feeding nuts

Not fed sheep outside in long time, but I guess it would depend on the nut and ground conditions. If you can get the nuts out on solid ground then it should be fine, but if lying on gutters then no. If you're not losing much then you may be okay. I'd prefer to feed them in troughs though. Nuts would be fine - some are designed to be fed this way.

Do you have troughs for them when they come home?

Corrugated pipe,grand job. I also put the nuts under a wire works fine

Yea, and if you have a big number of sheep they'd knock you over the troughs

Yea, but I know people that just throw them from the quad too

Until now there wasn't much demand for sheep cobs and the merchants would only supply one type but demand is picking up now so there might be different rations available as cobs. Were buying the 18%cobs from Grennans at a similar price to their lamb finisher.

Hay usually doesn't have great feed value so the bit of extra protein in cobs would be no harm. Protein helps livestock to digest fibre and God Knows there's plenty of fibre in hay.

Their nuts are only about 8mm, the cobs are 15mm.

As far as I know the only Cobs they're making for sheep are the 18% cobs. There wasn't a lot of demand for cobs and it's awkward for them to change the machinery unless they were sure of demand.

I'd sometimes feed Cobs at the end of april if the east wind cut the grass out of it and I'd have to go around the local branches taking what they'd left over

Not bad value in todays market and ingredients look good. Which mill are they from?

540 for Glanbia ewe master 20%. Got 5t blown in so hopefully get for 500 when pay at end of month.

Who and where are those prices from?

They're not bad. I paid 510 for 18% nut.

This is the nut I'm feeding from grennans.

It’s the best I’ve seen.

Have only used the elite lamb finisher pellet as the others were a bit dusty and clogged in the damp.

Like the elite ewe and lamb, the elite lamb finisher is a very good ration

520/ton in bags.

Fair difference. I'd to get it ordered in, merchant doesn't normally stock it.

whats your opinions on a mineral bucket? i usually go with lifeline as the lambs come lively and ewes have plenty of milk. are there other good/better ones out there?

I'm leaving a substantial figure with that merchant annually and have to fight my corner You (or myself) won't match it asking for a once off. (not trying to be smart)

A lot of comments here about 'good' nuts at very high cost. Remember gold can be bought too dear especially with the current outlook.

It's hard to know what's right or wrong. I'd got a few bags of 19% ewe and lamb nuts from liffeys before Christmas at 11.50 a bag and if it's anything like their cattle meal it's sh1t. For the sake of the few euro I'd rather feed them something right and have the ewes milking.

This is the nut I'm feeding this year at 13.35 for 25kg bags or 470 bulk available also.

How does it compare to the other nuts mentioned above ?

Maize,soya meal,barley and distiller are the first 4 ingredients..will do the job perfectly...what you don't want to see in the top 3 ingredients in the list is rapeseed, sunflower,palm kernel or gluten,alot of these bring up the protein % but the digestibility of that protein is low

Soya meal,barley,oats,maize soya hulls are what you want to see usually

Started feeding the COBS a week ago....absolute game changer for me !!!

I have a portable meal bin (JFC bale lifter type) in field with approx 20 bags in it....i stop on the way home from work and spread a bag in little piles (approx 1kg per pile) and that's 80 ewes fed in about 2 mins, with no troughs, no fighting ewes, no muck and no hassle.

COBS prob aren't good enough quality for final two weeks pre lambing but plenty good to get out wintered ewes that far...IMO