6 Best Molasses Lick Tubs For Winter Sheep Feeding for Tough Winters
For tough winters, molasses lick tubs provide sheep with vital energy and nutrients. We review the 6 best options to support your flock’s health.
When the snow starts to fly and the pasture is long gone, keeping weight on your sheep becomes the number one job. A good quality hay is your foundation, but even the best hay can fall short during the brutal cold of late winter. This is where molasses lick tubs become an essential tool, providing that critical energy boost to get your flock through to green grass.
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Why Molasses Tubs are Key for Winter Forage
Molasses tubs are more than just a sweet treat; they are a strategic energy supplement. Winter forage, whether it’s stockpiled pasture or hay, often has lower energy and protein levels than what sheep need to maintain body condition, especially pregnant ewes. The readily available sugars in molasses provide a quick energy source that fuels the rumen microbes, helping them digest tough, fibrous forage more efficiently.
Think of it this way: the tub encourages the sheep to eat more of the hay you’re providing and helps them get more nutrition out of every bite. This is crucial for preventing weight loss when temperatures plummet. A well-placed lick tub acts as a self-feeder, allowing animals to supplement their own diet as needed, which saves you a lot of time and labor compared to daily grain feeding.
Crystalyx Extra High Energy for Peak Condition
When you need a serious energy boost, Crystalyx is a top-tier option. This tub is known for its high sugar content and digestibility, making it ideal for flocks facing extreme cold or for ewes in the last few weeks of gestation when their nutritional demands skyrocket. The energy density helps ewes maintain condition when the growing lambs are taking up valuable space, limiting rumen capacity.
What sets Crystalyx apart is its manufacturing process, which results in a hard, weather-resistant block that encourages licking rather than biting. This ensures a consistent, controlled intake across the flock and reduces waste from rain or snow. It’s a premium product with a price to match, but for getting sheep into peak condition before lambing, it’s hard to beat.
Purina Accuration Hi-Fat Block for Ewe Health
The name says it all: this block focuses on fat as a concentrated energy source. Fat is incredibly energy-dense, and supplementing it can have a profound impact on ewe health and productivity. For ewes, this translates to better body condition, higher-quality colostrum, and more vigorous lambs at birth.
Purina’s Accuration technology is designed to control intake. The formulation becomes less palatable as the animal’s rumen environment changes, naturally limiting consumption to the targeted amount. This helps prevent dominant ewes from hogging the block and ensures the entire flock gets the intended benefit.
This tub is an excellent choice for the final 30-45 days of gestation. The added fat not only supports the ewe but also gives newborn lambs the energy reserves they need to get up and nurse quickly, which is often the difference between life and death in a cold barn. It’s an investment in both the ewe and her future offspring.
Sweetlix Meat Maker for Forage Balancing
Not every situation calls for the highest energy tub on the market. The Sweetlix Meat Maker is a fantastic all-around choice for balancing the nutritional gaps in average-quality winter forage. It provides a solid foundation of protein, energy, vitamins, and minerals without being excessively "hot."
This tub is particularly useful for growing lambs or for maintaining the flock through the early and middle parts of winter before the intense demands of late gestation kick in. It supports steady growth and good health by ensuring the essential building blocks are always available. It helps improve the digestibility of your hay, making your primary feed source go further.
Think of the Meat Maker as a reliable daily multivitamin for your flock. It’s not designed for emergency weight gain but rather for consistent, long-term nutritional support that keeps your sheep on an even keel.
ADM MoorMan’s Mintrate for Lambing Ewes
Pregnancy toxemia, or ketosis, is a serious metabolic threat to ewes carrying twins or triplets. ADM’s Mintrate tubs are formulated specifically to help prevent this condition by providing highly available energy and key nutrients that support a healthy pregnancy. The formulation is designed to keep the ewe’s energy balance positive, even when her appetite is suppressed.
This tub also focuses on high-quality protein sources and a robust mineral package, including selenium and Vitamin E, which are critical for reproductive health and lamb immunity. Providing this level of targeted nutrition can dramatically reduce late-term pregnancy issues and improve lamb survival rates.
While it’s a great product, its specificity is also its main consideration. It’s a targeted tool for the lambing season, making it a perfect fit for the final trimester but potentially overkill for other times of the year.
Ridley All-In-One for Complete Mineral Support
For the hobby farmer looking to simplify, the Ridley All-In-One is a compelling option. This tub combines energy from molasses with a complete vitamin and mineral package, including salt. This means you can put out one tub to cover multiple nutritional needs, saving space, money, and management time.
The convenience is undeniable. Instead of managing a separate loose mineral feeder that can get wet or contaminated, this tub provides everything in a single, weatherproof package. It ensures that even sheep who might ignore a loose mineral feeder are getting their required nutrients while they lick the tub for energy.
The tradeoff for this convenience is a lack of specialization. An all-in-one product may not provide the same high-octane energy as a dedicated tub like Crystalyx or the targeted formulation of a product like Mintrate. It’s a great general-purpose choice, but may not be sufficient for flocks with very high nutritional demands.
Hubbard Stock-Lix Tubs for Controlled Intake
One of the biggest challenges with lick tubs is managing consumption. A "soft" tub can be devoured in days by a few aggressive ewes, wasting money and leaving timid animals without. Hubbard’s Stock-Lix line is known for its hard, cooked molasses, which forces animals to lick, not chew.
This controlled intake is a huge advantage for the small flock owner. It ensures the tub lasts longer, providing a more predictable cost per day and giving every sheep a chance to get her share. This feature is especially important when introducing tubs to a flock for the first time, as they can be overly enthusiastic.
When choosing a tub, don’t just look at the price tag; consider the expected consumption rate. A cheaper tub that gets eaten twice as fast isn’t a bargain. The goal is a slow, steady supplement, and a harder tub like a Stock-Lix is often the most effective way to achieve that.
Calculating Your Flock’s Lick Tub Requirements
Figuring out how many tubs you need isn’t guesswork; it’s simple math. The first step is to check the product label for the manufacturer’s recommended daily intake. This is usually expressed as a range, such as 0.25 to 0.50 pounds per head per day.
Once you have that number, the calculation is straightforward. Let’s say you have 20 ewes and the target intake is 0.5 lbs/day.
- Daily flock consumption: 20 ewes x 0.5 lbs/ewe = 10 lbs per day.
- Tub duration: A 200-lb tub / 10 lbs per day = 20 days.
- Total need: If you plan to supplement for 60 days, you’ll need three 200-lb tubs (60 days / 20 days per tub).
This calculation gives you a baseline, but always be prepared to adjust. A sudden cold snap will increase energy needs and consumption. Conversely, if your hay quality is better than expected, they may lick less. The most important tool you have is observation; watch your sheep’s body condition and adjust your feeding strategy accordingly.
Ultimately, the best molasses tub is the one that fills the specific nutritional gap in your winter feeding program. Assess your forage quality, your flock’s condition, and your budget to make an informed choice. The right tub isn’t just feed—it’s an insurance policy against the challenges of a tough winter.
