Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["John D'hondt" <dhondt@eircom.net>]



Goats are natural browsers and they prefer herbs and tree leaves to grass. Mine are very fond of nettles and thistles and any kind of tree leave. They seem to prefer standing on their back legs for eating. But they don't debark trees any more.

john

I wonder whether that's why my goats don't bother mature trees. I think young trees are fair game, period. But mine get kelp top dressed in their grain every day, and they don't bother mature trees. 

Liz

On Nov 20, 2012, at 2:35 PM, "John D'hondt" <dhondt@eircom.net> wrote:

We used to have our sheep gird pine trees and sitka spruces and almost everything else. Hollies lost nearly all their bark every winter.

Then we started putting sea minerals on the land and the debarking stopped completely even from the goats.

john

My sheep will gird trees too - but not as quickly as the goats do:o)  Piggies yes, sheep no - though I have heard that some sheep are less likely to gird then others...  my cormo love bark but some folks say that the little mini southdowns dont....  And while the poultry dont gird the trees, I had some bronze turkeys this year that were up in my plum trees eating fruit and they practically lived in the blackberry bushes.....

 

Blessings,

Aliza
www.SomeKindaWonderfulFarm.com
Ashland, Oregon

“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” Howard Thurman

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From: Harvey Ussery <harvey@themodernhomestead.us>
To: Healthy soil and sustainable growing <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Sunday, November 18, 2012 4:55 PM
Subject: [Livingontheland] Sheep and orchard trees

I'm preparing for another printing of my book, sending a few minor needed corrections to my publisher. I've read in a number of sources that a good "stacking" strategy is: graze sheep in orchard to take advantage of the grass ground cover between the fruit trees.

Here's a statement as currently printed in my book (in a section on "Stacking Species"):

"Use sheep to mow your orchard (unlike goats, they won't chew off the bark), then follow with chickens to clean up dropped fruit and any parasites in the sheep manure."

Barry Koffler of feathersite.com advised me to correct that--he says that in his experience sheep will also chew bark off orchard trees.

Anybody out there with sheep: Have you found them to be compatible with orchard trees?

Thanks if you can help me out.

~Harvey

--
Harvey in northern Virginia
www.themodernhomestead.us

My book The Small-Scale Poultry Flock was recently published by Chelsea Green. Check it out at
http://www.chelseagreen.com/bookstore/item/the_smallscale_poultry_flock:paperback

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