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sheep farmers?

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SleepyFarmall

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Any sheep farmers out there? Just curious. I'd have them if I could and knew how. What is the market for sheep? Mostly wool I guess but meat too mebbe. Is manure a product? I'd like to have some manure for my garden but haven't connected with any. I tried lamb chops and was not impressed although certainly eatable. Is there u-tube video of successful sheep operations? Thanks, Michael.
 
It depends to large extent on the market in your area.

I raised Shetlands (prized for their wool) and Katahdins (large hair sheep) for 25 years. At least locally, the market for wool is essentially non-existent. If you can find a hobbyist that likes to start with raw fleeces and do the cleaning, skirting, carding, and spinning themselves, you can at least get rid of them. If you do all the work yourself and sell ready-to-spin roving, you'll lose your shirt. And that's if you can shear yourself or find someone to do it.

The meat market is better. I was a small time operation (8-10 lambs a year) and paid to have them cut up, vacuum packed and frozen myself and could charge enough for the meat to make enough to cover costs and put a couple bucks in my pocket. It was a hobby, not a money-maker for me. If you have an ethnic market in your area, I've heard you can do pretty well.

I did compost and sell the manure. Sheep manure is popular with the organic crowd.
 
Knew an old guy (bought pullets off him), when he got to where he didn't feel comfortable dealing with cows, he raised hair sheep.
People that bought his lambs slaughtered them on his farm, took everything with them.
He told me he made more money off those sheep than he ever did with his cows. That was a few years ago.

I liked the way he had his retirement figured out. He'd buy hatchery pullets, raise them to 8-10 weeks old and sell them, and messed with his sheep.
He was not in good shape last I saw him a couple years ago, but always seemed content with what he was doing. Interesting guy to talk to for a bit.
 
50 years ago I raised sheep. There was always a good market for lambs. Milk fed spring lamb was a delicacy. There was a wool buyer in South City, there was a government subsidy for wool. You would send the invoice and get a check for almost as much as the buyer paid.
Sheep eat brush too. I would have them now if I had fences for them.
 
Heresay probably: I once heard: To get sheep to load into your 18 wheeler livestock transport vehicle, get a smart goat. The goat will lead the sheep into the trailer along the wall where the ramp is located and go to the front end of the trailer, following the wall, turn and go down the other side and when it gets back to the loading ramp it exits and the transporter shuts the gate.
I had a goat while living in town when I was a kid....don't remember how that happened. "May" was her name as we got her in May of one year. My mother was a Cub Scout Den Mother and May was our mascot. Don't remember what happened to her. The small town where I grew up was initially a strawberry plantation and our house was just a couple of blocks from the fields that remained when the town changed to a blue collar town to support the Houston Ship Channel commerce.
 
We have sheep. the hardest part is to get a good price for lambs. Lamb price is always so low if you don't have twins you make no money. Guys that have cows and sheep always said they made more with sheep than cows. I don't believe it as I have had sheep for 15+ years and have cows. The sheep mostly belong to my children. Sheep need good quality hay and grain for winter and that gets expensive when you have 6 months or more of winter. Lambing in December and January is the only way to make money. as the easter market is $1-$1.50 more per lbs. 50 -80 lbs is what the market wants. so in winter you need a barn of some sort to lamb in. lambs do not do good at -30C but -5C is perfect. takes close to 3 months to get a 65-75 lbs lamb. I know my neighbor had 400 ewes and averaged 2.2 lambs per ewe. Had an old hog barn converted and I thought I would buy some of his ewe lambs to get better stock. He stayed in business for 5 years and sold them all. his dad had 100 cows and he decided sheep market dropped so bad cows were better. In Ontario I think s better than Manitoba as there price at the market is lots higher than us. All our lambs get shipped there for slaughter. So the buyers here pay less because of trucking costs and they know we have no options. One friend of mine lives 3 hours north of me and he has to truck all his lambs to here to the buyer so he is also thinking of getting out of them.
 
You need good fences. My in laws had sheep years ago. I always got roped into helping at shearing time. Not fun. I don't think there's much money in it. If it's for fun then go for it. Cj has it nailed down prey good.
 
All interesting and informative comments. I don't have a burning desire to own them but it still intrigues me as a hobby. I worked for a farmer in a previous life who raised sheep. I can still here them mommas and babies calling each other. I wonder what happens if you don't shear them. Anyway, thanks, Michael
 
We raised sheep for ten years, it was mainly the kids 4H project. As cjunrau posted you need good hay. Better hay than cattle or horses need. Because of the sheep we got into producing hay. If you are in an affluent area like we are, you can make good money on good hay because the horse people think that they need super good hay. I had many good customers for 25 or more years The manure from our little flock helped to make good hay. You can get very good money for lambs in the ethnic Easter lamb business. You need good fence. We used high tensile electric for our perimeter and three strand poly electric for dividers between paddocks wew used rotational grazing for best feed output from our limited pasture. Because of the sheep we got into hay production and then old tractors. generally I had two newer ones and two antiques in the hay operation. I got into tractor pulling also.
 
Do sheep need higher protein that's in good hay ? As for horses and horse people, good hay
could be produced with grass and a paint booth.
 
flying belgian said:
How did sheep survive in the wild before mankind started shearing them?
Click to expand...
It was through breeding that we got sheep to produce wool that needed shearing. Sheep in the wild like the Rocky Mountain Big Horn are a breed that doesn't need it.

If I were looking for meat producers. I believe I would go with meat goats instead of sheep. Much easier to care for.
 
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