The Sheep Research Center is located approximately three miles south of the Ohio State Wooster campus. The facility includes a total confinement building and complete feeding system to utilize silages, haylage, and stover. An additional building aids reproductive physiology research and winter lambing. This building is more traditional in design but has innovative features, such as an open ridge ventilation system and an above ground nipple water system. A custom corral system was developed over the years to allow handling and management of the flock.
The Sheep Research Center is located on 63 acres of permanent pasture and 30 additional acres of tillable ground used for intensive grazing research. The intensive grazing area allows study of annual and perennial forages under various management strategies.
Hampshire and Dorset sheep are used in a predominantly crossbred flock to provide research in the areas of reproduction, nutrition, disease, behavior, and management practices. The sheep center maintains a flock of approximately 300 ewes that lamb in two groups. One group of 120 ewes lamb in February while the remaining ewes lamb in May on pasture. These two groups provide opportunities for research in all phases of production and provide growing lambs for feedlot studies as well as grazing research.
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