- Location
- Highland
Seriously I think you'd be netting maybe £10/lamb sold. If you don't factor in any salary. 
. Seriously. Genuinely. Really.
It's simple. Add up the cost of your meds for each ewe for two worm doses, three fluke doses, 2 VitE injections, four fly treatments, two vaccinations, 2 ewe boluses, and dipping. 2-3 dosing guns and 2 injectors. Plus quad fuel. Plus a half kilogram of feed per day coming up to and after lambing. 50 bales of hay for winter. If starting from scratch you'll spend a £1000 on steel work - hurdles, feed rings and a basic handling race.
You'll need a few bottles of metacam and penstrep, plus several tins of blue foot spray, a few spray bottles of tar, and many marker sprays. For lambing you'll need bales of straw, a bale of fine shavings and a splint kit for broken legs, iodine ££, castration rings, feeding tubes, mineral drench/Vit E/Sel, lambing ropes, powdered glucose, heat lamps, and probably 10-20kg powdered milk and 1kg colostrum. Before that, 5 prolapse spoons, 2 bottles Twin Lamb drench, bottle of calmag, yoghurt, honey, an addict's range of needles and syringes. I'm sure I've missed a few things. Shearing . . . wool doesn't cover the cost. Fencing.
Oh how we laugh
. But all of this seriously adds up. And you're still 6-8 months away from selling anything that survives the summer onslaught of pests and mysterious sudden death.
If you're interested in small, part time sheep keeping, you might be better profit-wise looking at a specialty like breeding a good and desirable cross ewe lamb to sell as gimmers, maybe Chev x Shetland, as Shetland are very hardy and low maintenance. Or whatever is flavour of the month in your area. Might get £125 each. Store lamb's about £60 for us, north facing rough grass, non- continental.
. Seriously. Genuinely. Really.It's simple. Add up the cost of your meds for each ewe for two worm doses, three fluke doses, 2 VitE injections, four fly treatments, two vaccinations, 2 ewe boluses, and dipping. 2-3 dosing guns and 2 injectors. Plus quad fuel. Plus a half kilogram of feed per day coming up to and after lambing. 50 bales of hay for winter. If starting from scratch you'll spend a £1000 on steel work - hurdles, feed rings and a basic handling race.
You'll need a few bottles of metacam and penstrep, plus several tins of blue foot spray, a few spray bottles of tar, and many marker sprays. For lambing you'll need bales of straw, a bale of fine shavings and a splint kit for broken legs, iodine ££, castration rings, feeding tubes, mineral drench/Vit E/Sel, lambing ropes, powdered glucose, heat lamps, and probably 10-20kg powdered milk and 1kg colostrum. Before that, 5 prolapse spoons, 2 bottles Twin Lamb drench, bottle of calmag, yoghurt, honey, an addict's range of needles and syringes. I'm sure I've missed a few things. Shearing . . . wool doesn't cover the cost. Fencing.
Oh how we laugh
. But all of this seriously adds up. And you're still 6-8 months away from selling anything that survives the summer onslaught of pests and mysterious sudden death. If you're interested in small, part time sheep keeping, you might be better profit-wise looking at a specialty like breeding a good and desirable cross ewe lamb to sell as gimmers, maybe Chev x Shetland, as Shetland are very hardy and low maintenance. Or whatever is flavour of the month in your area. Might get £125 each. Store lamb's about £60 for us, north facing rough grass, non- continental.
hmmm just checking where you're all commenting from . . . not Highland it seems. BTW going down to freezing tonight. Up here anyway.
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