Straw Shake Down!

Today while I was off to work, diligently earning my keep, Wayne was at home spreading straw in the barn.  For the next week, we will move the ewes in the barn when the weather is bad so that we can get all of their fleeces dried out for shearing.  The shearer will be here on Friday, February 4th and will harvest our wool crop from the first 19 ewes who will start to lamb in about a month.

Why Straw???

At one time, straw was the "go to" animal bedding, but today a lot of people use wood shavings, ground up corn husks, shredded newspaper, etc.  With sheep, straw is really the best option for several reasons...  First and foremost, it isn't likely to contaminate the wool.  Wood shavings can become little slivers of wood that get tangled in the fleece and render the wool garbage.

If we were more talented than we are, we would figure out how to spin the straw in to gold, but instead we spread it on the floor and let the sheep deficate and urinate in it...  As the manure accumulates, we will put more fresh straw on top.  As the manure and straw "break down" underneath, it will create heat and the barn floor will act as a giant heating pad for the lambs to be born on. 

It is important that we keep the barn well ventilated and that we keep a fresh and clean layer of straw on top of the manure pack.  We will also use "Stall Fresh" granules to neutralize the amonia from the urine.  Once lambing season is finished, we will spread the manure pack out on one of the pastures and all of those nutrients will go back into the ground

Wayne also put up our barn calendar where we will record births, birth weights, and other important info (dinner dates, Zumba classes, my birthday, etc).



As usual, the barn work was closely monitored by Dozer the Cat and he was completely unimpressed.