Sheep are excellent foragers and, being ruminants, can utilize both pasture forage and harvested roughage. Selective in their grazing habits, they prefer short grass when available. Pregnant ewes can run on late pasture as long as it is available and abundant but in winter subsist satisfactorily on well-cured legume hay or mixed hay carrying a high percentage of legume. Corn (maize) silage is relatively inexpensive and relished by sheep; lactating ewes and lambs being finished for market usually require some concentrate, with corn (maize) favoured because of its high energy content and reasonable cost.

Range sheep grazing selectively on native plants frequently develop mild deficiencies of protein, energy, phosphorus, and vitamin A, especially when plants are mature or dormant or are eaten by ewes in the later stages of pregnancy or lactation. Broad spectrum antibiotics at the rate of five to 10 milligrams per pound of feed are normally used in all lamb finishing rations to prevent digestive disturbances and infections.

Management

Range sheep are normally white-faced crosses carrying both long-wool and Rambouillet breeding and are consequently very hardy and thrifty. They are wintered in bands, or flocks, of from 1,000 to 4,000 head at lower altitudes, and are moved in bands ranging from 1,000 to 1,500 head to summer range at much higher altitude, sometimes 300 miles (480 kilometres) from their winter quarters. Each flock is tended by a sheepherder and his dogs who move systematically from one grazing area to another. The herder often lives in a covered wagon or truck and may spend weeks at a time in complete solitude. The most famous sheepherders are the Basques, who emigrated widely from their home in Spain. The breeding ewes are mated to Suffolk or Hampshire rams and produce lambs during the late winter or early spring so that the lambs will be old enough to move to summer grazing without difficulty.

In many parts of the world small flocks are kept partly as scavengers to clean up fence rows, weeds, brush, and other undesirable forage, but this is a diminishing role. Large flocks are maintained partly for wool and partly for market lambs. Lambs are usually dropped in the spring and are sold at ages of from three to eight months and weights of around 40 pounds (18 kilograms) for Easter lambs, and 100 pounds (45 kilograms) for the usual market lambs. Sheep are sheared in the spring after the worst winter weather has passed. Some breeds are noted for producing a high percentage of twins, and others, such as the Dorset, for both high frequency of twins and heavy milk production. Shepherds frequently switch a newly born twin lamb to a ewe that has just lost a single lamb, thereby utilizing the extra milk. This practice requires skill and experience, since a mother ewe recognizes her own lamb by both its smell and the sound of its call.

Diseases

Such internal parasites as the tapeworm and several species of roundworms that infest the gastrointestinal tract are perhaps the greatest scourge of sheep, but modern vermifuges are quite effective against these. Dips are used to combat such external parasites as ticks, lice, and mites. Foot rot, caused by an infection of the soft tissue between the toes, results in extreme lameness and even loss of the hoof. The more persistent type is caused by a specific organism that is difficult to treat. The pain and the restricted movement of infected sheep result in rapid loss of weight. Enterotoxemia, or pulpy kidney, affects lambs at two to six weeks of age, especially those starting on unusually lush or rich feeds. A vaccination is quite effective in preventing this otherwise costly ailment.