sheep barns

Something useful handed down from my folks concerning sheep. Growing up in Northern Wyoming, the winters used to be brutal. We only had a small flock of sheep, 100 head of ewes and a handful of rams. My folks had tried spring lambing only to suffer major losses to coyotes. Ewes going into labor would wonder off to some secluded spot in the brushy hills to have the lambs, only to return without them...coyotes got 'em. Our neighbors on 3 sides of our 3000 acre ranch, had 20,000 +deeded acres with Big Horn Mountain grazing leases.and 10, 000 sheep.  Coyotes ate very well. So my family started breeding for winter lambs and sheering in the late summer early fall. We had a large sheep barn and due to the cold weather, ewes, without exception, would go to the barn to lamb. Because it was so freaky cold, we had 10 jugs for new mom's and lambs...a jug being a 4x4 paneled pen so they had to mother up and if you had to flip the ewe to make sure the lambs got first milk, it was a simpler contained operation. Each jug had a heat lamp above at a safe distance. The ewes and lambs spent 2 to 3 nights in the jugs before going back out to the gen-pop. When they left the jugs we branded the ewes and lambs with number brands so it was easier to keep track of who went with who. This brings me to the barn..My brother and I cleaned the barn once a week, and put in deep new straw. We went through a lot of straw! Mom, forever trying to make life work better, came up with a very amazing thing. To save straw, she noticed that when a sheep first gets up in the morning, the first thing they do is pee, a lot! So instead of just opening the barn doors to let them come out at their leisure to go to the feed ground, we started "ambushing" them just a bit before they normally got up. This was awesome. The startled sheep, would jump up, run out of the barn and then pee out side!! They fell for it every day. This bumped barn cleaning up to once every 3 to 4 weeks.
My Mom was my hero!

That’s a great story and lesson. Thanks so much.


Think outside the jug!

Good to know about the pee. Planning on sheep in the future...

For now, my pigs are smart enough not to do it in their pigsty.