Another interesting thing, our soils test out high in zinc,
manganese, copper and iron. But my forage tests were barely adequate
for zinc, copper and selenium and the sheep liver tests (from butcher
sheep) showed deficiencies in those minerals. Not enough to start
giving bo-se shots and copper boluses but enough to change the
mineral package to include more copper and more zinc and a fairly
high selenium level as well.
We never did soil testing for molybdenum, the soils guy said it
doesn't matter to the plants.
My vet started to think it was causing problems for the sheep so we
did test the forage for molybdenum and it was very high, hence the
reason the sheep need more copper, zinc and selenium to balance it.
I've also found that according to research done in Scotland, my breed
of sheep is known to need/tolerate more copper than many other
breeds. Most folks are told never supplement copper to sheep, we're
actually going to be adding a portion of a cattle mineral to the mix
to get enough copper into the sheep. We're already adding lots of
extra zinc. We have also had to really modify the mineral mix because
the sheep were not eating enough. We had a nicely balanced diet but
if the sheep won't eat it then it doesn't work. So we had to adjust
salt in the mineral to get it low enough to get the sheep to eat it
in the quantity we needed to get the other minerals into them.
Next year I am hoping to test the soils for all the same things I am
testing the forages for and also the same things I am testing the
sheep livers for.
In the long run it doesn't matter what our soils are, it's what the
animals are actually getting and I've discovered the molybdenum can
really mess with your results if you are not looking at it.
Testing is expensive, but I think it's the best way to know what is
really going on. You need the feedback of postmortem liver samples to
see what is really getting into your animals.
--
Oogie McGuire - oogiem@desertweyr.com
Weyr Associates - Multimedia and Web Authoring Services & Consulting
Desert Weyr - CMK Arabian horses and Black Welsh Mountain Sheep
http://www.desertweyr.com/
Paonia, CO USA
