort out sheep turn out.

Is hot wire the same as electric fencing?

If it is electric fencing then a lot depends on the individual sheep, breed and wool type can factor in as well as wool growth stage from shearing, or just an animal that ignores electric shocks. Electric fencing is only really additional security and not a stand alone solution. I utterly loathe is as it happens and would only really use it to keep out predators if there was a severe problem rather than to try and keep sheep in.

Sheep can become tangled in electric fencing, especially when there is a dog worrying them. I've known fully trained professional working dogs go off to practice some of their skills when the shepherd isn't about and alone or in teams they can become very aggressive which amounts to sheep worrying.

I wasn't trying to suggest that you personally couldn't handle sheep, what I am saying is that they are often misunderstood creatures and need a different type of handling and care to horses or cattle. I don't think it's fair on the sheep to keep a small flock just to use/train or work dogs on, clearly we're not going to agree on this issue :) but you did ask for opinions and that's mine.

Fair enough.

Trust me, I'd rather be doing it for real, but until I can find a way to make sheep pay what horses do, I'm just going to have to have the sheep as a hobby.

The electric was just supposed to be temporary, I can easily wait until I get the permanent middle fence in in that field. I just want to get them ounded in rather than drill the holes.

I think it's interesting that so many real shepherds are so adamantly against hobby trial-ers. If I am doing it right...taking care of the sheep, taking care of the dog, perpetuating the BC as a working dog, I really don't understand why it's such an issue.

I appreciate your agree to disagree philosophy.....so much so that I invite you to explain to me why this is such a bad idea. I have experienced punters in the horse world and I understand what appears to be the same sense of frustration in real shepherds. Why is this hobby trial-er thing so awful? Particularly if I can do this as an adjunct to an already livestock oriented live style?

I'm really inviting discussion, not looking for a fight, and it seems hopefully we can both manage that. : D

Cheers!

Ahh debate without confrontation is an ideal situation for me *G* I've never known there to be anything cut and dried where animals and plants are concerned.

I think shepherds dislike it because sheep do need a different kind of care to an extent and they do tend to be highly strung. It's ok in larger flocks where dogs are needed, the sheer numbers helps keep the stress down but with a handful of sheep, one or two dogs is often too much.It's a bit like using dogs to herd Arabians or Thoroughbreds for half an hour only not so expensive.

I can't speak for other people but it seems to me that some commercial farmers don't really like any part of their livlihood being treated as a hobby but I think that can be said for many industries and professions that could have a hobby element too :) Then again for some people it's both their hobby and their livlihood!


This message was edited Dec 20, 2006 6:47 PM

When I talked about just having a few sheep, I was really just interested minimizing my care. I have the capacity to handle more. If there is a "safety in numbers" factor, where do you think that line is for sheep, in terms of minimum stress while being worked?

Do I need to have...20? to keep them happy?

The dog I am working (she is a loaner) was an open trial dog. She is 100% reliable on her lie down. I wouldn't work a young dog on my own, any work the young dog does will be under my herding guru's management. : ) in fact, I don't even have a BC of my own at this point. I am just getting my ducks in a row for spring.

I just want to work with a dog...but obviously, I can't do that at the sheeps' expense. So far, I know signs of stress are extreme panting, and tongues out. It was one of the first things I asked to be taught...when to stop.

I am going to do this, but I want to do it right.

So teach on, Baaaaa : ) I am a willing pupil in getting it right for as many people (and by that I mean, sheep, dogs, me, etc) as much of the time as possible.

I've never trained a sheepdog and I've mostly worked with sheep that couldn't be herded (and some were very contemptuous of dogs) so the following is based purely on my sheep experience and not sheepdog. I have worked with a sheepdog on a larger flock but she couldn't understand my accent at first so we worked out some body language signals to get by with *G*

I should imagine though that a lot depends on how well trained the sheepdog is, how the dogs works and how used to dogs the sheep are. If you can locate some sheep that are used to being worked in small groups or (even better I imagine) used as a training flock then you may get away with having a smallish group. I would think a lot would also depend on the breed, some breeds are docile and hardy, others can be a bunch of nutters when the flocking instinct is set off, rushing into fences and generally panicking. Your trainer will better placed to advise you on breeds, numbers and possibly local flocks as I don't know how the American breeds and US versions of the British breeds behave.

The sheep will be labour intensive and if you're not overly interested in sheep then you may find you have to find a sudden interest from somewhere. Do you have any local shepherds? Some might let you use some of their sheep for training or be willing to help you out with the sheep.

http://www.barkingrock.com/sheep101.htm
http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/vetext/INF-SH_CarePrax.pdf

Here are a couple of links for you
:)
Anita

Hey, those links are great!

One thing I did discover is that my horse hay is going to be manna to any sheep...because horses' tums can be so delicate, what I buy for the horses (and will, be default, feed to my sheep because who can be bothered to go out and source more hay when there's really good stuff in the barn?) is going to be yummy goodness for the sheep.

Sometimes people feed sheep hay I would have thrown away without a second glance.

Baa, what makes your sheep so hard to work?

The sheep I am likely to get are whatever my herding teacher culls, just to start. He's had his flock for a long time so even if they are his culls I feel like they's till be pretty superior to what I'm likely to find at, for instance, the local livestock auction. Livestock auctions here in the US are not what they are in the UK...here, my feeling is they are mostly the last, dirty, scary, noisy, disease infested last stop on the way to the knacker's.

He has hair sheep. That eliminates some issues for me....but if I had to, I could deal with shearing...you probably don't know this but my ex-husband works for us.....he's a dab hand with a pair of body clippers, and we both have had shearing lessons...our neighbour keeps a 4H flock and we've helped them. (4H is a U.S. version of Pony Club, but for all kinds of stuff, not just horses...rabbits, chickens, tractors, gardens, etc. Good stuff.)

You are right that I need more interest in the sheep. I am counting on my enthusiasm for working with my dog to carry over once I've got sheep actually here. I imagine if I am lucky enough to get any lambs, my whole family will end up living in the sheep barn and pretty soon there will be sheep everywhere. : ) You always fall in love with what's in front of you, don't you? When you know an animal, care for it....it comes.

I live right outside metropolitan D.C. There aren't any sheep farms...lots and lots of "gentleman's farm"....10 acres, new Barbie Doll houses, commuters. I'm sort of on the outside fringe where development has not (yet) encroached on old family farms. There is a dairy , but precious few...one, in a valley that used to have nothing but.



This message was edited Dec 21, 2006 1:37 PM

Sheep from your herding teacher would be ideal by the sounds of it, no one knows their own animals like their own stockman do they. General livestock auctions are no picnic here either!

I no longer work on farms, I had time out for a year or so and then Foot and Mouth came along and practically wiped out all the jobs for those who'd taken time out. The sheep though were impossible to herd for several reasons, it was an open farm so one lot of mature mixed breeds were very used to humans and weren't worked with dogs, Soays who are an older breed which don't flock well, they tend to scatter and they are often more wary of any predators, the others were the hand reared lambs.

They weren't hard to work you just couldn't herd them, they were too used to humans on an open farm, there were around 40 sheep and 80+ lambs (brought in from other flocks). The Soays would follow a bucket as long as there were only one or two people about and they knew and trusted the bucket holder. The mixed lot would do the same but with less timidness, more in the way of crowding round my knees trying to run and knock the bucket out of my hands at the same time, sheep, humans & food are always a potential fatal or serious injury risk to the human. The hand reared lambs would just follow when they were outside their own paddocks or pens and would cry until I or someone else they knew well turned up if they escaped and found themselves outside their own territory, (some visitors would let them out too). Apart from the near death experiences of the mixed lot, it was a stress free and quick way of moving sheep for all concerned. Small flocks are calmer without dogs. They didn't automatically behave like that of course, it did take some trust building.

is the horse you are on a Appy?

Which horse do you mean?


I have one horse that is a flea bitten grey...from a distance, he's white, but up close, he has tiny brown speckles.

My herding teacher's dog, the one I work with, has come to stay for Christmas.

I accidentally triggered a trick she knows, that I didn't KNOW she knows...

First you have to know, I kill electronics. It just happens. It happens often enough that my husband keeps about two dozen light bulbs, fuses, spare parts, etc, and duplicates of anything key, like coffee machines. I don't know what happens, usually I turn them on and they go "bang".

So, in my house, when things "go bang"...it means I just killed something and he's supposed to go and fix it.

So I walked out of the bathroom just now, and say, "Honey, the night light just went "bang" " and god bless me if that dog didn't fall over as if I'd just killed her.

I honestly stood there for a second thinking......"AAAAAAAH. I KILLED the DOG!!"

But she got up and wagged at me.

: )

LOL what a cute story! and what a good dog pic...she did good :-)