sheep diets

[elgroucho]

How do sheep manage to get so fat if all they eat is grass?

[kick3m0n]

have to agree with Andy.....

what fat sheep have you seen elgroucho?  Having been born and brought up in a rural area, I used to think they looked rather pathetically skinny when shorn.

[Gef]

Sheep, like other mammals turn excess carbohydrate into fat. I'm not disagreeing with the other answers (except that fleece is mainly protein) just pointing out that the fat found in lamb chops etc come from grass.

[Noweia]

Quite often sheep don't just get grass!

Sheep can be fed hay, silage, haylage, concentrates (meal), straw and crop leftovers, eg turnips, amongst other things.

Any sheep eating too much and taking in more energy than it needs will get overfat :)

But most sheep (if the herd is correctly managed) aren't overfat - most of what you see is the fleece!

[elgroucho]

Thank you all for the answers. I live in a rural area and commute to the city and drive past many a field of sheep and the young ones appear to have got fat very quickly this year. I guess though that it is just the fleece as pointed out above.