Raising Sheep 101

So our journey began about 2 years ago when I became interested in raising sheep. I have never owned sheep, ate it or even touched a live one for that matter in my entire life. But as I researched homesteading ideas I found a lady that was in Ontario, she had a lot of great insight in raising sheep as a second income to the farm. Here we have always had cattle, hay, chickens and most years pigs to source the farm, but I wanted to learn more about goats and sheep and see what it would be like to raise them. So on to the library I went and there I found a ton of great resources along with the excellent videos they have out there on homesteaders who have raised sheep and the idea began to grow on me. Before long my dad told me some would be coming home, we have a neighbor friend who was into cattle but then decided to raise sheep as that was what he was raised with in Australia where he was from. After mentioning to him my interest in sheep he told my dad I could buy some of his and the deal was made. Now I am going to tell every last person on here DO NOT, I will repeat DO NOT bring home animals before you have the proper set up! I have told myself time and again but in the yard the trailer came when I wasn’t expecting it and there we were scrounging around for fence wire and shelter for them. We set them up with panelling in a tractor like fashion, and they looked great I could hardly believe they were home! They are a dorper- khatadin mix, these breeds have been brought together in their ability to fight off the cold weathers of the frigid Canadian winters, and also are great for their meat growth. I also love these animals for the fact that they are what is called hair sheep, most if not all the hair and fuzz grown for the winter months will fall off in spring and summer eliminating or cutting down on sheering. This was the second summer I had them and with the changes in weather I did have to shear a bit off the backs of some but for the most part on a normal year you don’t have to do a thing nature will take its course like on most animals losing their winter coat. Another huge thing I love is that they are so calm! I mean really calm, oh sure when I get in the pen they may be a bit skittish and run, one thing I was not expecting is how high they can jump when herding them haha but in comparison to cattle it is night and day. A cow can easily run you down and hurt you big time if you are in the wrong place at the wrong time, sheep being so small has been such a difference. I feel I can work with them on my own and that is a huge blessing. When they had first come home, I found instantly we had a problem though, within the first week we went to put them into the barn, where they had walked in themselves each night but one day we came to the barn door to find they were gone! Escaped! We searched everywhere into the night, nothing. Dad told me well they were probably dinner for the coyotes by now, but my mother and I refused to give up. We made a plan to get up at first light and search the country, it was harvest times so I let all the surrounding neighbours know to watch out on their combines for my sheep. Low and behold I got a phone call a little later that morning, “Is this mary?” haha yes they found my sheep! We hopped in the truck with the goose neck trailer and flew down the road, they had gone 5 miles from home. When we got there several men were standing around the pen, they had wrangled them up for me as the sheep sat waiting for their ride home. I thanked them all promising a homemade pie for their efforts and we went home. Now I have learned of my mistakes and now they are in the security of a nice fenced off unit. They have a large open quonset for shelter and they can come and go through their grazing fields. For feed we let them onto green grass through the summer months and then in fall and winter they are fed a bale of timothy/grass/ alfalfa mix. I supplement with a lick that has great vitamins and selenium in it, this has helped hugely when they began to lamb this year, great looking baby lambs were born all healthy and happy. You couldn’t help but smile to see them. Every animal needs 3 major things, 1.Shelter (including fence) lots of room to move about and bedding 2. Feed including vitamins and cold water. 3. Sunlight. If you can supply your animals with these you will do just fine. They are doing great and this experiment of adding sheep to our farm has been a great success. This last weekend I just sold off the lambs at 5.5 months of age the customers were very happy with them and I felt a burst encouragement of the great year. If you are looking to supplement your farm a bit more, sheep are a great asset to the yard in giving a bit more income in other parts of the year aside from hay and cattle seasons.