So what is so great about Earth Day around here??? Well, I will give you one hint ... THEY ARE NAKED!!!! That is right this year Earth Day is also known as Shearing day. With Shearing day came good and bad news. Okay it isn't really bad news but it isn't great news either. As Mom says well, "It is what it is...."
This also means that with Shearing day here ... 2013 Fleece is done growing and we are now working on 2014 Fleece. That also means 2014 Shares are on the General Store Page and up for sale... Don't miss out on these great products that seem to be on everyone's minds. And I will remind you that 2014 shares will include the fleece from the wonderful babies you have watched be born this birthing season ... That is right, you already are watching the crop grow.
So first the not so great news. Well, with shearing you get a chance to see all the fleece up close and really good. The truth is that the weather has been hard on alot of fleece. According to our shearer, Not just my fleece. He says that with it being 80 degrees in the day time and 30 degrees at night and the rain coming and going, it has caused Sheep to start losing fleece and even have some fleece start to felt on the animals. Needless to say this will not be our best crop ever but it will produce some decent products for shareholders.
The other issues that we found were health issues. First up, we found that Seneca is blind in both eyes. This really is a wonder as she not only cares for her own twins, Chicksaw and Quapaw, but she is raising Cheyenne too. She never bagged so all her babies are bottle babies but she doesn't care. Seneca is one of the southdown ewes and she probably isn't going to see many more years as she is already about 10. At this point we are scared to put her in the pasture for fear that she can't see danger so her and her "babies" are still penned until we figure out what we will do.
This also means that with Shearing day here ... 2013 Fleece is done growing and we are now working on 2014 Fleece. That also means 2014 Shares are on the General Store Page and up for sale... Don't miss out on these great products that seem to be on everyone's minds. And I will remind you that 2014 shares will include the fleece from the wonderful babies you have watched be born this birthing season ... That is right, you already are watching the crop grow.
So first the not so great news. Well, with shearing you get a chance to see all the fleece up close and really good. The truth is that the weather has been hard on alot of fleece. According to our shearer, Not just my fleece. He says that with it being 80 degrees in the day time and 30 degrees at night and the rain coming and going, it has caused Sheep to start losing fleece and even have some fleece start to felt on the animals. Needless to say this will not be our best crop ever but it will produce some decent products for shareholders.
The other issues that we found were health issues. First up, we found that Seneca is blind in both eyes. This really is a wonder as she not only cares for her own twins, Chicksaw and Quapaw, but she is raising Cheyenne too. She never bagged so all her babies are bottle babies but she doesn't care. Seneca is one of the southdown ewes and she probably isn't going to see many more years as she is already about 10. At this point we are scared to put her in the pasture for fear that she can't see danger so her and her "babies" are still penned until we figure out what we will do.
LaKota has an issue as well, that was also found while sheering. Only one side of her bag is producing milk. And her baby has created sores on the one milk producing side from nursing it so much. All in all what we found is that because our Southdown were bought older, their lives here on our farm are getting shorter. That means we have the three older southdowns and Momma Shetland that are not really in the best of health. We will do what we can but we are weaning Commanche and Apache early so that the Mommas have a better chance at getting to look and feel better sooner.
Moving on ... First, OH MY!!! You shareholders for Carrie Clothes shares ... I am jealous. I only kept one share for myself and oh Man. I will tell my readers that Carrie Clothes shares have sold out for 2014 but check this out ...
And a close up .... I will say that Carrie's fleece really is "VOGUE Baby!" Look at all that pillow of softness! I am telling everyone now that if you ever get the chance to get in on Carrie Clothes I really don't think you will regret it.
Okay, so one last suprize that we found while shearing. I am kind of scared to share with everyone because of how the last one went but here it goes. When we flipped Dimples over to shear her we found this ...
If you can't really tell, I will fill you in. That my friends is a bag ... Dimples is pregnant. If you read the blog the other day you know that Carmilla gave birth to an under developed stilborn. That is why I am scared. I will be watching Dimples very closely from here on out. We pulled the Buck Dec 1st so the last possible day for her to birth is suppose to be April 30th but if she runs 10 days over it could be as late as May 10th.
I will let you in on one more a little secret ... today didn't really go as we had planned. We were pushing to shear before the rain set in and we were actually running fleece to the barn to save it from the rain. We had to move into the shed to finish up and it was pretty hectic at times. But all in all it all worked out.
When Danny the Shearer left, we set out and cleaned up the Shed and two of the stalls we had sheep and lambs in for birthing. At this point we have just a select few head in the sheep pen and everything else is out on the pasture enjoying green grass. It is now time to rest those pens before breeding season comes around again this year.
So enjoy a few pictures to go along with a great Earth Day. And Happy shopping ...
I will let you in on one more a little secret ... today didn't really go as we had planned. We were pushing to shear before the rain set in and we were actually running fleece to the barn to save it from the rain. We had to move into the shed to finish up and it was pretty hectic at times. But all in all it all worked out.
When Danny the Shearer left, we set out and cleaned up the Shed and two of the stalls we had sheep and lambs in for birthing. At this point we have just a select few head in the sheep pen and everything else is out on the pasture enjoying green grass. It is now time to rest those pens before breeding season comes around again this year.
So enjoy a few pictures to go along with a great Earth Day. And Happy shopping ...
As for us we are off to sort and skirt us some Fleece so we can get it off to the mill.
RSS Feed
