People who have sheep to live with their horses....

ElleSkywalker

ElleSkywalker

As excited as Kitty about to be a bridesmaid
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.... How do you go about things like foot trimming, worming, shearing etc?

I have always borrowed sheep off a friend for a few months year but now have moved and so far not spotted any sheep farmers in the area. This also means that for the above I won't be able to just 'take them along to the local farmer'

Ideally I'd like to just borrow a few, but if not I don't mind having a couple of my own, most people in the village with horses seem to have a few but not enough that they could loan me any :rolleyes3:

Should add I do have a holding no and will sort a flock no once have decided if am getting my own or not :)

Custard creams for all :biggrin3:

Elle
 
I learnt from an experienced farmer tbh, so you have options - find a friendly farmer, offer them help in return for some of their wisdom - go on a smallholders type course, I often see them advertised - there are lots of great books about, always useful for common problems.

Shearing is highly skilled, I personally always had the chaps from New Zealand in to shear, but then I had 350 sheep.

Miss my sheep, highly recommend Mules :)
 
I have a small flock

I trim the feet myself, its very easy and you can learn from You Tube I expect though I got someone to properly show me and would recommend that 100%

Worming is also easy if you have a solid headlock and a syringe fitted with a long dispenser, wormer costs quite a bit but nowadays you can usually get what you need in small quantities (like a litre!) as opposed to giant bottles and it normally has a shelf life

You need stuff for fly strike, like the above its expensive but does keep

I have a 'travelling' shearer who comes to shear my sheep, he specialises in small jobs like this and puts you down on his list and contacts you when he will be in the area, you get little choice on day/time but he is very reliable and does always turn up. Shearing costs me much more than someone who keeps sheep on a large scale but that's the drawback of a small flock

If you choose not to lamb your sheep they can be incredibly low maintenance. Fencing needs to be good and they may turn their noses up at the sort of hay you get for your horse

Lots of people start with cade lambs but these can become menaces as adult sheep and what was cute and endearing in a lamb is certainly not when they weigh several tens of kilos! plus the cost of powdered milk is high and as with any young animal there is a risk of problems (having said that we inevitably end up with a couple of sob stories every bloody year!)

I would suggest starting with two or three adult sheep from a small flock that will have had regular handling and that have had every chance of good health with regular worming etc

If you have a local smallholder society its worth joining that for help and support

online you have Accidental Smallholder which is a very useful forum full of really helpful people
 
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Gave up on sheep - too testing for the fencing! Even now I look at commercial flocks kept in by three strands of wire and wonder why mine would just have jumped it. Perhaps having them in a field with showjumps in gave them ideas :(
 
jemima*askin said:
Gave up on sheep - too testing for the fencing! Even now I look at commercial flocks kept in by three strands of wire and wonder why mine would just have jumped it. Perhaps having them in a field with showjumps in gave them ideas :(
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Very likely! I too gave up with sheep, too testing generally. Bloody things were always escaping, grass being permanently greener on the other side no matter where I put them. Perhaps they try to escape more when there are only a few of them as they need to be in a flock?

We sheered ours ourselves. First tried borrowing big sheep shears from a friend, but it is really tricky to do it without cutting them - and boy do they bleed :( So we bought a little pair of hand shears from a smallholder catalogue, a bit like basic secateurs with longer blades, and we did them by hand, one at a time (and a day off in between for our backs to recover).

Didn't take much longer to do them than the carnage we caused with electric ones, and we left a collar of wool around their necks so we could still grab them while we did it. Fleece wasn't much use to anyone though by the time we finished!
 
jemima*askin said:
Gave up on sheep - too testing for the fencing! Even now I look at commercial flocks kept in by three strands of wire and wonder why mine would just have jumped it. Perhaps having them in a field with showjumps in gave them ideas :(
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Need to pick the right breed something like a romney you will keep in with a single wire ,Herdwicks would escape with prison fencing
 
Thanks chaps. Love the idea of sheep with showjumping ambitions :biggrin3: but wouldn't want one tho ;)

Funny you should say herdwicks are monsters, there are 3 or 4 directly opposite me. I've ridden past a few times to see their wee heads stuck in the fencing.........

I know there are a few breeds that shed on their own but guess they are quite primative breeds so might be hard to keep in :rolleyes3:
 
popsdosh said:
Need to pick the right breed something like a romney you will keep in with a single wire ,Herdwicks would escape with prison fencing
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Agree with this. Mine will only dive for freedom if the electric fence battery runs down, they have never bothered with the external fencing though, mine are Shetlands and Texel
 
ElleSkywalker said:
I know there are a few breeds that shed on their own but guess they are quite primative breeds so might be hard to keep in :rolleyes3:
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Shetlands will shed however they don't do this till much later in the year so if left are at risk of fly strike in the warm weather so I get them sheared. The guy I use is the 'Singing Shearer' on the Accidental Smallholder forum
 
WelshD said:
The guy I use is the 'Singing Shearer' on the Accidental Smallholder forum
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Can't really help, but would just like to second the 'Singing Shearer'. He came to do ours last year & plan to use him again this year! Yes it costs a bit (we only have two), but definitely worth it to save our backs!!
 
ElleSkywalker said:
Thanks chaps. As a matter of interest how much is the shearing by that chap?
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I want to say £40 for our 2 (so £20 per sheep), but he did say the more you have the more it goes down per sheep. For us it was well worth the cost as we had done them ourselves the previous year, & even though the local sheep farmer commented on our good job, I could barely stand up for days (& I'm only 27!!)
 
We are on our second lot of three. The first were a Ryeland ewe and her two ewe lambs, the first year we sheared the ewe with hand shears, it took a day and a half! We did get faster at it and eventually got some electric shears. I spin our own wool, so it doesn't matter too much if it's a bit bitty :) We now have three ewes who were 'orphan lambs', to avoid strike we use spot on (and use it on the horses too). Feet we trim only when necessary and have, on rare occasions, persuaded the farrier to trim their feet :D Ours are contained by dry stone walls. They have shelter, which they can choose to use, or not. When the innevitable happens we take them up to kennels, it is as well to have a plan (and a tractor with a bucket!) of how you are going to move them then, as they are very, very heavy!
 
When we had one die we took it to the local animal crem., ours is Cremtor at Newton Abbot. Shearing generally costs us a couple of quid per sheep, we stick our in the horse trailer and takes them to a neighbours when the mobile shearer is coming - they stay in the trailer for shearing. Ours are Jacobs, fairly docile. We can leave the gate open and they won't leave 'home'. In your shoes I would do a bit of research, some breeds seem to be very high maintenance re feet trimming!
 
There are many sheep breeds that shed their coats so require little shearing if any. If they really need it, you can just shear a strip around the back end to prevent fly strike. Takes a lot of practise to be able to do it quickly and hold them properly but worth learning. Its easy enough to make a head stock for strip shearing and worming and stores like patch and acre and Hadrian online sell wormers at reasonable prices. I have five retired balwen welsh black breeding ewes that i purchased from a gentleman on river cottage forum who was changing his breeding lines. They suit me as are small, low maintenance and don't wreck my fencing and are very friendly so the kids can play about with them and they quite enjoy the fuss. A great place to look for breed advise as is the National Sheep Association and rare sheep breeders guild as well as country small holdings website and river cottage forums.
 
ElleSkywalker said:
Thanks chaps. As a matter of interest how much is the shearing by that chap?

Also what happens when one of your sheep forfils it's life long ambition........and dies?! :eek3:
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I think I paid £50 last year but I only had five sheep then, I would imagine he has a system based on the callout and travel costs and works in the number of sheep

When one of my sheep died I called up trading standards or Defra (cant remember which) and they gave me three numbers of local companies that collect dead livestock, its quite expensive to have one taken away, I think we paid £60
 
kez81 said:
There are many sheep breeds that shed their coats so require little shearing if any. If they really need it, you can just shear a strip around the back end to prevent fly strike. Takes a lot of practise to be able to do it quickly and hold them properly but worth learning. Its easy enough to make a head stock for strip shearing and worming and stores like patch and acre and Hadrian online sell wormers at reasonable prices. I have five retired balwen welsh black breeding ewes that i purchased from a gentleman on river cottage forum who was changing his breeding lines. They suit me as are small, low maintenance and don't wreck my fencing and are very friendly so the kids can play about with them and they quite enjoy the fuss. A great place to look for breed advise as is the National Sheep Association and rare sheep breeders guild as well as country small holdings website and river cottage forums.
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Should say I am extremely lucky that my horses and sheep are sheared and foot trimmed along with the farmers own flock so it only costs me a few pints down pub. I am sure they appreciate it as my shearing efforts were as god awful as my horse clipping, everyone looked like wearing mini skirts!
 
Thanks everyone. Would still rather borrow some but if I do have to buy some I might go for Portlands. Saw some at a rare breed farm and the info said something along the lines of 'they are stroppy' which coupled with the fact they are ginger too appeals.......:biggrin3:

*Disclaimer* I will of course research properly and not just get some fleecey versions of my horse......:biggrin3:
 
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