Winter Care for Livestock in Wet Weather

When Wet Matters More Than Cold

Ask any Cumbrian smallholder what they dread most about winter and it will not usually be the frost. It is the rain. A dry, still, minus-five morning is far kinder to livestock than a grey, drizzly week at four degrees with a wind behind it. Animals can cope with cold if they are dry, well fed and out of the wind. What they struggle with is being permanently damp, standing on poached ground, with no dry place to lie down.

Wet weather drives heat loss, softens hooves, and turns a gateway into a bog within days. It also hides problems. A sheep that looks fine on a dry day can be quietly scouring in a muddy field, and a pony that seems sound on the yard can be tender once you pick its feet out on the third wet morning in a row. The good news is that most of the work is preventative, and a bit of planning in October saves a great deal of heartache in January.

Dry Bedding is Not a Luxury

Every animal on the holding deserves a dry place to lie down, and it needs to be genuinely dry, not simply covered in straw. If you push your hand into the bedding and it feels cold and clammy underneath, the animals are lying on wet ground and losing condition overnight.

• Build the bed up: start with a base of lime or wood pellets on bare earth, then layer straw thickly. Top up daily rather than mucking out completely, which keeps the base warm and dry.
• Aim for depth: a good bed for cattle or ponies is 15 to 20cm deep. Sheep and goats will use a raised platform or a deep straw bed just as readily.
• Keep it clean: remove wet patches daily. A barrow of soggy straw out of the shed is worth more than a bale tipped on top of it.
• Mind the doorway: rain blowing in through an open front soaks the first two metres of bedding. A simple hurdle, a bit of stockboard, or a hanging curtain sorts it.

Hay, Haylage and Keeping Condition On

Wet, cold weather raises the energy an animal needs just to stay warm, often by a third or more. That means more forage, and forage of decent quality. A ewe in late pregnancy, a suckler cow with a calf at foot, and a working pony all need more than maintenance in February.

• Feed by weight, not by eye: a ewe on good haylage will want roughly 2 to 2.5kg a day in late pregnancy; a 500kg cow on hay may need 10kg or more.
• Get it off the ground: hay racks, ring feeders and wall-mounted racks cut waste dramatically and stop animals eating mud-covered fodder.
• Offer a bit of shelter with the feed: feeding under a roof or behind a windbreak keeps hay dry and encourages animals to eat rather than stand miserably in the rain.
• Watch body condition: run your hands over ribs and spine weekly. If you can feel sharp bones, act now rather than in March.
• Never forget water: even in the wet, a lactating animal drinks a lot. Check troughs daily for ice, leaves and debris.

Shelter That Actually Works

Cumbrian rain rarely falls straight down, so a field shelter with an open side facing the prevailing wind is worse than useless. Think about the direction the weather comes from on your land and site shelter accordingly.

• Windbreaks first: a hawthorn hedge, a line of straw bales, or a well-secured stockboard fence will cut the wind and keep rain off the animals' backs.
• Three sides, one opening: a simple pole barn or field shelter with a solid back and sides gives a dry lying area and a place to feed out of the worst of it.
• Hardstanding matters: a strip of stone or concrete outside the shelter stops the entrance turning into a canal.
• Bedding the shelter: a thick straw bed inside means animals will actually use it instead of standing out in the rain looking tragic.

Field Management and Poaching

The single biggest cause of winter problems is poaching, the churning up of wet ground by hooves. Mud is not just messy, it is a bacterial playground, and it wrecks pasture for the following spring.

• Move animals before the field goes: once you see more than a hoofprint or two in the gateway, it is time to shift them. Do not wait for a quagmire.
• Rotate onto well-drained ground: higher, sandy or sloping fields hold up far better than flat, clay-based ones. Save the best-draining land for the worst weeks.
• Use a sacrifice paddock: accept that one area will get muddy and keep the rest of the farm intact. Fence off the wrecked patch and reseed in spring.
• Back-fence and rest: strip grazing with a movable electric fence limits damage and gives you control over where the muck lands.
• Keep gateways stoned: a few tonnes of hardcore in the gateway each autumn saves a fortune in lost grazing and veterinary bills.

Feet, Skin and Daily Checks

Wet ground softens hooves and skin, which is exactly when foot rot, scald, mud fever and rain scald take hold. A daily five-minute check of every animal is the cheapest insurance you can buy.

• Pick out and inspect feet daily for ponies and goats, and run sheep through a handling race weekly to check for lameness.
• Look for heat and swelling above the hoof, and for the tell-tale grey scabs of mud fever on the back of the pastern.
• Treat promptly: isolate a lame animal, keep it on dry bedding, and seek veterinary advice if it does not improve within a couple of days.
• Check fleeces and coats: rain scald shows as matted, crusty patches along the back. Dry the animal thoroughly before treating.
• Do the rounds in the dark too: a head torch and a waterproof jacket at 10pm will catch a cast sheep, a broken fence or a leaking trough before it becomes a crisis.

Small Habits That Carry You Through

Winter on a Cumbrian smallholding is a matter of routine. Fill hay racks before dark, check water twice a day, keep a bale of straw beside the shed for emergencies, and write down anything you notice so you can spot a pattern. Have a plan for a fallen tree, a power cut or a flooded lane, and keep a good torch, spare batteries and a first-aid kit where you can reach them with wet hands.

Above all, do not wait for perfect conditions. The animals do not care whether the yard is tidy; they care whether their feet are dry, their bellies are full, and the wind is off their backs. Get those three things right and even a Cumbrian February feels manageable.