What are the precautions for raising sheep in pens? Keep these key points in mind

As the population grows, land is becoming increasingly scarce. More and more sheep farmers are also choosing pen-raising, but if pen-raising is not managed carefully, losses are easy to incur. Below we discuss the precautions for raising sheep in pens, and sheep farmers everywhere should read carefully.

1. The sheep shed should be built facing south: each pen in the sheep shed should preferably be 15-20 sq m, with a large frame nailed together from wooden strips, and the pen floor raised to a height of 30-40 cm. Such a sheep shed is good for cold prevention, warmth, moisture protection, ventilation and feeding management.

2. Carry out crossbreeding improvement step by step: the foundation ewes for crossbreeding improvement should be local ewes of larger body size and with three or more lambings; for the stud rams, excellent breeds such as the Boer goat can be used.

3. Avoid inbreeding: in each sheep farm or sheep breeding area, there should be more than 3 bloodlines of stud rams to avoid inbreeding depression.

4. Ewes must be marked: breeding ewes kept on breeding farms should wear ear tags, which helps with mating, breeding and file registration.

5. Do a good job of basic infrastructure: for every 3-4 sheep, 1 cubic meter of ammoniation pit should be built. Seize the favorable opportunity of the autumn harvest to ensile, ammoniate or microbially ferment the straw, ensuring the flock has enough forage to get through the winter.

6. Combine green fodder and straw: in spring, summer and autumn, use green fodder as much as possible; where conditions allow, plant 1-1.5 mu of high-yield forage grass for every 100 sheep to reduce the cost of raising sheep.

7. Combine roughage and concentrate: while supplying roughage (green fodder and straw fodder), a certain amount of concentrate must be fed according to the sheep's body condition and nutritional needs. Each sheep should be supplied with 0.2 kg of concentrate per day, and crude protein should account for 18% of the concentrate. Ewes in late pregnancy and lactation should also have their nutrition appropriately increased to meet the needs of pregnancy and lactation. Lambs should begin supplementary feeding of concentrate and high-quality forage at around 15 days of age to ensure the lambs' nutritional needs and smooth weaning.

8. Group the flock at the right time: according to age in days, divide the flock into lamb groups, young sheep groups and breeding sheep groups. The number of sheep kept in each sheep pen should not be too many, preferably 15-20. To avoid scrambling for food and fighting, pregnant ewes, lactating ewes and stud rams should be tethered or kept separately, so as to prevent fighting and collisions that cause miscarriage and external injuries.

9. Deworm regularly: for the flock, Afuding and albendazole can be used to expel internal and external parasites. In addition, when a group is switched from grazing to housed feeding, attention must be paid to ventilation and air exchange in the sheep shed and keeping the shed dry, otherwise eye diseases in sheep are prone to occur. For sheep that develop eye disease, treatment can be given by subcutaneous injection of their own blood around the eye, and they generally recover in 5-7 days.

In addition, if buying lambs, try to buy larger ones, as the survival rate is higher; large ewes are best for the first and second lambings. When buying sheep, look at body condition: glossy coat color, a clean-looking face, a slender wedge-shaped body; for dairy sheep, they should have long legs, a long neck, a long body, soft udders with no hard lumps, no supernumerary teats, and normal vulva with no protrusion.