The evaluation of the function of the feeding of Sheep herds is suggested to involve the work effort, the fulfilment of the nutrient needs of the Sheep and the feed waste. Mechanisation of the feeding can be very simple or include high degrees of mechanisation. Three different farms, representing different levels of mechanisation are presented. Descriptions and analysis of the feeding systems including mechanisation, work effort and estimations of the feed waste are made on each farm. The herd with the most advanced feed mechanisation included a rolling feed band and mix wagon. The other farms were partly or little mechanised including ad lib feeding from big bales and manual distribution of hay and concentrates. The most mechanised farm was able to feed a large herd of Sheep at a low work effort and little feed waste. However, the investment in machinery has to be weighed against the improved efficiency.

Many of Europe?s day-living butterflies have shown decreasing populations during the last decades and many species are threatened. Many butterflies are dependent on managed semi-natural grasslands because of their richness in nectar sources and host plants for the butterfly larva. Swedish pastures are mostly managed through grazing. The number of cattle in Sweden have been decreasing while the number of Sheep in the country increased by 30%.

ABSTRACTThe principal aim of the study was to compare the feeding behaviour of cattle, Sheep and goats on pasture and explain any differences between speices. Furthermore, I compared foraging behaviour between dry season and the beginning of the rainy season, in order to see any relationships between weather and behaviour.The study was carried out in Shompole in southern Kenya. Behavioural data were collected by observing herds of cattle, Sheep and goats on pasture. The livestock were herded on pasture during the days and kept in bomas, where people live, during the nights. The weather in Shompole is characterized by high ambient temperature and low, bimodal rainfall.

The mountainous Central Asian and former Soviet country Tajikistan is the least advantaged country economically among the former Soviet Union states. Approximately 6.5 % of the land is arable in a country where roughly 80 % of the households typically own small numbers of Sheep and goats. Management practices and animal husbandry in the villages such as uncontrolled breeding, mixing of animals on pastures favor transmission of infectious diseases. Brucellosis is a zoonotic bacterial disease caused by Brucella spp. The disease is endemic in Tajikistan. B.

In Swedish Sheep industry it is desired to have lambs slaughtered evenly distributed over the year. Swedish Sheep are generally seasonal breeders with lambs born in the spring and slaughtered in the autumn. Some of the breeds, e.g. Swedish Finewool and Roslag Sheep breeds have shown ability to lamb out of season. For increased knowledge on the possibilities to breed for out-of-season lambing in Swedish Sheep breeds, the aim of this master thesis is to study the variation in frequency of two alleles in the MTNR1A gene in the three breeds; Gotland, Swedish Finewool, and Roslag Sheep.

The Sheep is the oldest livestock, and has been in Sweden for 4-5000 years. Thanks to that you can obtain skin, as well wool and meat. Therefore it was an important animal. Sheep production has increased, strongly lately due to the pasture support. The purpose of this paper is to find out what kind of different EU-subsidies you can get and to compare the subsidies in Öland and the main land. Sheeps are very good conservationist with grass, bushes and herbs, because of different grazing lands hardness and growth is it important to control the pasturage strain. A good way to regulate this is to have different enclosed pasture to switch between. I have been studying the different EU-subsidies.

The quantity of methane emissions from Sheep depend on several factors, for example, the composition of the diet, feed quality, the age of the animals, time of the day and maybe also breed and sex. A comprising literature review was made about which factors that affect the size of emissions. In addition, a questionnaire was sent to two farms, one with a more intensive production system and another with a more extensive system. Inventories of the two farms were made; the rest of the data needed to conduct the study was taken from literature and other sources. Meat produced at the more intensive farm caused emissions of 0.4 kg of methane per kg of bone free meat and the more extensive farm caused emissions of 0.9 kg methane per kg of bone free meat.

The idea behind this project came from a feed study executed two years during the lambing season. Both years wool loss was experienced. Low temperature in combination with shearing was believed to cause the wool loss the first year, while protein deficiency was believed to be the cause the second year. In the literature many causes of wool loss are described; mechanical wear, telogen effluvium, bacterial dermatitis, external parasites, wool break, scrapie, genetic causes and nutritional deficiencies are some examples. The aim of this thesis was to study causes for wool loss and how common wool loss is in Swedish Sheep herds.

Haemonchus contortus is the most important bloodsucking gastrointestinal nematode in small ruminants worldwide. It is often controlled by anthelmintics. Even though other methods to control are available, the most efficient way to treat an animal with clinically manifested haemonchosis is to use one of the available broad spectrum anthelmintics: benzimidazoles (BZ), macrocyclic lactones (ML) or imidothiazoles-tetrahydropyromidines or the narrow spectrum drugs salisylanilides or nitrophenols. Anthelmintic resistance (AR) against all groups of anthelmintics in nematode parasites has been reported from many countries, and even multiple AR has been observed. In this study I have investigated the resistance levels to all major classes of broad spectrum anthelmintics in a naturally infected flock of Sheep of Red Maasai Sheep (RM), Dorper Sheep (D) and their offsprings on a research farm in Kenya.

Selenium (Se) is an essential trace element that is involved in several physiological functions in mammals. Mostly, Se is bound to proteins, many of them with enzymatic functions. A group of seleno-depending enzymes, glutathione peroxidases (GSH-Px?s), are important as antioxidants and protects against free radicals. The activity of GSH-Px is strongly regulated by Se storage in the liver.

The aim of this literature review was to suggest suitable index traits to use in the Swedish Sheep Recording Scheme for fertility and maternal traits. Since fertility and some of the maternal traits are not normally distributed advanced methodology is needed to calculate genetic parameters. Breeding is a tool to improve the economy of the farm and for the selection of breeders estimated breeding values (EBV) for important traits are of high value. In Sheep breeding both lambs born and lambs weaned should be taken into consideration as well as the ewe?s maternal ability, which includes lambing ease, lamb survival, ewe behaviour as mother and the early growth of the lambs.

The virus-mediated disease Rift Valley fever (RVF) was discovered during an outbreak in Kenya in the 1930s. Since then it has spread to most parts of Sub-Saharan Africa, and in the last decades several outbreaks have caused economic and health issues in Africa, Yemen and Saudi-Arabia. The disease mainly affects domestic livestock, causing abortions, but is also a zoonosis. To be able to control the spread of the disease it is important with surveillance for better knowledge about the distribution and virus circulation even in inter-epidemic/epizootic periods. The human population is growing, and people and their livestock constantly move closer to areas with wild animals which act as reservoirs for different viruses. Also, humans and their animals often get within reach for arthropod vectors, hosting or carrying viruses.

Phytoestrogens are secondary metabolites produced by plants. Among the plants that make phytoestrogens are soya, red clover and some types of grass. The name phytoestrogen is a collective term for compounds such as genistein, daidzein, biochanin A and formononetin. These compounds are similar to oestradiol-17? in their chemical structure.

Peste des Petits Ruminants (PPR) is a disease of major socioeconomic impact. It is an acute and highly contagious viral disease of small ruminants caused by the agent Peste des Petits Ruminants Virus (PPRV), a Morbillivirus closely related to Rinderpest virus (RPV) which was declared eradicated from the world in 2011. PPR has a high morbidity and mortality rate and is characterised by high fever, nasal and ocular discharge, pneumonia, necrosis and ulceration of the mucous membranes and inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract causing severe diarrhoea. The role of wildlife in the epidemiology of the disease is still unclear. The disease is currently affecting Sheep and goat in 70 countries worldwide and this year (2014) FAO has announced a program to eradicate the virus by 2030. In Tanzania, the disease was first reported in 2008 and has since then spread to different parts of the country.

Generally in Macedonia keeping farm records and farm business planning is not often practiced like an ordinary activity in farming. Therefore one of the crucial things to do it is to comprise and continuously practice record keeping of farm data. The efficient and justified farm business planning should be based on farm records about the previous work of the farm, which will bring a structured approach for planning all the activities, as well as provide a good basis for attracting investors and creditors for the additional expansion of the business.Given that Sheep breeding holds an important part of the livestock production in Macedonia, there is a need for adding analytical Sheep enterprise budgets to support the farm business planning process at Sheep farms.The aim of this research was to develop Sheep enterprise budgets created on the best production practice for Macedonian conditions of breeding and test their applicability into the farm business plan model Agriwise Macedonia. The Sheep budgets were composed with a process of data collecting consisted of direct farm data (for the cases), expert's consultation and relevant desk research, as well as a literature study. The aim of doing it was to attain more accurate calculations of the enterprise budgets, which will result in a more precise outcome in the farm business plan model Agriwise Macedonia.