#62 LoLa

 Lola delivered these twin ram lambs Monday evening all by herself.

Lola did wonderful, she is so calm and laid back.

These little guys are marked quite nice.

The lamb on the left is moorit, with spotting and eye patches.  The lamb on the right 

is katmoget with spotting and will most likely be fawn in color.

 Rear view....

What a cute face.

We are done lambing !!! So glad to be done.

We have had 24 ewes birth 42 lambs.  All births went well

and I must say this was one of the easiest years I've had with 

lambing.  No problems and everyone delivered on their own.

Out of 42 lambs we had 21 ewe and 21 ram lambs.

That was amazing....I didn't know this until I ran my tally.

I have 9 lambs that are Border Cheviot / Shetland crosses;

3 are ewes and 6 are rams.

I have 33 lambs that are Shetland;

18 ewes and 15 rams.

I do not know yet what will be available as far as lambs go.

I will have several ewes available when lambs are weaned.

If interested email me.

Sheep coats'n Sheep

This evening after turning the ewes out to pasture I decided to 

throw the sheep coats in some soapy water and let them soak away 

the soil and lanolin.

So thirty-seven sheep coats will be soaking for a few days until

I have time to scrub them.  I prefer to clean them by hand

outside using dawn dish soap and a garden hose.

Last year I invested in more coats to get all of the adult sheep covered.

Although I will need to take count again and purchase a few 

additional coats to make sure I have adequate sizes to 

cover everyone.  

When we went to our accountant this past year to do our farm taxes

and the accountant asked, "sheep coats"?  Do they get cold?

I then had to explain the whole purpose of why the sheep wear coats.

Not because they get cold....because those coats keep their fleeces

clean and that is what hand spinners want.  A clean raw fleece.

Free of VM (had to explain that too!)

So if you are coming to the Great Lakes Fiber Show at the Wayne Co.

Fair Grounds here in Ohio on May 27th & 28th .  You will get to see some 

Awesomely clean raw fleeces for sale.

LoLa is still hanging in there.  Her due date is on the 22nd.  She looks like

she could go at any time.  Hopefully soon, I would like to be done 

with lambing. (note to self....after I've taken the breeding groups 

apart.   If a ewe comes back into heat...DO NOT put her in with 

a ram!  I don't want late lambs!) 

 Above, all the ewes and lambs out to graze for the evening.

LoLa on the left, expecting soon and Jasmine on the right...buddies.

#118 Luna

Luna delivered the katmoget ram lamb with a spot on 

Saturday evening (4/29/17), she is a first time mom.

Luna was bred to ram #26,Gwynevar Du Roy , a polled grey katmoget ram.

This little ram is probably the finest fleeced ram lamb that I've 

had born this year.  If someone is looking for a super fine shetland 

ram lamb that will probably be polled he is available.

One more to go before we can report our lamb totals.

Homemade creep feed gate

The girls have been yearning to get out into the grass, so the last few days I have 

been letting them out in the late afternoon until dusk.

Making them come into the barn and settle in for the evening.

Today's post is about my homemade creep feed gate....it's as simple as it gets.

You can go and buy a nice metal gate with spindles that turn as the lambs go through

or

You can make a homemade gate for much less and it serves the same purpose.

This is my basic gate.  I use inexpensive furrowing strips of wood that are 

8 ft. long from the local Home Improvement store.

I'm guessing that I used 8 boards for this gate.

I didn't get measurements on the gate tonight, I'm guessing it to 

be about 36 inches tall and 8 foot wide.

 This bottle baby is my "model".  You can see he is in front of the gate, 

 he is able to slip through the slots.  The slots are about 6 inches wide and about

10 inches tall.  You can see behind the lamb that I have two 8 ft boards next to each

other, this was added later to keep the yearling ewes from slipping through the gate

and eating the lambs pellets.  By adding the second board it has decreased the 

height to about 7 1/2 inches tall, keeping  those ewes from getting into the lambs space.

Pic. above shows how the lambs maneuver through the slots in the gate.

Some of the slots are a little wider than others and the lambs will learn 

which ones they can fit through better as they use them.

As my yearlings fill out and mature I will be able to remove the extra board

from the gate which will increase the height for the lambs.

It's pretty simple to make, I have several gates  that I've made using this wood.

They are not something I would use for a ram pen but they work just fine with the 

ewes and they are light and easy for me to move them around.

This is a view inside the lambs area.  Accessible only to the lambs.  They have

feeders that have lamb pellets in them constantly so they can eat at their leisure.

The gate off to the right is another creep feed gate that I have that needs some repair.

But I have flipped it over to use it as a regular gate, so I get double duty out of 

these gates too.  Just another tip if you are trying to keep your costs down.

#52 Sophia

 We have been long awaiting Sophia to deliver these two.

I was hoping for a moorit gulmoget.

But we got one black gulmoget and one black with some 

white markings on top of his head.

Both are rams.

Sophia was bred to Tardus Radd.

Tardus was bred to several ewes, solids and katmogets 

and all the lambs have come out black or

black gulmogets.  I think he may are go to guy to 

produce more fine black fleeces.

 

Skirted fleeces

 As time allows I've been skirting fleeces.  Above is a

gorgeous fawn fleece.  These will be available for 

sale at the Great Lakes Fiber Show

 another beautiful fleece, an off white, cream color with some

light brown also is fleece.  Check out that staple length!

 another great fleece, this is what I love about the breed.  If you process

the fleece yourself you can separate it by color, spin it up and

have two to three different colors from the same fleece.

 Oh yeah!!  That is a mioget fleece above.

For those not familar with "mioget" it is a color

I just love and don't have alot of.  I would describe it as

a buttery blonde....if that makes any sense and yes this fleece will 

be for sale at The Great Lakes Fiber Show.

Another fine fleece with variations of creamy white, light grey 

and some darker grey.

All the fleeces I will be taking to sell this year are clean.

I invested in coats for the sheep and the wool is very clean 

from veggie matter.

Chloe

Chloe delivered these lambs, a  ram and ewe.

She was bred to my Border Cheviot ram.

This is the last of the lambs I expect from the Border Cheviot.

I bred four ewes to him and got 9 lambs, all nice looking lambs too.

I expect another ewe to deliver soon and two more that will be 

a little farther out.  As they were originally with a lamb ram in the fall

and did not get bred by him, so when they came into heat later

I put them in with another ram. So these will be a few weeks out.