English Shepherd as Poultry Guardian

[centrarchid]

Those can be pretty skiddish. Hopefully they settle in quickly.

The guy I bought them from used a lasso to catch them. The sheep tried to dodge his rope.

I'm pretty close to a novice with sheep. I have held them while fecal samples were taken and when they were scanned for fetal development. Both settings had sheep confined to shoots.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

The guy I bought them from used a lasso to catch them. The sheep tried to dodge his rope.

I'm pretty close to a novice with sheep. I have held them while fecal samples were taken and when they were scanned for fetal development. Both settings had sheep confined to shoots.

I was actually thinking of Barbados sheep instead of Katahin. So hopefully they are more manageable than I was imagining. My sheep experience is with bottle raising a few Suffolk, and Dorset back in the day. I went with goats only eventually.

 

[centrarchid]

I was actually thinking of Barbados sheep instead of Katahin. So hopefully they are more manageable than I was imagining. My sheep experience is with bottle raising a few Suffolk, and Dorset back in the day. I went with goats only eventually.

I thought about sheep only for a while. Brush management though was going to be more fun using goats.

 

[aart]

Brush management though was going to be more fun using goats.

Not to mention much more effective...
....sheep graze the ground, goats eat above the ground.

 

[alwaystj9]

Yeah, goats are browsers and eat more at head height, eating habits are closer to deer. Sheep will scour the earth grazing. I have always been surprised that 2 species that look very similar - goats and sheep - can be so very different in feeding and handling. Not to upset the sheep fans but goats are way smarter, all sheep in a herd appear to share one brain. I seem to have spent a lot of time trying to keep individual sheep and goats from trying to kill themselves in new and exciting ways. (I worked as a shepherd in CO in the 80's and have had my own herd of goats here in Louisiana for 30 years.)

 

[centrarchid]

I'm all about trophic niches in pastured production animals. Bigger concerns for me is keeping sustainable browse and controlling impacts of word burden ideally without use of dewormers. There will be a lot of pasture rotation and intensive bouts of grazing to get animals on and off a given piece of ground quickly.

 

[alwaystj9]

I run a mostly closed herd and worm rarely (by fecal checks). My goats are currently eating a lot of bamboo, I haven't started haying yet. My biggest challenge is minerals, especially copper and selenium. Best wishes on your herd-building and I enjoy reading your threads!

 

[Perris]

intensive bouts of grazing

is that what's otherwise known as mob grazing?

 

[centrarchid]

is that what's otherwise known as mob grazing?

Yes, mob grazing.

 

[Perris]

that's catching on in some quarters here. There's a lot of misunderstanding about it too though.