Stephanie Parrish
Thu, 15 May 2008 07:54:32 -0700
David,Sheep don't really require require a concentrated (grain) feed of any kind. As ruminants, they are best adapted to eating grass (or hay) and not grain. In fact, too much grain will make their forestomach (rumen) too acidic and can actually sicken them. I'd recommend feeding grass or hay, a good mineral supplement (I like Fertrell's Grazier's Choice), and water and not much else. If you let them eat grass or feed a good quality hay, they will have all the protein they need.
Best regards, Stephanie Parrish Westminster, SC On May 15, 2008, at 8:47 AM, David Mansur wrote:
I've been on a continuing quest to locate any research on nutrition from the major feed companies regarding protein content for about the past 3 months. To my surprise I haven't had a single producer/distributer respond to any of my requests for information other than to give me a copy of their label. I recently was asking here on the ListServe what some of you use as feed and got some interesting answers. I found an old publication (http://jas.fass.org/cgi/reprint/1932/1/37.pdf) and I was wondering if anyone might find this useful. If I'm reading into this publication correctly, it seems that it's saying that the high protein feeds are much higher than what is needed for our Blackbelly (Wool production utilizing 25-38% of the protein consumed - And our sheep aren't wool sheep). If I can draw a further conclusion from the information, it seems to me that the low 10% protein All-Stock is much more than adequate for feeding our sheep, even lactating sheep - And this is the least expensive commercial feed I see in feed stores/lots. If anyone else reads the article, can you verify I'm calculating this correctly? It seems to me that this could be a cost savings for people if they're using something else (As I am). Any other comments or information you might have would be appreciated. --David _______________________________________________ This message is from the Blackbelly mailing list Visit the list's homepage at %http://www.blackbellysheep.info
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