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The lambs have entered their finishing stage as the first butcher date approaches

https://v.nostr.build/j719Zg3Xh5CIppXr.mp4

We are trying something new this year finishing the lambs. Because we are slightly over stocked, the butcher date is earlier and the lambs were a bit below average weight, we are feeding all the pasture we have left exclusively to the lambs. Along with the pasture I'm feeding them tree leaves by pruning the trees at the edge of the pasture.

Because we put up a new hard fence in the maple sugar bush and we managed to score some discounted hay we decided it would be best to build a small paddock for the rams and let the ewes have most of the woods. We are feeding hay for now but once the lambs are butchered, we will be moving the ewes back on pasture or putting them on the turnips we planted across the street at the neighbors. It's always interesting what challenges and opportunities each season provides grazing the sheep and producing lamb. Especially as the homestead travels along its natural path of succession.

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#permaculture #permies #homesteading #meshtadel #lamb #rotationalgrazing #sheep

rev.hodl 1y ago

Buying time while the winter turnip pasture matures by using the sheep to heavily graze an area of weaker pasture.

With all the lambs off to the butcher, except for a handful I will process here at the homestead, we are focusing our attention back on the ewes.

There hasn't been a hard frost yet, so the winter turnip field is still able to continue growing. We put the sheep in a paddock in a pasture that wasn't very high quality this season. The idea is that they will over graze it and put some heavier impact on it so it can be reseeded. Once they finish a couple bales of hay they will move in to the turnip pasture.

#permaculture #permies #meshtadel #regenag #regenerativeagriculture #sheep #rotationalgrazing #hairsheep #lamb #pasturemanagement

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Discussion

CuznVinny 1y ago

👍🏾

rev.hodl 1y ago

Sheep eating turnips to extend the grazing season

While this planting of turnips wasn't a blowout success, it has been the best we've done planting turnips so far. When comparing the cost and effort of planting turnips to feeding hay, we determined that the turnips needed to last the sheep a month of grazing.

Unfortunately the sheep only made it 3 weeks before they finished eating them all up. But there was a gotcha, we decided to cancel our last butcher date to process 8 lambs for our own consumption to save on the fees. Our plan is to butcher them ourselves this winter. So with 8 extra sheep in the flock eating up the turnips it isn't surprising that the turnips didn't last as long as we had hoped. However it was likely pretty close to a wash either way.

If the neighbors will let us plant their field again next year, I think we will give the turnips another shot. I'll likely be more prepared and get them planted a little earlier and hopefully the soil will be ever so slightly improved from the microbial activity added from all the sheep manure. In the spring we plan to frost seed a cover crop grazing mix which we will let grow all spring and then graze it off with the sheep just before planting the turnips mid summer.

#permaculture #permies #homesteading #rotationalgrazing #sheep #lamb #meshtadel #regenag #regenerativeagriculture

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