Sheep, while easier to care for than cattle, have their own needs
Many of the people in our area have small grassy acreages that are suitable for livestock, but they don’t have the facilities to work with cattle. On these little farms, sheep are a nearly ideal livestock choice.
Sheep don’t require the heavy equipment for handling or for cleaning up that cattle require. They are not as potentially dangerous as some cattle can be. Many sheep I raised from lambs became people-orientated.
The less-than-ideal side of raising sheep is that sheep require more constant maintenance chores than do cattle. Sheep should be wormed every two months in the fall and winter and each month in the spring and summer.
They need to be shorn each spring and need to have the wool tagged before they lamb. They require vaccinations before breeding and before lambing. They often require assistance at lambing. They also should have their feet trimmed every one to two months.
Foot trimming is a procedure neither the sheep nor the farmer look forward to. I used to put the chore off with my own sheep as long as I could. Without foot trimming, however, the sides of the hooves curl under the foot causing the feet to turn under from the outside.
This will cripple the animal and can sometimes lead to permanent deformity. Besides causing deformed feet, curled-under hooves may also trap in rocks and debris promoting an ideal environment for bacteria to multiply and invade the foot.
This causes foot rot. Once an infection begins, the foot must be trimmed to rid it of all diseased tissue. Even after this sometimes radical surgery, the sheep may suffer recurring bouts of the infection for the rest of its life.
True foot rot may begin even in well-trimmed feet once the pasture has been seeded with the germ. Trying to combat the disease is often frustrating.
The best approach is to avoid the problem by purchasing clean sheep and by maintaining their hooves in good order by trimming each month.
(Dr. Fred Conkel is the veterinarian at Westgate Clinic.)