Dyed Chicks

I just found out that some people dye chicks! Crazy! The eggs are injected with dye before they hatch. As the chick grows up they do loose the color. Personally I like to natural colored chicks best and some may buy these guys as pets and not take care of them. Though I do wonder what a broody hen would think if some of the dyed ones were put under her. "Oh My, what happened to my children!?"



A video of the little guys: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3sfUakyaoU&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3sfUakyaoU&feature=related

Breeding Groups 2012-Sheep

This year I decided to lamb everyone in the spring after all. I'm just going to make another shed. I don't care for lambing late. The lambing in and of itself is nice, but the lambs are much smaller, not skinny or bony  just little. They don't have nearly as much wool either so I can't shear the culls/market ones until spring and none of the coats fit-I had to make them all smaller. I've also decided to breed all the first time lambers to Shetlands as some of the first timers were sucked down to the bone as it were by their big growthy lambs and are thinner for this time of year than I like.

This year I'm breeding a few more girls to the purebred boys so I should have some ewe lambs to sell next year. This year I only have a couple blacks for sale. All of the ewes are my breeding unless noted. Now I'm looking forward to lambing and I haven't even sold my market lambs yet! Well I am glad it won't be for five months....

Sommarang Gilroy-black, fine fleeced, horned and spotted. I'm hoping his groups throws lots of spots and fine fleeces.
Dingdong-fawn (carrys spots)
Eastwind-spotted emsket
Early Spring-mioget (carrys spots.)
Elm-lt. grey (carrys spots)
Ferndale-sheala F1 Gordon
Glitter-white
Gardenia-grey gulmoget/katomget F2 Dillon
Goldenred-moiget/musket F2 Orion
Grettle-white F2 Jings
Gladys-white F2 Jings
Hollyhocks-moorit (carrys spots) F2 Jericho
Honeydew-fawn katmoget (may carry spots) F2 Jericho
Sheepy Hollow Sienna-moorit horned ewe
UnderTheSon Jelly Drop-emseket

PS23 Fife-moorit, F1 Orion fine fleece and fully horned out of a horned ewe. Long and deep bodied.
Flourance-white F2 Skeld
Fairlie-fawn F1 Orion. This is a linebreeding, hpoing he make the lambs crimpier and she makes them silkier as she is not very crimpy, but very silky.
Gloria-white F2 Jings
Hyacinth-grey katmoget F2 Jericho
Heather-grey katmoget F2 Jericho
Hope-white F2 Jings
Hummingbird-black F2 Jericho
Hydrangea-white F1 Skeld
Forsythia-lt grey F2 Greyling

PS23 Hector-white F1 Jings super fine fleece. Fine boned and small-my smallest ram, refined. (Not undersized, just by comparison to my other rams.) I was actually going to use Fairlight my other F1 Jings who is much more meaty and a flock book type, but decided to use him  at the last minute instead.
Under The Son Aran-sheala
Under The Son Hopi-sheala/dk brown horned ewe F2 Skeld
Hadassah-moorit horned ewe F2 Orion
Harmony-fawn katmoget, horned ewe F2 Orion
Funzie-grey katmoget, horned ewe F1 Jings. This is a linebreeding.

HVF Coopworth-white long silky and soft fleece, crossing sire for commercial ewes and market lambs. His lambs were very nice both for fleece and meat this year. He is also quite meaty, according to Lydia he is wider at the withers than her horse!
Dove-white
Easterlilly-white
Ely Catherdral-fawn katmoget
Emrald-grey katmoget
Evening Primrose-black gulmoget
Essex-fawn/moorit
Edelweiss-musket katmoget
Finch-white
Fiona-black
Gem-sheala gulmoget
Ginger-musket
Gloxinia-musket
Gwendolyn-musket, scurred ewe
Gloss-white
Windswept Lime-white

Croftland Farm Ile De France X Dorset-white, terminal sire. He is not as thick muscled as a pure Ile De France, but not as tall and thicker than a pure Dorset-perfect combination in my opinion for a terminal sire. His fleece is like a Dorset's springy and bouncy, I think his lambs should have decent fleeces (I've seen Shetland X Suffolk wool that was quite nice)-I'll see though! All of his lambs will be market lambs.

He got all the crossbreds-9 Coopworth X Shetland, 3 Corriedale X Shetland, 4 Shetland X Merino, 2 Corriedale X BFL/Shetland, 2 BFL X Shetland, 1 Coopworth X Shetland/Dorset/Corriedale, 1 Shetland X Corriedale/Doeset and 1 Coopworth X Shetland/Merino-23 in all. All of these girl's have nice fleeces, just a variety of types longwool-med/fine wool. It will be interesting to see how each kind of wool matches up with the down wool type of fleece. (I'll shear the lambs before they go to market unless they are under 2 or 3 in. long.)

Fall Color

These fall pictures are from a couple of weeks ago. Enjoy! Now our fall color is mostly gone. with just an occasional gold, rust or brown tree among the bare, black trees. 

 Wacky carrot from our garden.

 This is not very colorful, but I like it. If you look closely there are sheep in the picture.

 My lambs grazing in the sunset.

Nepal in His Prime

I just found a picture of Nepal the black buck from Judy while looking up some information one a couple goats sites. http://tredd.com/lavenderhill/boys_of_lavender_hill.htm His sire Warlock is also pictured on the website from his original farm.

WI Sheep And Wool

This year at the WI sheep and Wool Festival I got to visit with several other Shetland Sheep Breeders and an Angora Goat Breeder friend. One of the Angora Breeders, Judy, did not come back to vend so it was kind of sad not to see her with her booth filled with all sorts of wonderful mohair locks and yarn. She is just going to keep her goats for pets now and is getting out of both selling goats/breeding and vending. (I bought her last two bucks earlier.)

I don't have any pictures but http://underthesonshetlands.blogspot.com/ , http://www.okacres.com/ and http://ramsayfarms.blogspot.com/ have lots of nice pictures of the Shetland show and a few of the fleece show.

I entered five very crimpy single coated fleeces and won a second place with the white. The others did not place. One of the colored ones that did not place won a Reserve Champion last year at Greencastle. This years fleece is a little nicer as it is longer (shown after the rise instead of before.) The fleece that won  Champion was a spectacular jet black of Theresa's . The Reserve Champion was also really nice- a soft, crimpy grey with black tips. I think it was either Garrett's or Kim Nikolai's.

Sales were good this year thanks to many return customers. Thank you!

Pet Angora Goat For Sale

I have a yearling super fine (her mohair is kid fine now) and locky fleeced white Angora doe, Heidi for sale. She is available as a pet because of her size. She is too small to be bred. She was tested negative for CAE. Heidi is $60 after I shear her of $85 now.

Lambs

 Here are some pictures of my lambs. Most are crossbreds and are Shetland X Coopworth or Shetland X Corriedale. The grey katmoget is a Corriedle X and has very fine crimpy wool. I have two ewe lambs like that and they are for sale. I have a few black/charcoal grey/ dark brown Corriedale X lambs as well.

 I also have several white Coopworth X ewe lambs that are fantastic. I'm selling all the white cross lambs this year so the best are available. They really are nice and big with long (some have 4 or 5 in already) silky, soft fleece.

 The little grey ewe lamb (next to the black with horns) is Gloria's out of Gilroy.

 Keeper doe kid. Both her and her sister look alike, one is a tad paler. Both are super fine and soft!

Kids....I have several very nice doe kids and could sell a starter group with an unrelated buck if anyone is interested. Or they are for sale individually too. All are to be registered with CAGBA.

(Not sure why blogger is changing the color on my pictures. Again. Grrr.)