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using sheep in the forest industry


KrisK
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I had posted this in another part of the board, but I think it's more appropriate here.

 

I just received my April edition of Harrowsmith Country Life (I think it's only published in Canada...but I could be wrong). Anyway, on page 36 is a story entitled "Ewes to the rescue" and its about how a woman in Alberta uses her sheep to control unwanted vegetation in the forestry industry. It's a great story and the best thing is how environmentally friendly the system is! She has border collies, Great Pyrenees and New Zealand huntaways to help her out. She started out very small and now has a flock of 800 sheep, a mix of Dorsets, Rambouillets and Suffolks. Last summer the flock cleared 2,000 hectares!!!

The magazine does have a website www.harrowsmithcountrylife.ca

 

The article does say that this is fairly common on the west coast (Canada & US) but has anyone heard of this practice in the east?

The forestry industry is extremely important in the area I live in. There may be an opportunity to develop this type of business perhaps by finding other people with small flocks to work together. I hope to contact the woman in the article to find out more.

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Hi Kris,

 

I have a few friends who have spent summers working on cut blocks in British Columbia, using mobs of seeral thousand sheep to control fireweed and a few others while pine plantations get a foothold. The trick is to have enough grazing pressure to get the undesirables while not allowing them to damage the plantation.

 

I have used my sheep to control vegetation in veneer log plantations, but most of my vegetation management work has been in places where land trusts or governmental agencies were trying to restore or maintain open fields. I have also worked for a company that attempted to use sheep to control trees under power transmission lines.

 

I think that the system in BC is probably the one with the most promise. Because the cutblocks are up high and way north, they don't need sheep until sometime in June, and they have to come down off the mountains in early September. This allows a more or less normal breeding cycle to take place. Where I am, we need dry ewes in May, which means lambing in the dead of winter, which means expensive facilities.

 

I suppose if you could find contracts that paid enough, you could simply overwinter the ewes but not breed them, but so far I haven't been able to find any that pay that well.

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Kris, actually I found out that they use sheep here in the south to control kudru (the vine that ate the south!). I found out cuz someone stole the sheep they were using at a park and it was in the news. Apparently sheep LOVE kudzu! Which is good for me! I don't have any on my property, but it is all around me!

 

I had at one time visions of me, Jackson, and 40 sheep roaming the south, killing kudzu where ever we went! :rolleyes:

 

I would like to know the nutrition value though. Would it be enough without supplements etc. And if they can control THAT pest, I am sure sheep could control other types!

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I did find a research document that was done in 2000 in my area. Unfortunately, I can't access the entire document yet but it appears as though the isolation of our forest replanting areas makes using sheep not financially viable. However, the study was only completed for one season and I think I'll do more digging. Maybe it's a service that could be offered on a smaller scale to people clearing lots or additional farmland.

 

'EDIT' There didn't seem to be any indication of the type of sheep used in the study. From what I have read so far, the type of sheep used may have affected the outcome as well.

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Kudzu-- there have been research projects on calves eating Kudzu- the results were unimpressive.

The idea was that the protien was unavailbale or so unbalanced that they couldn't make use of it.

 

But..... on some VERY basic experiments with goats- SEEMS like they may be able to make more nutritional use of Kudzu.

 

Haven't read anything about sheep and kudzu.

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Killer, perhaps the farm extension dept. may be able to give some data on sheep and kudzu. If not there may be just some folks around that have experience with their sheep eating the kudzu and if they gave supplements and what the results were in either case. I will call them today and see.

 

The article I read about was from FL. The sheep apparently were left at this park till the kudzu was ate back, then they were taken to another place to eat kudzu. In the story, they said they hope the people didn't intend to eat them because the sheep were old, (?) and they had been given shots the day before. They said it wouldn't hurt to eat them, but would probly make them sick. I say it would serve them right. :rolleyes:

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Hi Bill,

 

I found the 'isolation' conclusion rather suspect myself. Once I get my hands on the entire document, I hope to see what other conclusions they reached. The test areas where not located much farther north than I am. There is a very large forest company located about 25 km. from my place, so I'm going to contact their reforestry department. There are large tracts of land in my immediate area that are being cut and reforested and I wouldn't exactly consider my location 'isolated'

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Hi Kris,

 

It could be that the tracts are too small and isolated from one another to make the economics work. In my VM business, I get a few calls from people who have an acre or two that they would like cleared, and unless they are directly next to another project that we're doing, it costs too much to get the sheep there and get them back. Not to mention the costs of daily shepherding, etc., etc.

 

I'm not sure how big some of the blocks in BC are, but it was my impression that they were hundreds upon hundreds of acres. They'd take a few thousand sheep out in June and stay there until mid-September when the snows came.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Thanks Alaska, I'll check the link as soon as I can.

 

Bill, it does appear from the bit of the research that I read, that you're right. The tracts were too small and not close enough to one another to make it viable. However, I'm going to continue looking into the research that was done.

 

Thanks!

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