Detailed Explanation of Key Points on Lamb Creep Feeding and Fattening Techniques

When fattening lambs, they should be started on solid feed early during the suckling period. This is especially important for goats, which adapt poorly to concentrate feed. To ensure they eat early and eat plenty during the suckling period, special attention should be paid to selecting feed with good palatability and high quality.

The weaning time for lambs can be flexibly determined according to their creep feeding status; generally, they should be weaned when they can consume 70-80 grams of concentrate feed. To reduce the stress response when lambs are moved between groups, before transferring the lambs out, water and hay should first be withheld from the whole group, letting them stay empty-stomached overnight. The next day they are loaded onto the truck and transported out, keeping the travel time as short as possible. On the day of arrival at the fattening site, do not feed them; only let them drink water and give a small amount of dry hay so the sheep can rest quietly and avoid disturbance. Then proceed with weighing, injection of the quadruple vaccine, and administration of deworming medication, etc.

After fattening begins, regardless of which fattening method is adopted, there must be a pre-feeding transition period. For moderate fattening, the pre-feeding transition period is roughly divided into two stages: the first stage (1-3 days), feeding only dry hay to let them adapt to the new environment; the second stage (7-10 days), providing 70% dry hay, 25% corn kernels, 4% soybean cake, and 1% salt. For intensive fattening, the pre-feeding transition period is roughly divided into three stages: the first stage (1-3 days), feeding only dry hay to let the lambs adapt to the new environment; the second stage (7-10 days), with a reference daily ration of 25% corn kernels, 64% dry hay, 5% honey, 5% soybean cake, and 1% salt; the third stage (11-14 days), with a reference daily ration of 39% corn kernels, 50% dry hay, 5% honey, 5% soybean cake, and 1% salt, plus 35 mg of antibiotics. The above daily rations are fed twice a day, and the amount of feed given should be such that the sheep can finish eating within 40 minutes. In addition, the feed can also be adjusted according to the different resources available in each region.