We would not recommend doing this without a great deal of experience and a certain lack of sense! The grain silo holds our supply of Triticale grain that we use to feed the rams over the winter. As the amount of grain goes down it becomes harder to get out of the silo and someone needs to climb down the ladder inside and use a shovel to push the grain towards the out pipe. Dusty and unpleasant job and not for the fainthearted.
The 70 rams get about one metric tonne of Triticale per month (13 MJ/kg fed Metabolisable Energy and 12% crude protein) between them and are fed via a Bromar lick feeder that holds about just that. A key component of this feeder is the 11 hole plastic inserts that are on both sides of the feeder. The sheep must lick the grain upwards and use the saliva on their tongues to get the grain out when closed down for supplement feeding. This prevents overfeeding which can lead to bloat and means that the rams have to 'want' the extra feed over and above what they can get from the pasture.
We hope that the extra feed this year will see the rams gaining weight through winter and being in top condition for the November 12th sale.
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