Stable Equipment: Feed and Water Well Placed in the Sheep Shed

Stable Equipment: What Keeps the Sheep Shed Running

In a sheep shed the workload is decided in two places: where the animals eat and where they drink. Get both right and the group stays calm while you save yourself a few jobs every day. So this category takes you to troughs, hay racks and waterers and adds the small helpers that otherwise go missing: hay net holders, tool holders and tubs.

Order at the feed face and on the wall

Plenty in a shed fails not on the kit but on the tidiness. A special holder for hay nets keeps the net up and open instead of letting it collapse so the hay ends up on the floor. The Growi tool holder keeps fork, broom and shovel on the wall and lets you take them down with one hand, even when the other one is carrying a bucket. And the 90 litre universal tub is the piece you reach for constantly: for soaking, for mixing, as a carrier or for foot bathing. Small items like these sound unspectacular, yet they decide how fast the daily round is done.

Feeding and watering as the core

Everything else splits into two areas. Feeding is about troughs and racks, so that every animal gets to the feed at the same time and the feed stays clean. Feed barriers stop sheep climbing into the trough, and a roof over the rack keeps hay dry. At the waterer what counts is flow and frost protection. Float valve drinking bowls hold the level by themselves, field troughs of 150 or 380 litres supply a group out on the grass, and heated versions with trace heating keep the water liquid in winter.

Frequently asked questions

How much feed space does a sheep need?
Plan so that every animal can eat at the same time. Otherwise the bossy ones push the weaker ones away and those fall behind.

Why does the feed in the trough get dirty so fast?
Because sheep climb in. A trough with a feed barrier solves it, since the animals can only put their heads through.

What matters more in winter, trough or waterer?
The waterer. Without water the feed intake drops at once, so a frost proof solution with heating pays for itself.