Record Keeping

[Womwotai]

I am curious how most people keep herd records? Being in my first year of sheep raising and with only a small herd (6 sheep, 2 goats), so far my memory has worked well enough. But this morning I gave 3 ewes a dose of CDT in preparation for lambing and realized its probably a good idea to keep a record of this somehow. For now I just put a note on my (computer, so its searchable) calendar. And I also added a 2nd dose 4 weeks from today, and set a reminder the day before so I can be prepared.

I realized that I will have other things that need reminders kept though. The dates lambs are born. When they have their shots. Worming. Etc. So - how do you keep records? If there is a better way than I'm doing it so far, I'd love to give it a try while it is still "early days".

 

[Ruus]

I use a program call Flock Filer. You can use the free version as long as you like, it just gives you a popup now and then telling you that you're using a trial version. It keeps track of pedigrees, vaccinations, birthing/weaning weights, wool production, and a bunch of other stuff.

 

[Womwotai]

Thanks Ruus - I am downloading the trial version now.

 

[SheepGirl]

I keep paper records on my flock. I designed some record sheets back in 2012 (look at the Basic Sheep Care Guide > Record Keeping page), but they are 4 pages long per animal. I keep my records in file/storage box with hanging folders. One folder is for current sheep, one folder is for past sheep, one folder is for flock breeding/lambing records, one folder is for flock health records, and the last folder is for receipts.

So I'm redesigning; I have printed out a couple record sheets of different types that I liked and I was going to go and take the parts I liked out of each one and create a new one with all of the information I want to/I am able to record. I think I will still keep my file/record box, though.

Here are the links to the ones I like that I'm going to get bits and pieces out of and create my own records:

• http://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/x.../1957/12674/StationCircular182.pdf?sequence=1
• http://www.esgpip.org/PDF/Technical bulletin No.30.pdf
• http://xstatic99645.tripod.com/site...s/animalidentificationrecordkeepingcanada.pdf

 

[Womwotai]

I keep paper records on my flock. I designed some record sheets back in 2012 (look at the Basic Sheep Care Guide > Record Keeping page), but they are 4 pages long per animal. I keep my records in file/storage box with hanging folders. One folder is for current sheep, one folder is for past sheep, one folder is for flock breeding/lambing records, one folder is for flock health records, and the last folder is for receipts.

So I'm redesigning; I have printed out a couple record sheets of different types that I liked and I was going to go and take the parts I liked out of each one and create a new one with all of the information I want to/I am able to record. I think I will still keep my file/record box, though.

Here are the links to the ones I like that I'm going to get bits and pieces out of and create my own records:

• http://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/x.../1957/12674/StationCircular182.pdf?sequence=1
• http://www.esgpip.org/PDF/Technical bulletin No.30.pdf
• http://xstatic99645.tripod.com/site...s/animalidentificationrecordkeepingcanada.pdf

Thanks SheepGirl - I will check out those links though I confess I am not much for paper record keeping. I've always preferred to keep records via the computer where the info is searchable.

However, I'm not having any luck downloading the FlockFiler trial version. Its been over an hour but it never progresses beyond a certain point. Its only a 35MB download but it gets a tiny way into it - maybe 5% and then the status bar stops progressing. I've shut it down twice and trying for a third time but so far the result is the same. So I may end up sticking with my computer calendar and alerts. It would be nice to be able to print out a report for any individual animal though….

 

[SheepGirl]

Instead of printing the papers out, you could always just have a word document for each sheep and then just type in information as you get it. That way it is still searchable and you can print out any page as you need to.

 

[Womwotai]

I wanted to provide an update on the Flock Filer issues I was having last night. I finally emailed the support email address, explaining the problems I was having, not expecting to hear back until business hours. To my surprise, within 30 minutes of sending the email, I had a response from the developer explaining that they had had a slow down. I was really impressed he was so responsive late on a Sunday evening! By the time I got his email, my download had started to progress and was complete a short time later.

Thank you to Ruus for letting me know about this software! So far it seems very user friendly and does everything I was hoping for, from keeping acquisition/sale records for each animal, to lambing, vaccinations, worming, hoof care etc., and also keeps a pedigree of each lamb born. Although I am still in the evaluation version, I plan to purchase the pro version. My husband is a software developer and I know what goes into developing software so I feel like if I'm going to use it, I should pay for it.

 

[Mike CHS]

I watched several of the demos for Flock Filer and was impressed with how user friendly it appears to be.

 

[Womwotai]

I watched several of the demos for Flock Filer and was impressed with how user friendly it appears to be.

Yeah, there is a PDF file you can download to learn how to use it but I haven't downloaded it yet because I found it so easy to use I didn't need the pointers. I figure if and when I get stuck, I can download it then. And I was very impressed with the support on a Sunday night, and there is a forum as well, for users to ask specific questions.