posted 3 years ago
We are planning to bring our first livestock onto our farm this year. It'll be a small handful of katahdin or katahdin mix sheep. I wan to set them up for success, but also not invest too much into things that they may not actually need. I would eventually like to be able to offer free choice minerals, but as we will just be learning about pasture rotation and training the sheep that we aren't terrifying monsters, I want to try to keep things simple. It seems like the priorities are a salt blend with selenium, and maybe a kelp meal. I figure that should theoretically start covering our bases, and I can add complexity in the future. From what I've read, mineral blocks aren't ideal as the animals can wear down their teeth trying to chew off bits of salt, plus there's the negative of the weight of hauling 50lb blocks of salt around my hilly pastures, versus a smaller mineral feeder. Do I need to consider adding other minerals at the outset, or are these likely to cover my bases?
None of the local farm stores I'm looking at (tractor supply, rural king) carry loose selenium salts (ideally it'd be something like redmond selenium 90, but I'm not married to any one brand), and I can't find anywhere that carries kelp meal (ideally something like thorvin Icelandic kelp meal, but once again, beggars can't be choosers) that doesn't charge like $70 for shipping.
Since I'm new to this, I'm hoping that I'm just missing something and someone has some advice. Thanks!