Sheep - AgRIS

Careful management of the pregnant, parturient and lactating ewes will have a marked
influence on the percentage of lambs dropped and reared successfully. So the following steps
may be taken to afford proper attention to these animals.
1) Do not handle in-lamb ewes too frequently.
2) Separate them from the main flock and take effective care in relation to their feeding and
heeding.
3) Extra nutrition (flushing) during the later part of pregnancy will be beneficial for milk
production of ewe, birth weight and growth of lambs.
4) Inadequate and poor nutrition may result in pregnancy taxaemia, abortions and premature
birth of weak lambs.
5) Bring lambing ewes into lambing corals 4-6 weeks before parturition and provide
maximum comfort.
6) Watch gestation length which ranges from 142 to over 150 days. Early maturing breeds
have shorter gestation period.
7) Save parturient ewes from cold and chilly weather.
9. 2.4 Dry Ewes
No extra care is required for these animals. Regular grazing for 8 to 10 hours on a good
pasture is sufficient to maintain their weight/ condition.
9.2.5 Care of weaners andfatteningstock
Complete separation of lambs from their mothers is called weaning. The practices and
problems of weaning and care of weaners vary from place to place. The management of
weaners play an important part in good sheep husbandry because these weaners will be the
future breedable animals. The following steps will greatly help in proper care and management
of weaners.
i) Weaning should preferably be done at 90 days.
ii) Avoid malnutrition, as it will result in stunted growth and susceptibility to worm
infestation.
iii) Provide supplementary feeding and good clean pastures.
iv) Drench them regularly against various gastro-intestinal parasites as these are very prone to
worm infestation.
v) Vaccinate them against enterotoxaemia, struck and black- quarter diseases.
vi) Do not graze weaners in burry and seedy type of pastures which may cause skin irritation
to lambs, damage to wool and cause ophthalmic diseases.
vii) Provide them shelter against vagaries of climate and predation.
viii) They should have easy access to fresh and clean water and nutritious green pastures.
This includes identification, tail docking and castration. Ear tagging for identification is
done immediately after birth when except in their pens to encourage the lamb to start nibbling.
The young lambs upto one month should stay in corrals from one month onwards, lambs should
be given 50-100 g concentrate. They should go out for grazing separately from their mothers
after one month of age. They should stay with their mother at night. During the second month
lOOto 150gofconcentrate shouldbegivendependingtheir body size. It should be increased to 200
or 250 g in third month, after weaning 350 g of concentrate should be offered along with
grazing for 6 to 8 hours in the lustrous pastures.
The mutton sheep require improved pastures, cultivated cereal fodders and legumes, grain
and oilseed milling byproducts as concentrates for intensive feeding. If sufficient land for
growing cultivated fodders or pasture is not available, the sheep should be supplemented with
concentrates to the extent of 300 g per head per day during last 45 days of pregnancy, with
400g per head day during first 60 days of lactation and with 250glhead/day for flushing. The
breeding rams should be provided with 400 g per day concentrate mixture during the breeding
season. Crop residues could also be improved in their nutritive value through treatment with
certain fungi, ammoniation using urea, steam treatment withtwithout addition of urea and
molasses, and pelleting. Roughage feeding should be done at night especially during summer
tto avoid heat incremerit due to rumen fermentation.
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