Fluctuating Flocks...

So October's come and gone, and November is half gone, too. Again, there's never a dull moment on the farm, and the past week has been no exception.

Last Saturday was slaughter day, and five ram lambs were processed on site and are now in the freezer. Their pelts are salted in preparation for tanning. Because these boys were quite shy, I wasn't able to get a sense of their wool until it came off. Overall it is much better fleece than last year with very crimpy roots and a super soft feel. I can't wait to shear the ewes in February and see the lambs in March!

Of the seven ram lambs we decided to keep two over the winter to see how they would develop. If things get out of control we can always use more burger; Shepherd's pie and curried lamb burgers - yum! If not, then we can try to sell them next year.

After being exposed to the girls for a short 23 days, Cedar was swapped for Winston, a grey ram with an impressive set of horns. While he won't get to prove his worth this breeding season, I think this ram will add great diversity to our flock and bring in some new colors. He seems to be settling in well with the wethers and ram lambs.

As for the girls, they're all grouped in our largest grouping yet - 19 sheep! Eight were exposed to Cedar, and if he was fast enough, they will lamb between March 15th and April 6th. A ninth, Annie, was exposed to Nelson (the little moorit that was held over) for 48 hours. I don't have much faith that she took, but it certainly wasn't from a lack of trying on Nelson's part. If she did, she'll be due around April 1st. The girls are getting along well, and it's so nice to have them all in one place!

So the sheep flock has certainly changed, but perhaps not as much as the chicken flock...

In the last few days we've had to remove two weasels from the barn after they'd collectively killed at least seven birds, including this year's rooster. (At least I didn't have to eat the rooster.) Ermine, weasel, what-have-you, these nasty creatures were dropping our flock numbers and out-smarting our wired coop walls. Of course they couldn't have helped us rotate our flock by knocking off the old ladies, but instead they went right for the new girls and took at least five of our pullets and yearlings. So our egg numbers are down, and now I'm not sure how many pumpkin pies I'll be able to make. I guess custards and quiches are off the menu for the foreseeable future. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that there were just the two, or else we'll really be out of eggs for a while.

Time to mix things up...

I've been busy the last three days trying to get the sheep sorted and penned and ready for breeding. Since I've been working by myself, it's taken me longer than usual to get the fields in order and ready for the ram. So tomorrow is the big day when Cedar will finally get to be re-united with his ewes...that is, if all goes as planned.

When I sorted the ewes on Monday I had seven ewes mapped out for breeding, but things never seem to go as planned. (It's good to be flexible!) So Cedar will have 8 ewes this year because Poa was being a brat and apparently didn't want to be left out of the fun. As she's my second oldest ewe and she always produces correct lambs, I really didn't want to expend the energy to drag her into the non-breeding pen. Poa joins Crystal, Kira, Madeleine, Wynona, Maggie, Claire, and Edna to complete the 2012 breeding group.

When Cedar's done in mid-November I'd like to re-home him, whether it be in another flock or in the freezer. After this breeding cycle he will be too closely related to my flock, especially when it comes time for next year's breeding. He really has been well behaved, but I need to add some diversity and I just love his daughters too much. He's improved our flock so much that I really do need to sell some of the older ewes to make way for the new. He's listed on the NASSA site as registration number S30956. If anyone knows of someone looking for a ram, they can contact me at oldhomecrawford@gmail.com.

Even with all of the breeding sheep, that still leaves 4 wethers, 7 ewe lambs, 3 open adult ewes (Annie, Mocha, and Clover), and Lwaxanna, the rescue meat mutt.

The next decision is whether or not we breed the goats. I keep going back and forth on this one - to have goat cheese, or to not have goat cheese. If it were that simple it would be a no-brainer, but with the freshening and the kids and the milking, I'm not sure that I want to take on that kind of commitment.

Seasons come and go...

You can always tell the season's changing if you watch your flock. A few weeks ago I was seeing lots of lip curling from the rams (see example to the right) and head-butting between the ladies. It seems to me that the sheep can tell the seasons have shifted, which means it's time to consider who will be bred this year. I've already decided to sell Cedar after this season, as next year I will have several of his daughters to breed. I really don't like the idea of having multiple rams, so he'll have to find another home.

As for now, he's been excellent with the ram lambs. Yes, some of his sons have tried challenging him, even if they are half his size. But Cedar always responds with a quick throw of the head and they know to back down. He's even stepped in upon occasion when the brotherly fights get out of control, or when Otto tries to be the big bully wether. And his boys certainly are fond of him. Many times I've seen them rubbing their faces into his neck wool. Perhaps it's the teenage sheep version of cologne? Whatever the reason, Cedar proudly offers his scents and willingly takes the affection. 

So, on to next year's lambs. This year the process was more about who not to breed, primarily for promoting as much genetic diversity as I can using one ram. Some of my favorite girls will be sitting on the sidelines, but nevertheless I am still very excited about what lambing possibilities exist.

Crystal will be up for her third breeding here at Old Home Crawford. Last year she had twin ram HST lambs, this year twin surviving ewes (a ram lamb died at birth), and her lambs are always so friendly!

Wynona will be bred again - if she cooperates and joins the group. Two years ago she wouldn't switch pens so I had to leave her open. Last year she jumped in to the mix. Hopefully this year I can convince her it's a good idea. Her lambs are always structurally correct.  This may be her last year breeding, as she'll be 9 this year. I'm hoping for another ewe out of her. With triplets this past year, I'm hoping for at least one solid ewe out of her before she retires. Wynona is a solid moorit that carries spotting.

Maggie has been an excellent mother this year to her lambs. As Wynona's daughter, I've been pleasantly surprised by her mild manners and sweet personality. Maggie is a speckled-faced fawn who carries the HST pattern. I'm hoping she'll produce a nice HST moorit ewe for me someday.

 Kira will be bred for her third season here as well. Here ewe lambs are always so friendly, and her rams almost make great rams - if only those horns would curve a few more inches away from their faces! She is a very light grey ewe who has given us two sets of twins. Last year she has twin musket lambs, and this year she had twin grey lambs. Her lambs always have the most downy fleece with a shorter staple length. 


And this year Kira's daughter, Madeleine, will be bred. Maddie is the friendliest ewe, and is often aggressively affectionate. She always knows where the treats are and will do almost anything to get them from you. She rams other sheep out of the way if she feels she's being neglected. As a lamb she would crawl into my lap and fall asleep. This ewe really is more like a dog than a sheep. I'm excited to see what this spotted musket produces when crossed with a solid black.


The other two ewes that will be bred this year are Mocha's Edna and Poa's Claire.  Mocha and Poa will take the year off, but their daughters will continue their lines. Edna is a moorit with a white star and Claire is a mioget with white face markings. Both are yearling ewes who will be bred for the first time.

To recap, Cedar will be exposed to seven ewes again this year; however, this year there will be many more spots involved and the possibility for more colors. Most of the lambs will probably have white-spotted faces, and there is the possibility for more greys or modified colors.

Mocha, Poa, and Clover are taking the year off. Poa's other yearling ewe, Annie, will also remain open (- I think). With four ewes out of Poa in two years, I felt it was best to limit this line.

 And just because it fits the season, the dogs wanted to show off their hunter-orange outfits.

Fun with Sheep

Cute, fuzzy runt.

It's the first year for selling lambs, so I've been busy taking pictures for potential buyers. I have one woman potentially interested in a ram, which would mean that one of our seven ram lambs could be temporarily saved from the freezer. It's been hard not to be biased toward the cute little fuzzy runt, who probably should have been wethered; he'll make neither a good ram nor a good chop - too small. But I think I've selected two or three of the boys that could make fine breeding stock.

Potential Rams for Sale

 

Kira's ram just had to be chosen. After all, he is already harassing his sisters non-stop, showing he certainly has the instinct to do the job. He is squarely built and our first grey ram. While his horn tips do point inward, they are growing outward nicely from the base. His fleece is especially crimped, and it should be softer than his mother's downy fleece.

Kira's Ram

Of course crazy Wynona's rams had to be part of the selection. She simply has the best conformation of our ewes and has easily trained her boys to stay clear of humans. Bred to Cedar, she produced two lovely ram lambs. Both have strong Shetland tails, masculine faces, nicely curved horns, and square conformations. If you remember from previous posts, one was born blettet (with spots on his head) and the other is solid. Because Wynona is solid brown and Cedar is solid black, both are heterozygous black, meaning they could produce brown or black lambs. The more I look at these two, the harder it is to decide which is the better ram. (I think this picture is of the same ram.)

Wynona's Ram

The more important but less flattering side.

And then there are the ewes for sale... 

Annie shows off her nice tail and long legs.

Molly stands square...

...and shows off her fluffy neck wool.

Franny was so cute a week ago,...

...and now she's looking more and more like her mom.

 And then there is just Madeleine...

 

She's supposed to be for sale, but I'm not sure I can part with her. 

Yes, she paws at my legs to demand scratches. Yes, she jumps on my back to get grain. Yes, she pushes me over to scratch her head, especially when I'm sitting on a rock! 

She can be such a PAIN! 

But who could be mad at that sweet face?

So I'm sure the flock will be changing in a month or two. Then I'll have to decide which ewes get bred, and how many to breed. There's always something new on the farm!

Shetland Sheep for Sale

Our first ever year to sell sheep is here. We simply have too many sheep for the winter, so it's time to make some difficult decisions. In an attempt to reduce genetic repetitiveness, we've tried to either offer adults and keep their ewe lambs or sell ewe lambs and keep their dams. We're primarily selling moorits to increase our fleece colors.

The two ewe lambs for sale sired by Cedar are both moorit based with nice conformation and comparable fleece. Franny (left) is a solid fawn out of Maggie, who is out of Wynona, so we felt that line would be reasonable to start thinning. Both Wynona and Maggie are excellent, attentive mothers who lamb without assistance, and each have strong Shetland features with nicely shaped tails. Maggie twinned her first year lambing, and Wynona successfully lambed triplets this year. Molly (right) is a spotted fawn out of Poa, who has given us twin ewes for the past two years. There are only so many ewe lambs I feel I should keep from one ewe, so this was another reasonable starting point.

The registered yearling ewe that will be offered is Annie, another ewe out of Poa but sired by Xavier. She is a spotted moorit who has held her spots and her color well. A nice ewe, but we really felt we could only keep one ewe lamb from each breeding out of Poa. Claire ('11) and Hannah ('12) will stay here, and they were primarily chosen over the other two for their fleece colors (mioget and black, respectively).

The hardest decisions were regarding adult ewes. Since we were able to get two nice ewe lambs out of Crystal, we've decided to see if we can find her a nice home in a smaller flock where she can hopefully get more scratches than we can currently give her. I may regret this sale, but it really isn't practical to keep a ewe and both of her twin ewe lambs. Nettie will give us the potential to get a horned ewe or more HST lambs, and Cali will be our token spotted black ewe.

Mocha will also be for sale, and we're considering selling Madeleine. Hard decisions, but to improve our flock and increase diversity it is a necessary component of shepherding.

New Fences, New Fields

We've had a very productive Summer already, and it hasn't even really started. Three weeks ago we had a crew come and install new fencing, which has expanded the goat lot, divided the big grazing field, and replaced some fallen decorative fence. The farm is really looking nice and the animals are really enjoying the new vegetation.

The goats now have an acre-plus wooded-field lot behind the barn. They have all sorts of browse to choose from, and they're helping to keep the predators from sneaking in on the chickens or baby lambs. Unfortunately they're being a bit wimpy and really staying right behind the barn. The only way I can get them to graze the field is if I go visit the big-boy sheep and encourage some competition for attention. I do think once they nibble down the small stuff they'll wonder further from the barn to seek out the rest of the brush.

 In the meantime the ram and company are grazing the new field and enjoying a change of scenery. Cedar, Buckwheat, and Otto are happily browsing raspberries while Mac recovers from his horn trimming. Robbie's happy to keep Mac company, especially if it means extra scratches and a few treats.

The lambs are all growing quite nicely. A few of the ram lambs are getting exceptionally fine fleece. I'm really pleased with the quality of the lambs we had this year.

We did have to have one horn trimming yesterday, which was unfortunate for such a young lamb. He's recovered just fine, but it's too bad his horns are no good because he has great fleece and is the fastest growing ram lamb so far. He really could have made a great ram had his horns cooperated. He's the large black ram in the back.

The sheep have decided that the dead apple tree (-thanks goats!) is a great scratching post. Maggie really wound herself into its branches this afternoon to get a good back scratch. The lambs also seem to enjoy nibbling and rubbing against the downed branches. They like to play follow-the-leader these days, and often they congregate in groups and begin hopping on one another.

Who's that ewe?

Now that the girls have grown some they've been (unofficially) named. In June we'll tag and register all seven. I think we'll be keeping at least five of these girls, but we'll have to see how they turn out in the next few months.

And now for the history lesson...

Nettie
(Crystal x Cedar)

Nettie Maria Stevens was a teacher and scientist. Born in Cavendish, Vermont in 1861, Stevens spent much of her early adult life saving money to attend college. At the age of 39 she finally began her career as a research scientist. Credited with discovering inherited sex chromosomes as the cause of gender determination, her theory was not initially accepted by the scientific community.

Cali
(Crystal x Cedar)

Calista Robinson Jones was raised in Bradford, Vermont where she later co-founded the Bradford Public Library. Known for her patriotism, she helped sew and erect the first national flag flown over a Chicago public school in 1861.  A national president of the Women's Relief Corps, Mrs. Jones sought to increase patriotic celebrations nation-wide and helped raise money for the Southern Memorial Day fund.

Ella

(Kira x Cedar)

Ella Amelia Colt lived in Brookfield, Vermont during the 19th and 20th centuries. A recently discovered photographer, she photographed daily Vermont life.

Franny  

(Maggie x Cedar)

Named after Frances Allen, daughter of Ethan Allen. While this ewe's name has been shortened to Franny, it should be noted that the historical figure went by Fanny.

Born in Vermont, Frances Allen devoted her life to helping the sick in Montreal where she was a nun. Fanny was also the hospital's chemist. Today, Fanny Allen Hospital stands in her memory in Colchester, VT.

Isabel 

(Clover x Cedar)

Isabel Hayes Chapin Barrows was the first female eye doctor, and she was from Irasburg, VT. She spent much of her adult life living in D.C. where she and her husband worked for the State Department. Over the years she lived abroad in India and Russia. For several years her family ran a summer camp on the Canadian shores of Lake Memphremagog.

Hannah
(Poa x Cedar)

Hannah Dustin famously escaped from native captors after being held for fifteen days. A memorial stands in her honor at the confluence of the Merrimack and Contookook rivers in Boscawen, NH.

Molly
(Poa x Cedar)

Molly Stark, wife of General John Stark, was born in Haverhill, NH. During the Revolutionary War she became a doctor, nursing her husband's wounded troops in their home in Wilmington, VT.




All information was researched through the following sites: www.womenshistory.vermont.gov,  www.pa-roots.org, www.nature.com, and www.heritage-history.com. Pictures of several of these influential women and their full stories may be found at the womenshistory.vermont.gov website.

And I almost forgot! For those of you who have been following the lambing news, you may be wondering what happened to Wynona's ewe lamb. Sadly, for unknown reasons, this ewe did not make it through her second day with the flock. I came home from work last Monday to find her dead in the barn. I'm not sure if she was unable to compete with her brothers (although she seemed to be nursing), or if she was just too weak to keep up with the flock. In the future I will definitely keep triplets confined for a few extra days before integrating them. Wynona's rams seem to be doing just fine, and she is being very attentive to them both.

Lambing Season Summary...

Lambing has finally concluded just after three weeks from its start. As I suspected, Wynona and her daughter, Maggie, must have cycled together and been bred one round apart. Maggie started our season on March 30th and Wynona ended it today.

In all we ended with 15 lambs out of seven ewes, which makes our lambing rate just over 200%. This is pretty respectable since the average Shetland produces at 150% (or 1.5 lambs per season). Our lambing rate is even higher if we include the two lambs out of Crystal and Kira's triplets that didn't make it. Genetically speaking our small sample pool followed the statistics pretty closely. Of the 15 lambs here are some numbers: 7 rams and 8 ewes, 6 brown and 9 black, 5 spotted and 10 solid. We actually have quite a nice showing of the many Shetland phenotypes in this crop of lambs from our small flock.

Here they are from oldest to youngest:

 Maggie's twins - HST black ram and solid moorit (fawn) ewe

Crystal's twins - HST black horned ewe and black krunet ewe with white tipped tail

Clover's twins - solid moorit ewe and ram (with Maggie's ewe at left)

Mocha's twins - solid black ram and solid moorit ram

Poa's twins - solid black ewe and spotted moorit (fawn) ewe

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kira's twins - solid gray (black with "sugar lips") ram and ewe

 

 

 

 

 

 

And finally, after weeks of waiting, I came to the barn this morning to find this...

 

 

Our first set of surviving triplets! Wynona, despite all of her less flattering qualities, is an excellent mother. She has one VERY LARGE (9 lbs!) spotted black ram, one medium (6 lbs) solid black ram, and one tiny (5 lbs) solid moorit ewe. All did very well nursing and moving around today and tomorrow they will finally be introduced to the other ewes and lambs to conclude the chaos of lambing season.

Now comes the hard part: naming and deciding which of these girls (sorry fellas!) will be staying here and which will need to find new flocks to join.

Next post...layer chicks arrive on Wednesday!

    

Purely Predictable...

As per usual, Wynona has to be difficult. All season I've thought, She HAS to be next. But no, of course not. Wynona is LAST to lamb. She must have quads, or the biggest twins possible. Hopefully by Sunday she'll wrap the season up so I can get some sleep.

What wasn't predictable was Kira's triplets overnight. The first one must have been mal-presented because it was buried in the hay when I arrived back at the barn at 5:30 this morning. When I left at 11, after 4 hours of labor and no progress, I just didn't know what to do for her and she seemed to be contently eating hay. I suspected something was not quite right, but since there seemed to be few options aside from me entering to "investigate" the situation, I decided I'd let nature take its course. Kira didn't seem distressed, so I trusted she'd be able to handle the situation. She had three black lambs, two ewes and one ram, all with the white "sugar lips" that signify the color gray in Shetland genetics. One of the ewes didn't make it. The other two lambs, while they seem exhausted, are eating and content.

I'll post pictures after my camera battery charges.

The 10-day stretch...

I should have counted on Poa to lamb 10 days after the crowd. This is the third year in a row that she's waited 10 days beyond Clover to lamb. This morning I got to the barn just after the water bag was passed. Within an hour two little ewes were dry and nursing.

The other lambs are growing taller and stronger each day. They love to form a group and go racing around the paddock rocks playing follow-the-leader while the ewes eat breakfast. Most of the lambs are quite shy at this point, but Crystal's little ewes are just (almost) as people-friendly as she is. The ewes this year seem especially cute; but then again, what lamb isn't cute?

Here's Clover's ewe to the right. She has the most uniform fleece of all the lambs thus far, and she seems to have especially feminine qualities. I've been waiting for a ewe from Clover for the last three seasons, so maybe this one will have to stay with us for a year or two.

Crystal's ewes are just so fun to watch. The littlest ewe seems particularly feisty and is out-socializing her sister. When a little ram lamb came to investigate the stick these girls were trying to enjoy, the little ewe butted him away, clearly claiming her rights to the new-found toy.

As for Wynona, I've been thinking she's going to lamb "any day now" for the last two weeks.  She's been letting other lambs sidle up to her and she's been bossy and seeking isolation for almost a week. She grunts and pants and she seems extremely uncomfortable, especially with the temperature in the high 70s. She's so large she has to be carrying triplets, but I guess only time will tell.

The other lambs seem to follow her around - maybe they want more lambs to come play? Come on, Wynona, enough is enough. For both your sake and mine, please let those little lambies out.

Photos taken today of the last two: Wynona and Kira. Kira looks like she did when she twinned last year. Wynona is HUGE.

As soon as more lambs arrive I'll post again.