Hi.
Every year I get offered the access to barley stubble to put sheep on from a good farmer friend of mine. He used to have someone bring lorry loads he says to run over it and seems keen for me to do the same. We have not met to discuss details yet so may re erect this thread in new year.
I have no experience of this so looking for any advice and experience please as I can't find much info on this. I spoke to my vet and he says it can be quite good depending on how much grain is left etc. but have to be extremely careful to get them going on it - limited access or get them used to hard feed prior.
Basic questions - is it useful/worth it? What sort of growth rates can be achieved? Stocking rates? Tips on getting them going? Any other supplementary feeding? Run back?
At the moment I lamb a small flock as a sideline if you like but own no land so lots of running round for small numbers. I have the opportunity to retail a much greater number of lambs next year so wondering whether buying store lambs off farm and run as one group would be a better option for me and finish anything else on my local spring grass taking onto hoggets.
In a predominantly arable area and dairy grass already used locally over winter by other people with bigger numbers of sheep so looking at any other options to simplify what I do and get me going quickly with greater numbers for retail. We retail ourselves and I rear about 6-700 pigs a year for this and I want to be doing 150-200 lambs next year to go alongside.
Cheers.
Every year I get offered the access to barley stubble to put sheep on from a good farmer friend of mine. He used to have someone bring lorry loads he says to run over it and seems keen for me to do the same. We have not met to discuss details yet so may re erect this thread in new year.
I have no experience of this so looking for any advice and experience please as I can't find much info on this. I spoke to my vet and he says it can be quite good depending on how much grain is left etc. but have to be extremely careful to get them going on it - limited access or get them used to hard feed prior.
Basic questions - is it useful/worth it? What sort of growth rates can be achieved? Stocking rates? Tips on getting them going? Any other supplementary feeding? Run back?
At the moment I lamb a small flock as a sideline if you like but own no land so lots of running round for small numbers. I have the opportunity to retail a much greater number of lambs next year so wondering whether buying store lambs off farm and run as one group would be a better option for me and finish anything else on my local spring grass taking onto hoggets.
In a predominantly arable area and dairy grass already used locally over winter by other people with bigger numbers of sheep so looking at any other options to simplify what I do and get me going quickly with greater numbers for retail. We retail ourselves and I rear about 6-700 pigs a year for this and I want to be doing 150-200 lambs next year to go alongside.
Cheers.