Contented Butterfly Farm

Catching up ... again

2011-03-25T11:13:00.007-04:00

Once again I suffered from blogunattentionitis. A truly serious disease where one forgets to do blog posts on a regular basis. This tends to happen to me over the winter. Anyone else have this horrible affliction which not only has the unintentional disadvantage of making others kept in the dark about farm happenings?

Many things have happened and so once again, into the breech to fill in the happenings on the farm.

NOVEMBER
November started breeding season for us. A tad later than normal, but what's one week among friends? I kept my breeding groups notoriously small to try to keep an eye on our flock numbers. Here's the rundown of the breeding groups:

SheltrgPines Uber (shown above enjoying a lovely pumpkin thanks to Riverview Farm) was given three lovely ladies: LaughingRiver Rosemary, Contented Darby, and Contented Helle

Contented Fimtan (being ever so gentlemanly and sharing his pumpkin with Mildri) was given four lovely ladies: Contented Brisingamen, Contented Rotinn, Contented Mildri and Contented Thyme.

DECEMBER
December came and Brisingamen was still in the breeding group but acting very funky and looking bloated. So, out she was pulled and put in with last years lambs. I consulted the vet via the phone and we gave her some therabloat, because we were thinking it was a frothy bloat. She responded well and so we kept her with the lambs; her breeding group having come to a premature end.

JANUARY
Since the sheep were starting to get fuzzy looking, we called the shearer, Gwen Hinman, to schedule a time to shear. We picked an early January day that surprisingly was nice and not freezing! We, and when I say that I mean she, sheared a total of 33 sheep (four from Missing Mountain Farm aka the Rice family). First on deck was Sabrina shown below.
Then we continue down the color continuum from light to dark until we're done.

The lower picture you can see Gwen getting ready to shear one of our smallest sheep, Contented Ingrid (from Underhill Mulan and Underhill Bach). Got to love those tiny Underhill sheep! Although, I'm sure she was cursing them under her breath!

Here's a better shot of more of the gang working away. It was funny because we had a 4 year old who when he saw that a sheep had been nicked kept saying that she sheep had and owwie. Gwen, jokingly said "That kid has got to go!" After that, they left because he was getting bored, she didn't see them go and got concerned that they took her seriously!
All shearing pictures are courtesy of Missing Mountain Farm, specifically Pam Rice. Thanks a bunch for sharing them with me.

Once all the sheep were sheared, I noticed that Brisingamen (the one pulled early from the breeding group) looked fairly skinny. I made a mental note to start supplementing her with extra feed. Unfortunately, within five days she was looking extremely bloated again and was down, not wanting to get up. Once again we sequestered her and tried to get her back on track again with another therabloat dose. The next day, she was still down, so we called our vet. They came out to look at her and said that something more was wrong since she was trying to bring up a cud and when she couldn't she would grind her teeth. I opted for euthanasia since she was "on the chopping block" since lambing last year. Her lamb last year lasted for a few days and then with no warning died. We were re-breeding her to see if this was a chronic issue with her. We necropsied her and found that her rumen was 3 times the normal size. All other organs looked normal. Once everything else was examined, the rumen was opened and we found it was full of dry foodstuffs. There was no liquid in there, nor the fiber mat that separates the liquid from the dry. It seems as if she lost her bacteria a while ago and I never noticed. Some of the contents included pumpkin seeds that we had stopped feeding about a month prior. She had approximately 20 pounds of food in her stomach and was essentially starving to death. On top of it all, when necropsied, the vet noticed that she had become pregnant (with how many I didn't want to know). More than likely, had I decided to try to fix her, the fetus would have been reabsorbed to concentrate her energy on living. That day I felt like a failure.

FEBRUARY
Nothing new with the sheep, but the chickens were slowly starting to lay more eggs. We also received our seed order from FEDCO seeds, so thoughts of spring were abound!

MARCH
Now we're more or less up to date. The ewes that took are looking nice and pregnant. There's at least one that has twins in her as she's looking very saddlebaggy. The black pussy willow is out and crocus are trying to peek their heads out of the snow. The promise of spring is coming!

The Great Delivery

2010-10-22T09:53:00.006-04:00

Okay all, sorry for the delay, but my camera has crapped out on me and since I haven't had a chance to get a new one, I'll have to rely on pictures that were sent to me when I was searching for that right ... thing.

With regard to my hints, you could have assumed a number of different things ... no?

The item in question could have been a guard llama.

They come in brown and white.

The item in question could have been a herding dog.

They also come in brown and white.

How about if it was a cow?

They also come in brown and white.
Maybe another sheep?
Yes! Drum roll, please.

Now introducing Windswept Goshawk. The newest addition to our breeding stock.
Okay, so you were right. Lets not try to be too smug about it!

Stay tuned. Breeding groups are up next. Can't November 11th come fast enough? No,, I can wait, still haven't decided who's going with whom.

Exciting news aka The Great Delivery

2010-10-14T15:59:00.003-04:00

In case you've been reading my posts on Facebook (not on it? Don't fret, there's a side bar here with all the farm's posts so you don't miss out!), there's some news on the horizon. Saturday Tim and I will be heading to the Rhinebeck Sheep and Wool Festival, not to look around, but we'll be having something delivered to us to take back home.

Here's some hints:
1) The item is brown and white.
2) It's coming from Michigan.
3) It's for the farm.

Any guesses out there? Can't think of what it could be? Don't despair, by the end of the weekend I'll post on the Great Delivery.

9th Annual Jefferson County Fiber Festival

2010-08-23T09:49:00.008-04:00

This year I decided to try out the 9th Annual Jefferson County Fiber Festival in New York. It's located at the Stone Mills Museum, in LaFargeville. LaFargeville is just north of Watertown, NY. Since Tim's folks still live in Potsdam (about 1 1/2 hours away), we stayed with them and drove down to the festival. The festival is pretty small, so it's the same weekend as the Old Farm and Home Days and everything seems to fit in pretty well.

We were able to set up in the pavilion, which was nicely located so that vehicles driving by could see what was going on. We had our usual items for sale, wool rovings, wine socks, spinning tools, etc. In the two upper pictures I was still working on setting up. After I moved some things around, Tim took a few more pictures of the "finalized" booth.

Close up of the cedar sachets and wine socks.

Here's a shot of the overall booth. I need to work on getting some material to make a nice skirt for the tables. Not too bad, if I do say so myself. It's a two day event, but we opted to only vend on Saturday becuase Sunday was pouring rain and there was some talk about possible flooding. No need to get stuck in a flood with items that will absorb water!

There were some nice fiber folk also vending there and we enjoyed chatting with them. One lady had two angora goats for sale and they were adorable and friendly! The only few things that saved Tim from me purchasing one was the fact that we didn't have any room in the truck with all the fibery stuff as well as the fact I'm not sure how goats are involved with the Voluntary Scrapie Program. Perhaps in time, I will add an angora goat to the mix ... but not today.

Summer Lambs

2010-08-04T09:59:00.006-04:00

Gullison, our musket gulmoget ram lamb. We'll be keeping him.

Alendil, our white ewe lamb. We'll be keeping her.

Mulan's grey ewe lamb by Bach. For Sale.

Mulan's black scurred ewe lamb by Bach. Mulan's black scurred ewe lamb's back end. For Sale

Viveka's moorit katmoget ram lamb by Bach. Nice horns so far, as well as a not bad tail. For Sale.

Viveka's other moorit katmoget ram lamb with scurs. Unfortunately, his scurs are not looking like they're going to clear. This is, in my opinion, a fault and he will more than likely turn into little white packages.

Last, but not least is a beautiful moorit gulmoget from Arwen (right next to her). She's absolutely gorgeous and will be a keeper at the farm. Any ideas on a name?

Bittersweet

2010-05-03T08:53:00.004-04:00

On Wednesday, April 28th, I woke to the strains of Tim calling, "Jen, can you come help me?" Brisingamen, our black ewe had just given birth to a brown gulmoget ewe lamb. She had been bred to Gulliver. This is our third gulmoget of the year. Unfortunately we didn't get any pictures of the newest birth, and the last one for this year. Lambing season officially ended with that birth.

On Friday, I picked up my friend, Ruth, and we traveled to Maryland to attend the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival. The largest and I believe longest running festival in the US. Ruth had been to it many times before, this was my first time. It was lots of fun, although a bit hot. Crazy me had packed a nice heavy sweater just in case it was chilly. Glad I had also packed tee shirts, as that was all that was needed. Was amazed that there were announcements to folks who decided to leave their dog in the car. What are they, whackos? Anywho, I bought a few things and Ruth bought a few things, including a BFL ewe lamb! Since we drove down in my Prius, we had to find a pet store to buy a crate. Luckily in Columbia, we located a PetSmart and they were fairly understanding about the fact that we needed to make sure that the carrier would fit in the hatchback. Needless to say, I've done this before (remember we brought Mulan home that way). Great time there and came back Sunday.

First stop was Ruth's where we offloaded all her purchases, including the ewe lamb. Then I got home. First thing Tim tells me is that we had a loss. Seems as if Brisingamen's lamb, the one just born on Wednesday, was found lying on her side dead at 2pm. She was doing great as far as feeding, but I kept thinking she was lying down an awful lot. Tim remarked that she was looking/acting funny on Saturday. She was also still lying down quite a bit and evidently leaning against the barn. He's wondering if she may have also been blind in one eye. Needless to say, something was wrong and she decided to cross that rainbow bridge.

I'm so sad about it. Think I might go out and spend some time with the bouncy lambs.

The singleton

2010-04-29T09:37:00.005-04:00

On Tuesday, April 27th, at around 6pm Arwen started to go into full labor. I was on my way to knitting group, when I got the call from Tim. I immediately turned around and came back to watch/help out (or as Tim would say, worry incessantly). Arwen did a good job and delivered a healthy brown gulmoget ewe lamb.

Arwen was bred to Gulliver, our black gulmoget ram that we lost due to hypothermia. Such a sweet looking little baby. Makes the loss of Gulliver a bit easier.

The triplets cometh ...

2010-04-27T12:10:00.004-04:00

What started out looking like this:

Ended up giving me triplets. Viveka was bred to Bach, and she's never given triplets before. Since I was at work and Tim was out at the time of the birthing, we're not sure what order they came in, but we ended up with this little guy. A nice brownish katmoget.

This little guy with the white stripe on his back also appeared. Yes, another katmoget.

The third lamb born was a light looking brown based ewe lamb (normally when we get moorit babies they're so darn dark it's almost as if they're black) that most likely would have been fawn colored. Unfortunately she was stillborn. Looks like, from her development, that she died in utero at the later stage of Viveka's pregnancy. The lamb was fully formed (as far as I could tell) but her eyelids were closed and they appeared sunken in where her eyes should have been. Also, where she should have had a nice rounded looking belly, she appeared as flat as a pancake. Is it possible she ran out of space to grow? Something happened, and I'm sure it was a blessing in disguise, although a bit of a let down.

These are the only ram lambs that came from Bach's randy insistence that he breed everything on the farm that was wooly and female. Unfortunately, it looks as if Bach's insistence to breed others left Rakel (Viveka's twin sister) without being tupped this year. But, fortunately for us, it also looks as if he didn't get any other ewe we didn't want him to have!

Two more to go. Will I get any more gulmogets from Gulliver ... time will tell.

Third and Fourth Babies of the season!

2010-04-23T19:28:00.003-04:00

Late last night Mulan gave us twins. She was a bit sneaky. So much for them not eating prior to lambing. She tucked into the minimal grain that we give them each evening and also went out for some hay at about 8pm. When we went out around 10pm, she had already delivered her twins. She gave us two girls. These girls are Bach's lambs. I was hoping for at least one ram lamb, but alas, no go.

I like them much and they both have a bit of white color to them. I'm thinking the one could be grey, but since Bach was modified, perhaps an emsket? Thoughts?

They're adorable, so we'll do a wait and see as to their true colors.

Second baby of the season!

2010-04-20T14:57:00.004-04:00

Today Maybelle Sabrina, my white ewe, who was bred to Underhill Bach gave me a lovely looking white ewe lamb at about 2pm. She weighs 7 pounds.

She's just adorable. She has a little patch of phaeo on the back of her neck (at least I believe that's what it is). It's hard to see in this photo as mom hadn't finished cleaning all of the gack off her neck, but it's slightly above mom's nose.

Dare I say I want to keep her? This lambing season isn't bodeing well if I don't have any new lambs on a sales list!

First Baby of the Season!

2010-04-18T11:10:00.006-04:00

Yesterday morning, Sabbath Farm Sylph gave me a beautiful brown based gulmoget ram lamb.

He looks like he may even carry spotting, which isn't surprising as Sylph does carry spotting and his daddy, SheltrgPines Gulliver was a spotted gulmoget ram.

This little guy will most likely be kept here on the farm to replace Gulliver.

Underhill Bach

2009-12-03T11:51:00.005-05:00

Here's a picture of Bach after we brought him home from attending MFF last year.

My Bach is no more. He crossed over the rainbow bridge yesterday evening. It's a long story, so let's start at the beginning.

This year for breeding, we put him where he was next to the non-breeding ewes (we've done that before with other rams without problems) and he kept trying to break into the non-breeders even though he hadn't settled (that I'm aware of) all his girls. After a few attempts and us having to fix and reinforce the fence twice, we decided to put him in a hog panel pen on the lawn exactly where he was last year. Nice and far away from the non-breeders. Well, this year, there was no getting his hormones in line and Monday night around 10pm we heard some bashing and found he had escaped his ewe pen and was smacking the hog panel pen where Gulliver was with a few girls. Bach's girls were luckily still in the pen as he got out from a side area that was baling twined together (multiple times) and was able to squeeze his tiny frame under the fence. I know this as there was some of his wool left behind. Naughty bugger. I'm not aware that he has still settled all the four ewes he was given (only saw him breed Mulan the first day and this past weekend he was breeding Viveka). He was still looking interested in Sabrina and Rakel, but they were having nothing to do with him.

After running around trying to catch him and putting up electronet to grab him, we were able to get him back in our control after one hour. Can you say greased lightning? Once we caught him, we placed him back in with the bachelors and had them all "squeezed". They started clonking heads like usual and I thought it will be no problem. I worked on reinforcing their pen Tuesday to make sure "houdini" didn't get out again and they were starting to become more civilized, I thought. There wasn't a whole lot of bonking going on that day.

Wednesday came with still no terrible problems in the morning, but as evening fell, Tim called me at work to say that when he peeked into the ram pen, Bach was down and he wasn't sure he was still breathing. A half-hour more of work to go and then I came home to him still down and breathing raspily. The vet was coming out to put him down if nothing else could be done. When she got here, she examined him to find his pupils not reacting, a broken jaw, and figures he also had massive brain trauma. While Tim was waiting for her (before I got home) Bach went into a seizure. Needless to say, the right choice was euthanasia.

I will miss my standoffish ram with the beautiful fleece. I now have to hope that he settled enough girls to give me a nice ram lamb to keep.

May you be bounding around verdant fields with no fencing and lots of fertile ewes to breed!

Breeding Groups Together

2009-11-12T17:25:00.011-05:00

Every Veterans' Day Tim and I put the breeding groups together. It always seems like a good date for us. Firstly, because we have the day off and secondly, it gives us lambs in April when the grass is starting to appear and the dreaded snow is disappearing.

This year we opted to use two rams with 7 ewes total. Last lambing was a blast with 11 ewes pregnant, but we really didn't need the extra work and there are a few lambs left over that didn't get purchased.

First group is SheltrgPines Gulliver's girls. Gulliver is a black smirslet gulmoget (At/Aa BB/Bb Ss/SS M?/M?).

Gulliver's ladies are Sabbath Farm Sylph, a light grey ewe (Ag/A? BB/B? Ss/S? M?/M?). Sylph is our oldest ewe, but is still going strong! In this picture you can see her chowing on a pumpkin. We've bred her twice and each time she singled. This year we're hoping for twins.

Contented Brisingamen is the black ewe chowing down on some hay. Her genetics are Aa/Aa BB/Bb S?/S? M?/M?. Brisingamen is a first timer with a ram and it will be nice to see what she throws.

Contented Arwen is a gentle moorit (Aa/Aa Bb/Bb S?/S? M?/M?). This will be her first time lambing as well.

Our second breeding group is with Underhill Bach. Bach is a mioget (Aa/Aa Bb/Bb S?/S? Mm/Mm). This photo shows Bach with his four girls.

Bach's first ewe is the one in the middle with the black face. It is none other than Underhill Mulan, our grey ewe (Ag/Aa BB/Bb Ss/S? M?/M?). This breeding will be very interesting. Bach threw a horned ewe lamb and a scurred ram lamb this past lambing and Mulan has thrown a scurred ram lamb in the past. Needless to say, I'm looking forward to seeing their get. They'll hopefully make it so that I don't have to wait too long. There was a bit of "activity" yesterday after they were put together.

The next two are Islandfleece Viveka (Ab/Aa Bb/Bb SS/S? M?/M?)and Islandfleece Rakel (Ab/Aa Bb/Bb S?/S? M?/M?), our two moorit katmoget twins. We weren't going to breed Rakel, but the twins have never been separated, so we said "what the heck" and kept them together.

The last ewe Bach is getting is Maybelle Sabrina, our white ewe (Awt/Aa Bb/B? S?/S? M?/M?).

Almost breeding season

2009-10-22T15:19:00.004-04:00

I haven't blogged in a while. Life is crazy and hectic and I know it's no excuse, but it's only one I have! :-) Spent the first two weeks of October in Germany. Lots of fun and had a good time overall. Our great friends Ruth and Ed took care of all the critters while we were gone. No major problems, but Ruth has resolved that she will get chickens, just no roosters! Ed the last couple of days decided to read our instructions on how to take care of the critters and read the grain amount we give the girls a little wrong, so needless to say they were not happy to see us come back with the "puny amount" we gave them. Thanks so much Ruth and Ed for all your work keeping our critters healthy. Now it's back to reality and needing to keep plugging along. We're going into the winter with more sheep that we had originally planned. You know what they say about the best laid plans. So, knowing that we have a wee bit too many, we're working on only breeding a few of the ewes. Here's the plan so far.

SheltrgPines Gulliver (our black gulmoget) will be getting Contented Arwen (moorit), Contented Brisingamen (black), and SabbathFarm Sylph (grey).

Underhill Bach (mioget) will be getting Maybelle Sabrina (white), Underhill Mulan (grey), and Islandfleece Viveka (moorit katmoget).

With Bach and Mulan's breeding, I'll be interested to see what the get is like as Mulan is a half poll and I'm not sure what to call Bach (threw a scurred ram lamb this year from Sage and a horned ewe lamb this year from Celebrian). Needless to say, that breeding has the potential for all sorts of things!

Will have pictures posted when the groups get put together.

Horns or Scurs? You be the judge

2009-07-09T16:32:00.006-04:00

Around the time we were getting ready to do CD/T shots on the lambos, I noticed that Celebrian's really crimpy daughter (CB0035) has what appears to be horns or scurs popping out. The following pictures show the size of the "whatevers". This was around June 20th. I haven't noticed any significant growth of them since then. They're still there, but I'm not familiar with ewes and their horns. I'm assuming that they take a while to pop, unlike rams, that pop pretty soon in their lives.
Can you see them, they're kind of small and look chocolate chip like.

After posting about them on the Shetland polled yahoo group, it appears we forgot that Underhill Bach, this little girl's sire, came from a horned ewe.

Another breeding of Bach gave us a ram lamb with scurs. He's so super friendly that he's destined to be a wether and a local family had their hearts melted by him. The little rascal layed down right at their feet and any time a family member moved, he followed looking for scritches.

So, are they horns or scurs??

Catching up for lost time

2009-07-02T09:27:00.004-04:00

Okay. I'm trying to catch up for being a bad blogger. I know, whip me with a wet noodle.

Sage gave birth on May 11th to two ram lambs. That ended lambing for us with 18 lambs on the ground with 10 ewe lambs and 8 ram lambs.

We've been moving the ewes over to the Gingras' grassy areas. They've been grazing like locusts! Before moving the girls, Sylph's ewe lamb wasn't paying attention to where everybody went when they moved to another patch of grass. She started to panic when she didn't see mom, so she ran into the hog panels we have up for fencing. I took her to the vet to find out she had a clean break on the bone between the hoof and elbow area. She looked like this after the vet wrapped her up.

She's now doing better - the break has healed and she's not sporting some funny kneesocks anymore. But, she still favors the leg from time to time. She's also not going to be registered. She's scritchy feeling and that's surprising for a lamb, considering her mom is the oldest ewe we have and still soft feeling. Her dad is SheltrgPines Uber and real soft, too. What a disappointment.

Rain, rain go away.
Momma needs to cut some hay.
The sheep are sad,
the weather's bad.
We'll all be glad when the sun comes again!

Thus ends your poetry interlude.

One other exciting thing that happened, was that when googling the farm name, I came across a person who bought some of Celebrian's wool and she posted on her blog about it. Check it out on her blog called Able to Dream.

Website is live!

2009-07-01T10:29:00.003-04:00

After what seemed like many months of us and the web designer procrastinating, she came over yesterday and taught us how to upload and make changes to the website. I'm so thrilled. Keep in mind that we're still adding content (such as the color genetics of each sheep). But stop on by and see what you think.

Tim says Whoohoo! You can find us at http://contentedbutterflyfarm.com/ so take a look.

I'll do another post catching you all up. Sage had two ram lambs, we dealt with a broken leg (on a lamb that is) and other fun times.

Mini Baby Explosion - catching up

2009-05-14T15:31:00.004-04:00

Sylph lambed on April 28th and gave us a little girl. Sabbath Farm Sylph was bred to SheltrgPines Uber. This little girl is going to be grey. She already had sugar lips when she was born.

The next day, Wednesday, April 29th, Maybelle Sabrina gave us a little girl as well. Sabrina was bred to Contented Balder and gave us a little moorit girl! I know now some of Sabrina's genetics! Wahoo!

That same day that Sabrina gave birth, Sabbath Farm Celebrian graced us with her twins! Both girls.

Celebrian was bred to Underhill Bach and gave us a really crimpy moorit/possibly fawn girl.

The other I believe will stay moorit. Of course, time will tell and we'll see what we get.

Baby Explosion!

2009-04-26T10:03:00.012-04:00

The last couple of days have been a lambing explosion! First, Islandfleece Freya lambed on Thursday. I didn't get a chance to grab the pictures and was planning on doing that on Friday. Here's a picture of Freya with her two lambs. She was bred to SheltrgPines Gulliver.

This is Freya's chocolatey ram lamb. He was the second one to be born.

This is Freya's black ewe lamb. She was the first one to arrive.

On Friday, I planned on getting shots of the new lambs and posting here on the blog, but when I got home Friday night, Tim came into the house saying that there were lambs everywhere. I quickly rushed out to help him to find that Contented Rafn had a black ewe lamb on the ground and that LaughingRiver Rosemary had just birthed a lamb.

Below is a picture of Contented Rafn. She's a black who has some heavy iset (white fibers mixed in the fleece - think salt and pepper hair). Excuse the sideways picture of her. She was also bred to SheltrgPines Gulliver.

Rafn gave us this really pretty black ewe lamb.

LaughingRiver Rosmary, another black ewe, was bred to Contented Balder. He's not registered yet - dam is Sabbath Farm Celebrian and sire is PaintedKnoll Zweiback, but will be as he is looking excellent conformation wise and his horns are nice and wide. Rosemary is very protective of her lamb.

Here's a shot of Rosemary's black ewe lamb.

Tim thought that the black lamb of Rafn's was Rosemary's until he picked up the lamb only to have Rafn baaing and following after her. Silly Tim, Rafn knew it was her lamb! After we got the lambs and moms sorted out, we placed them in their lambing jugs to bond with baby.

Not to be an exaggeration of baby explosion, we noticed that Viveka, who as one friend kindly put it, "She's as big as a table!", was wandering away from the other ewes. Sure enough, she was not going to be outdone by two younger ewes!

Islandfleece Viveka promptly (okay not so promptly - about an hour or so after the others were settled into their jugs) gave birth. She was bred to SheltrgPines Uber. Their pairing gave us two katmoget ram lambs. Here you can see her with the second ram lamb behind her. We had run out of lambing jugs, so constructed a jug around where she lambed using hog panels. God bless hog panels.

Here's a shot of the first ram lamb born.

All that birthing in two days time has me wiped. I'm so tired, you would have thought I gave birth to 6 lambs! I just looked over my paperwork when we had breeding groups together and see that I did catch when Bach mounted Celebrian. Based on that date, looks like more will be on the ground by Monday. Stay tuned. I'm excited to see what Bach is going to give us.

For those keeping track, we've had 7 ewes give birth to 12 lambs. We bred 11 so, we've got 4 more to go. The ewe to ram ratio is currently tied at 1:1 (6 ewes and 6 rams).

Helle's lambing debut

2009-04-16T12:58:00.004-04:00

Contented Helle is one of the first lambs that have been born on our farm. This is her first year to lamb for us. Last year we put her in with one ram and he turned out to be a wife beater (he was very yummy - no wife beaters on this farm). She then was popped into another breeding group, but I think she was still way too wary of the ram to settle. This year, she was given to SheltrgPines Gulliver and settled.On Monday, April 13th, she gave us two ram lambs. The chocolatey ram lamb with the splashy looking face was the first to be born. He's going to have some really big horns. He already has some buds pushing out of his head. I'm thinking that he's going to be a musket (oatmeal) colored lamb as he's already looking kind of light around the neck when I part the wool.

The second lamb (who still had birthing fluid on his hip when I found them) is a ram lamb who at this point is looking very black. Here he's lying down on the step up to the hay feeder. You can see a real close up of mommy's ear and a portion of her eye. She was looking for some cookies.

Here's a shot of mom and the boys. One taking a snack while the other looks out the doorway.

Mulan's 2009 babies

2009-04-09T16:50:00.004-04:00

Mulan finally came through and gave me some lambs. I've been watching her get larger and larger and her bag has been quite full for a while, so I figured she was going to be the first to go. They always like to keep me guessing. Underhill Mulan was bred to Contented Balder, an as yet unregistered offpspring from Sabbath Farm Celebrian and PaintedKnoll Zwieback.

Mulan gave me one ewe lamb and one ram lamb. So far they're both moority looking.

Mulan is a good, protective mommy. Excuse me, is that camera going to hurt my baby? No? Okay, progress with the pictures.

The little boy is a nice chocolately moorit. His horn leather is very small, so he may just have scurs. Mulan carries the half-poll gene.

The girl has a few white hairs on her head and there's some light fibers by her ears, so she may become a musket.

First lambs of 2009!

2009-04-08T21:45:00.007-04:00

Islandfleece Rakel just surprised me this early evening with twins. She was bred to Sheltrgpines Uber. Both are girls.
One girl is a katmoget with a nice splash of white on her head. A krunet katmoget. She weighed 6 pounds.

The second girl is a nice chocolatey moorit. She weighed in at 5.8 pounds.
I think they all make a nice family. I'm so happy that lambing for 2009 started off on a good foot.

More chickens?

2009-04-05T12:04:00.005-04:00

More chickens you say? Well, yes. We needed to get more chickens as our supply wasn't keeping up with the demand. Since I'll be at the Windsor Farmer's Market now, I figured a dozen or two wasn't going to cut it.

Enter the Golden Comets, a cross between a Rhode Island Red and a White Leghorn. They're supposed to be good layers of brown eggs. I found out that my feed store carries 16 week old pullets to purchase. We ordered 12 of them and I went to pick them up yesterday morning. I'm hoping that I got the chicken that laid an egg in the crate while they were waiting to be offloaded. Wouldn't that be lucky? They're currently residing in the Boober's kennel. Okay, Boober hasn't resided there since we put breeding groups together (hence the hay chaff on the ground).

Tim and I worked on a small pen they could go into for the evening (nothing more than a modified breeding hut) with a roost and guess what they chose to sleep in last night? That's right, Boo's dog house!

All 13 of them (including Limpy the second banana Barred Holland roo - thanks mom for the phrase).

The girls have taken to Limpy, including grooming him. I've not seen my other chickens do this before.

The only time they dissed him was when I let the other chickens out and they got a good look at the Partridge Chantecler roo. According to mom, they ran over to the fence and left Limpy with a cold shoulder. Here's a shot of him. He is a pretty handsome devil if I do say so myself.

The girls prior to lambing

2009-04-04T14:35:00.006-04:00

Here's a video of the girls that I took about one week ago when Tim was cleaning out their pen in anticipation of lambing. They can go any day now.

Shearing time

2009-02-15T10:59:00.007-05:00

On Sunday, February 1st, our shearer, David Hinman, came to the farm to shear our 25 sheep. We shear in order of color, white first and then continuing on the other colors until we're down to black. Here are a few pictures of the shearing day. All pictures are courtesy of Bryn's DH, Nick. Thanks so much! I tried getting the video camera to work, but it really takes better videos if you hit record! Can you tell I don't use it much?? We'll Nick saved my bacon and allowed me to have some pictures to share with you all.

Sabrina being sheared. She was the second to be done.
One of my kat twins with a good shot of David. He was concerned that the video camera was going to point at his rear end, so now he can breathe a sigh of relief.

Viveka coming through the door. Good to see the wool off of them as she and her twin, Rakel were rubbing against the doorway in their pen every time they would go through. Add a bit of snow and they made a horrible scratchy sound.

Here's a shot of Minard (red - in front) with Pat getting the fleece ready to be bundled and Oren in the blue coat. I have them bundle my fleeces in bed sheets and I then skirt and figure out what happens with them later. Minard pitched in and helped by taking the fleeces over to Pat and Oren to bundle. This was his first time seeing sheep being sheared and when we were done, he took some of the belly wool to take into his kindergarten class for show and tell.

This is Balder waiting his turn to be sheared.

Here's another shot where you can see Oren in the background while Mulan, I believe, is being sheared.

After they get sheared, each one gets a coat on them. This shot shows Arcturus (blue snuggly) and Wilkins (rust snuggly). You can see that they weren't all done as Gulliver's toosh is still looking very wooly! Some tend to shrug off their snugglies after a little bit, but some stayed on for a while.

This picture shows David shearing a lamb with Ruth (in the pink shirt) and I'm next to her in the elf/hershey kiss hat. Ruth and my job is to get the sheared sheep and put the snugglies on them and then take them out back to be put back in their pens.

We keep them indoors for a good solid week, then remove any snugglies that have stayed on and then normally another week to "harden them off". Then they're released to the elements. This time, Tim was chomping at the bit and they went outside a few days earlier than I was figuring. The girls had fun running and cavorting like lambs. You can see some baby bellies now. April here we come!

We'll miss you, Wilkins

2009-02-11T08:55:00.009-05:00

Today is a sad day. Wilkins has passed away. He was born in 2001 and I was fortunate to have purchased him from Nadine Chounet back in 2005. For those who've never met him, he was a wonderful ram. He was very gentle and was a great way for me to get used to rams, even though in the beginning I was very nervous about his size. He was very good about not letting one ram pick on another by either stepping in the way or just pushing the "bad boy" out of the way. He was VERY good about converting poor quality hay into a "beer gut"!

I think he was taken out by one of the yearlings that was trying to establish dominance. I've called the Federal Vet to report the death and may have to call the local vet for necropsy sampling to be done. Yipee.

I know that he's now frolicking around the fields just beyond the rainbow bridge and looking for all the ewes he can find.

I'll post tomorrow or another day soon about the shearing that happened on February 1st. Just got the pictures yesterday evening.

Do we have quail or chickens??

2009-01-10T17:32:00.004-05:00

Today Tim came in after giving the chickens a little veggie snack and said that he had a special egg for me. I waited as he pulled out six different eggs from both the Chanteclers and the Hollands until he showed me the "special egg". It came from the Chanteclers, but I could have sworn it was a quail egg. Below is the picture of the crazy egg next to a nickel.

Here's another picture with it next to some of the normal sized eggs we've been getting.

We decided this wouldn't make much of a scrambled egg, so we decided to crack it open to give to Adrienne (aka Boober). The shell was very thick and took a good whack to get it to crack. Only a small portion of the top (or the bottom - if you're so inclined) came off. Try cracking a grape and you'll understand! It was very interesting looking with what appeared to be a fairly colorless yolk with only a smidgen of color that was comma shaped. How bizarre! Boober enjoyed it and downed it in one slurp.

On the sheep side of things, Bergelmir was placed in with the ewes for clean up duty. We figured that if he settled his mother or any of the other Wilkins children we have (Helle and Rafn) that the offspring would go into little white packages. Bergelmir is an old chip off the block, and was walking around with his neck stretched out looking for all the world like he's been walking around following his chin. On a side note, it will give Wilkins a break as the two of them have been trying to determine who is king of the farm. Wilkins wants to keep his crown and Bergel is trying to dethrone him. Arrgh! Why can't boys just behave??

Catching up on all the details

2008-12-30T10:31:00.010-05:00

Okay. I know mea culpa. I've been away for a while. First things first. Lots have been going on/happening around here.

1) I had a birthday that another Shetland shepherd shares with me (hint: he's got a blog with Shetland sheep and his passel of dogs). It wasn't a big milestone birthday, just a normal another year older and hopefully wiser day. Tim got me a kitchen towel weaving kit for my Leclerc Artisat I've had taking up a bit of space upstairs. He's okay about enabling me with my fibery goodness as long as I do at least one thing on it. This is my first thing on my own loom. I took a class where I wove a scarf back about 2 years ago. So far so good. The edges are not even, but for a second time at a loom, it doesn't look too bad. What do you think?

2) A nasty ice storm came through brought a little ice and bit of snow. Even though we had not so much ice around here, we ended up losing our electricity from that Friday morning until close to mid-afternoon on Sunday. Our pellet stove requires electricity, so we were relying on a Mr. Heater that kept the place a balmy 60 degrees. I like it much warmer, so needless to say, I was bundled to the hilt! Tim kept looking every day for a generator, not knowing how much longer we'd be without power and wouldn't you know it, he found one on Sunday and was cresting the slight rise in the road to the house when the power came on. Murphy sure has a sense of humor. We're keeping the generator even so. Never know when we'll need it again. To water the sheep, we had to haul water from a spring house/collection point. Luckily we have a stream that runs by the property and a spring house on our property that are both downhill from the sheep and house. We opted to get water from this one that is right next to the road and on a much flatter surface. The picture was taken while I stood on the road looking at it. The water level is that dark area. The first time we took water from it, I had to break the small layer of ice and dip the water out bucket by bucket. It dropped the level down a bit, but by the next day, the level was back up to it's normal amount.

3) We split up the breeding groups the weekend after the ice storm. Round one done! We'll be using Bergelmir for cleanup around January 10th. Hopefully he'll not be cleaning up anyone, but if so, then so be it. Rams were put together and as Tim always puts it, it smelled like a bordello in there for a while. We do the scent and stuff technique which works for us. Here's a picture of the girls enjoying a sunny day today. All 14 are there. Can you pick them out?

4) We added lights into our chicken coop prior to the ice storm and wouldn't you know it, during the ice storm (when the lights weren't turning on or off) they seemed to kicked it into gear. They started laying much more prolifically and so now we're getting anywhere from 6 to 10 eggs a day. Woo hoo. I am an office supply freak, so I purchased some half dozen cartons and a stamper for the cartons that identifies our farm. No, the cartons aren't exactly office supplies, but you should have seen the stamper they sent with the rubber stamp. It's the biggest one I've ever seen. I can ink the whole stamper at one time. Yes, a bit over the top, but I really like the stamper and envision other uses for it too.

5) The holidays are upon us. So far we've survived Christmas unscathed. We opted to stay home and not travel to either parental unit household. New Year's Day will find us once again on the road to visit my folks.

I think that's all the major details for now. I keep trying to squeeze in some spinning, knitting and dyeing. I finished Tim's Freya mittens, so now he has matching (meaning the same sheep) hat and mittens. I just overdyed some musket roving to a nice blue color. It looks good if I do say so myself!

Take care and talk to you in the new year.

Rams for Sale

2008-11-29T15:32:00.011-05:00

Adrienne's on the run to tell you it's time to find new homes for some rams we have.

First, we have Contented Bergelmir. To see his pedigree, just click here. He's an Ag grey ram who carries wild spotting. Just look at the post when he was born and you'll see what I mean. He's really coming into his own and looking like a a great ram. If he doesn't find a new home shortly, we'll be using him for clean up of all the ewes in January. At this juncture, he's unproven.

Secondly, we have Contented Theobroma. To see his pedigree, just click here. Theo is a proven moorit ram. He's a gentle ram that understands his place around humans. We used him last year on two of our ewes (to figure out what they were genetically) and he threw twins both times. I just love the light patches he has on his face. Very striking. They were also visible when he was a lamb.
The third and final ram we have available is Contented #15. He's just waiting for the right home to name him. He is also unproven. He is unregistered at this moment, but is the offspring of Contented Theobroma and Islandfleece Rakel. He was born April 14, 2008. You can see Rakel's pedigree here. He has a nice intermediate fleece. At this point, I don't see any registration faults with him. He's got real nice looking horns and everything else seems to be in the right place. :-)

If any of these rams catch your fancy, just give us an email or post a comment to the blog and we'll get right back to you. Our prices are reasonable ($150 for unproven and $200 for proven) and we figure registration or transfer costs are ones that we should absorb. We do have a discount when you buy two or more. Lambs, like #15 also come with a horn guarantee. If for some reason, his horns turn wrong we'll refund half the purchase price.

Thanksgiving Wishes

2008-11-27T08:21:00.004-05:00

May your day be filled with good food, great family and friends, and so many things to be thankful for that you need to borrow your family and friends fingers and toes to count off your blessings.

Breeding Groups are Together!

2008-11-15T16:53:00.005-05:00

Tim and I were able to put our breeding groups together on Tuesday. We always try to do it around Veterans' weekend. I've been a bit under the weather, so I didn't get shots of everyone the day they went into the groups, but I can give you a heads up of how it went and if the blasted rain would hold off, I'll grab some shots and upload them.

First off, each lady needed to get a pedicure before meeting their big date. First up was Sage and Celebrian. After pedi's done, Tim got the pleasure of dragging (actually she kept rolling a number of times) Sage while I walked Celebrian to the hog-paneled pen near the old J.D. baler that they would be staying in. We then grabbed Bach to meet his women. The funny thing is that they all sniffed and then Bach went right over to the hay and started munching down. Mmm this hay is good!

Next breeding group would be Freya, Helle, and Rafn to go on another hog-paneled pen on the front lawn. Tim took Freya, who funily enough acted much like her mom, Sage. I got Helle and Rafn to move to the pen in leaps and bounds. They were given Gulliver, who sniffed and started immediately pawing Freya (who was having nothing to do with him).

Third breeding group included Sabrina, Mulan, and Rosemary to go to the dog's kennel complete with filled in holes and a blue tarp for shelter. I thought that I would be real tricky and take Mulan, who after all is a Gail Former sheep, so should lead properly. Guess what? She didn't want to budge and kept putting on the brakes and dropping her hind end. Sabrina and Rosemary moved much better for Tim. I kept putting pressure on Mulan and every so often she would do a jump (which would release pressure on the lead nearly making me do down!), but eventually she got to the dog's kennel. They were then introduced to Balder who showed a keen interest in Rosemary, but who was also not interested in him. She was much more interested in eating the grass in there.

Last, but not least, is the grouping of Viveka and Rakel (aka the bruiser twins) and Sylph. They stayed in the normal ewe winter quarters and were introduced to Uber. Uber wasted no time and found that Rakel was receptive. He must have mounted her at least 5 times.

If you're counting, you realize that there's 3 other ewes who won't be bred that were put in a separate pen near the barn. There's also a bachelor pen of 5 rams (anybody interested in a ram or 3?). One more pen was created when Wilkins came back from breeding 6 ewes in Meriden, NH for a 4-H'er. He's currently sharing residence with Arcturus (our wether) until his quarantine is over.

All told, we'll be and have been taking care of 7 pens of sheep. This will stay that way for 36 days (a good 2 cycles) and then we'll bring all the girls back together for 2-3 weeks and then separate out those 3 non breeders and use Bergelmir to clean up anybody who didn't take. At least that's what we'll be doing in theory. Changes can possibly happen.

Just us chickens

2008-11-08T15:09:00.005-05:00

Tim's away helping Nadine and Glenn put up 5 acres of high tensile electric fencing. So, it's just us chickens. Here we are, the Partridge Chanteclers. Mr rooster is in the center of the picture. They were created in Canada to withstand colder winters. Each chicken has a slight bump/nub of comb on them to prevent frostbite.

Another shot of the girls.
Here are the Barred Holland's. They are also a dual purpose chicken, like the Partridge Chanteclers, but they lay white eggs. Actually, they look more like eggshell white (not as bleach white looking as those in stores). Rooster in the center (looking a bit more greyish than the hens.

Here's another shot of them. Okay, now you see the sneaky part. We ordered two roos of each breed. The Partridges are down to one roo as the other was getting really persnickety (read mean). Needless to say, he was enjoyed in a nice wine based marinade. We still have two of the Barred's as they haven't been really mean to us. We will eventually take care of the one (who happens to have a crooked middle toe - like it was stomped on or has arthritis). Just not right now.Okay, it's more than just us chickens. There are the 2 cats, Adrienne the Border Collie, the 11 rams (we're trying to shrink that number down) and the 14 ewes. Since it's after Halloween, we've got a real good deal worked out with a pumpkin farmer to pick up his pumpkins to get them out of his field (before he discs them in) and we get pumpkins to feed the sheep for an extra energy boost. Here's some of the pumpkins we picked up over by the girls.

Normally we go for the pie pumpkins as they last longer, but as they say beggers can't be choosers. They pointed out to Tim where the pumpkins were this year (they rotate them each year) and unfortunately showed him where the regular jack-o-lantern pumpkins were. C'est la vie! Here's a shot of some of the girls. It's a bad shot, but you can see 3 black girls (Sage, Freya, and guessing Rosemary (can't see the ear tag). Fee Fee is also there (white) and one of the kat twins (either Rakel or Viveka). A grey girl (my guess is Mulan) lying down in the foreground.

In the next picuture, there is Celebrian (moorit in the background), Rafn (black ewe peering around bale box), Helle (grey in front of Celebrian), Sabrina (white), Sylph (grey lying down to left), Arwen (moorit) standing betwee Sylph and there's Mulan again.

Looks like we're missing a few girls. Brisingamen (black ewe lamb from Freya) and the other kat twin seems to be missing. Probably chilling out near the barn (that would be to the left of the last picture.

Soon there will be breeding groups. Stay tuned to see who goes to whom.

I'm famous, and other delusions

2008-10-19T17:02:00.004-04:00

I sell some of my Shetland stuff on Etsy and I joined the Made in Vermont Etsy Street Team a while ago. I'm not very active on the team, but I figured it was a good way to get my feet wet to that aspect of marketing. Well, normally a shop is picked to be featured. I finally got picked! Just go to this link to find my feature story. I'm famous! Well sort of.

I appreciate when I get comments from people. I was surprised once when Kara M. mentioned that she looked forward to seeing my new sheep on the blog (when I was heading out to MI) as I hadn't updated the blog in like a year or so and hadn't really advertised that I had it. Well, Jen Johnson recently gave me a comment about how she liked my hershey kiss cap. This was a comment left for the NE meeting summation and I couldn't figure out what she meant until I looked at the picture of a few of us going out to look at the sheep. She's talking about my hat. Actually to be clear, it's a hat I made for Tim with some of the first spun Shetland and came out really big. Remember that kid who wore a cap that covered his face on Fat Albert?? Well, it looked like that before I actually started felting it to make it shrink. It's still kind of funny looking, but Tim and I always referred to it as an elf hat (because of the funny bingle at the top), but when Jen mentioned the hershey kiss, he said that he never thought about it, but it does look like that, too.

Well, just knit up a new hat for Tim to take as he travels to Wyoming this week. Don't want him to freeze his ears off. Perhaps I can coax him to take a pic of himself while out there to share with all of us.

Talk to you soon.

North East Shetland Meeting

2008-10-16T10:18:00.004-04:00

Tim and I went to Linda Doane's house on Saturday, October 4th for the annual North East Shetland Meeting. This meeting I know that I always look forward to going to. It's nice to see familiar faces, and sometimes we see new faces. We've been going to the meeting since we got Shetland sheep (perhaps it was one year prior to them??). Each year, we met new faces and always felt welcomed by all. I always suggest to people new to Shetlands to go to the meeting. You learn a wealth of information and get to meet like minded folks. They have to be like minded to love Shetlands!

We gathered in the house first to talk Shetlands. It was a small group with Tim and me, Scott Bailey, Libby James, and of course, Linda Doane. We started by working on sorting the latest color study sample submissions into the 11 colors. The submissions had been previously placed in bags with a barcoded sticker, so nobody could identify who the samples came from. After a bit of sorting, Libby needed to leave, but it was nice to see her again. Faye Whitney showed up just in time to take Libby's place in the sorting. We also discussed the computer portion of the study. We also discussed the 2011 AGM that we'll be hosting. I'd tell you what we discussed, but that would ruin the AGM and I'd also have to kill you! :-)

After sorting and chatting about colors and sheep in general, we ate a nice potluck lunch. When we finished lunch, we started on our way to see the sheep. Pictured below shows Scott, me, Faye and Linda (behind jeep).
The first sheep we encountered was the ewe flock. True to form, Ginger (I think that was her name) marched up to say hello and ask for scritches. She's Linda's flock greeter and a nice older ewe.We were also eyeballed by the flock guardian. We all passed muster and continued on our way. Excuse me, but I think you have something stuck between your teeth.
We looked at different ewes with different facial markings. Like the ewe pictured below. Moget faced??
This ewe had a lovely face and markings, too.
Then we went on to see the lambs. Linda showed us the organic pellets she's been trying with the sheep which are Aloe Vera with garlic and kelp. They looked interesting and the lambs ran up to the feeders to gobble them down.
After finishing with the lambs, we went back up to the house and said our goodbyes. It was a nice day to talk "shop" and we can't wait for the next meeting next year. For those of you who didn't come, I missed seeing you again. Hope to see some of you there next year.

To stay up to date on when we next meet, or anything else of interest to those in the NE region, sign up for the NE Shetland Yahoo Group.

EGGADS!!

2008-09-30T19:34:00.006-04:00

Tim has been having some talks with the chickens as they haven't started laying yet. He's told them that if they didn't start laying soon that he was going to eat them one at a time.

I didn't realize how persuasive his talks were to the chickens. Tonight, when closing them up for the night, Tim spyed an egg! The Partridge Chanteclers have done a good job! This is our first egg from our own chickens.

It's kind of small, but I'm really happy. He found it on the floor of the coop, even though there are nest boxes in there for them to use. We'll need to do some things to make the chickens feel confident to use the boxes.

Now we need to start cajoling/threatening the Barred Hollands!

I'm so happy!

Civil War Expo

2008-09-29T08:59:00.013-04:00

This is the third year I've been involved with the Civil War Expo in Vermont. This year, the expo was in Chester, VT (which is a bit closer than Tunbridge - where it used to be held). My friend, Ruth Ticknor, spun with me the second year as well as this year. This time around I was pleasantly surprised to see a weaver (young girl not in period costume) as well as a bobbin lace maker and tatter there (who was in period costume). Duh! I probably should have taken pictures of them too, but didn't think of it. Can you tell I'm not used to thinking of taking pictures for the blog. We were all in a room in the Historical Society building.

At the Expo, there is always a scavenger hunt where a number of questions are created and kids and adults need to go scavenging around the Expo looking for the appropriate people to ask their question and get the answer. At the end, when they've gathered all the initials on their pieces of paper, they return to the educational booth and get a prize. If remembering correctly, some metal object. They like us to come up with different questions so that they don't say, "I remember the answer" and don't bother to interact. Luckily, dealing with spinning and fiber, there are lots of questions that can be asked and it should be a number of years before we run out of questions and have to start repeating the questions. This year the question was What is the oldest form of creating fabric that is still used today? Any guesses? Does this picture help you with the answer? Yes, I understand there's a bit of clutter behind the table, but just focus on the table.

Of course, it's felting. We didn't actually deal with water and show how to felt, as that would have been messy in the room. Also, luckily for us, most of the kids had done some sort of felting in school or other groups, so when we mentioned felting and showed them the objects, they all went "oh, yeah!".

Here's a picture of my friend, Ruth, spinning at her great wheel. She's a real good spinner and it's nice that she's willing to tote it to the Expo so that people can see her wheel and how it worked. Every now and again her spindle would fill up and she'd break out a "new fangled ball winding gadget" to unwind the fiber spun. :-) Not everything can be done authentically (at least you won't see us doing it that way!)

Here's Ruth, sans bonnet.

In the past, all we would do is demo and have business cards ready in case anyone was interested. This year we also opted to ask if we could bring some items to sell. Ruth created drop spindle kit baskets, just in case anyone was interested in trying their hand at spinning. We both also brought some hand spun yarn, too. We had only one sale, but that wasn't too bad. One sale is better than no sale. I was a bit unprepared and didn't bring any business cards, so when I had a sheep inquiry, I put all the information to contact me on the back of Ruth's business card.

Here's my little niche that I was working at. I was spinning Arcturus that I had washed by hand, picked by hand, and then was hand carding for the folks to see and then spinning on my Majacraft Rose. No, it's not period with the plastic bobbin, but castle style wheels were around during the Civil War as Irish immigrants were bringing them over during that time period. Got lots of questions about the style as many hadn't seen that type, although they've seen the traditional style and the great wheel. We also had a drop spindle to demo on, too.

How did VT Sheep & Wool Fest go??

2008-09-18T07:16:00.004-04:00

Well, I'm about a week or two tardy from responding, but Garrett was kind enough to ask how did it go? Well, it was fine. Normally I share a booth with Ruth Ticknor of Sunrise Hill Angoras/Farm and her DH, Ed, puts up a few pics and note cards that are "farm related" as he's a professional photographer. This year, Ruth was in Michigan for schooling (doing it online, but every so often she needs to actually attend the campus). So that left Ed and me to man the booth. Tim was over in the animal section as we brought three rams (2 yearlings and a lamb) to sell.

We hitched the sheep trailer to the truck and put the fibery goodness in the front of the sheep trailer, so that left the sheep in the back of the trailer. Fibery goodness loaded on Friday night, sheep first thing in the a.m. and Ed came over so we'd be giving him a lift there. It worked out well. Got there in once piece and offloaded the boys (the rams, not Tim and Ed). This was the first time we brought livestock to the festival. After sheep offloaded, we took the truck over to where the booth would be set up and offloaded all that. Would you believe, I didn't bring the camera, so no pictures of either set-up. I know I need to bring one and you would think the professional would remember, but didn't. He had even made a remark about that on Saturday.

Sales were good. First thing, even before the festival opened, I sold Wilkins fleece that didn't sell at NH Sheep & Wool Fest. That left me with 4 more to sell, or haul back home, package up and send off to rovings. My cedar stashets were evidently priced too low as the first two to show any interest bought them all! All the rovings but the one I've finally titled as Spring in Vermont sold at the show.

There was quite a bit of interest in the sheep with lots of questions and that was good to see/hear. I did stop by at one point and reached in to give Bergelmir a scritch and he took a swing at me. Evidently there was a "little child" (being kind here) that was banging on the fencing and really making him annoyed. Tim had warned the little child and he kept doing it. Oh well! None sold at the sale, but we did have a number of people who were curious and thinking about next year. All in all, I think a good experience.

We stayed at the Day's Inn with points Tim had accrued from all his traveling. Thankfully his traveling gives us some benefit every so often. So we didn't have to drive back up to Essex Junction the next morning.

Next thing to do is the Civil War Expo next Saturday. Will bring my camera and take pics of the set up and our get ups - have to dress somewhat authentically!

Maybe tomorrow I'll show you the dye that was soaking in a jar over the Festival weekend.

Getting ready for VT Sheep & Wool Festival

2008-09-04T13:14:00.008-04:00

Today I'm getting ready for the Vermont Sheep and Wool Festival that is this weekend, September 6 & 7 at the Champlain Valley Expo in Essex Junction.

I'm dyeing up a storm. I told Tim that I was going to be dyeing and his remark was how, by drowning, electrocution, etc. and I told him via chemicals (I know we have a weird sense of humor).

This is some of the roving I've dyed already. Have one left that's working, so will see how that one does.
Here are some shots of them close up so you can really see the colors. This first one is almost a celadon green. Not what I think of when I think of kelly green. This next one is a combo of bright red (that looks more pinkish), burgundy (that looks kind of purplish) and yellow. Makes me think of Easter.
This next one is blue and some hint of a bluish green. Want to hit the beach anyone? Or maybe think of an iceberg?

This next one was a feeble attempt to get something orangy that would make people think of fall. It's sort of that, but I'm not too sure!

I've also been dyeing and stitching up some cedar "stash"ets. Here are a few that I need to piece together. Now how did I get that middle one so orangy?? And no, I don't take notes when dyeing, just like to shoot from the hip and hope I don't get anything that looks like puke!

I was kind of bummed that the S&W festival is the same time as the AGM in Wisconsin, so I'll be missing all the Shetland people going to that. If you're in my neck of the woods, stop by the festival and say howdy. I'll be in a booth with Sunrise Hill Angoras and Studio One Photography (Ruth's DH).

What happened in Michigan

2008-08-26T08:24:00.008-04:00

Okay, I'm trying to be better. Two weekends ago, DH and I went to Michigan. On the way out we dropped off a ewe lamb to Kara. Our main mission for going out to Michigan was genetics! We have a number of rams on the farm that all link back to Wilkins, our lovable head ram. We were looking at two ram lambs from Gail Former and at the time a ram lamb and adult ewe from Stephen Rouse.

We looked at all of Stephen's sheep and it was like being a kid in a candy store. I want that one, and that one, and that one. Restraint prevailed and a bit of common sense (do we really need another unrelated ewe, even though she's awfully cute?) and so we left at the end of the weekend with a black gul ram lamb from Stephen and a nicely crimped moorit/fawn ram lamb. So far, they're not named and we're calling the one gul boy and the other uber crimpy. Any suggestions out there??

From Gail, we were looking at a mioget ram lamb (which we purchased) named Bach. We also leased a moorit ram lamb who carries the modifier gene named Coltrane. This second guy, if I'm remembering correctly, doesn't have iset in his background. That's a nice bonus.

While there we also enjoyed the MFF (Michigan Fiber Fest - for those of you not in the know). It was a nice event. Got to see more Shetlands and Shetland people. Enjoyed putting faces to the names that are out in cyberspace. Also did a bit of shopping, not too much, since the big shopping was the ram lambs! More about that little shopping later.

At the end of the trip we went home with 9 sheep and 1 French Angora bunny in the truck and trailer. Two Shetlands were dropped off to Rich Johnson in New York, Nadine Chounet picked up one Shetland, and Becky Colpitts picked up two ENORMOUS sheep (one BFL yearling and a UK Suffolk yearling). Ruth Ticknor was the proud owner of the FA rabbit, that she came to pick up, too.

That was some trip and I'm still exhausted thinking of it. We left Michigan on Sunday around noon and got home Monday morning at 5 to 5:30am. Lots of gas stops and bathroom breaks (checking on the sheep the whole time) and the one stop to give Rich his sheep.

Getting back into the groove

2008-08-21T07:33:00.005-04:00

Okay, so I'm bad about blogging. There are only so many hours in the day to do stuff and my life is kind of busy. I had intended on blogging on a regular basis, but got out of the habit. Then I thought that it'd be fun to blog when there are only lambs on the ground. We all know that lambs are the cutest thing in the world, but I didn't get to that this year because we were in Hawaii during lambing. Okay, not during the whole time, but pretty much. We missed two out of four births because we were away.

We also got chicks this year and they arrived in the mail (from Texas) the day after we got back home. The picture below shows the Partridge Chanteclers. We have 6 pullets and 2 roos of that breed and also got the Barred Hollands with the same pullet and roo numbers.

Now for the why I'm getting back in the groove. One reason - guilt. Tim and I went to Michigan during the MFF (Michigan Fiber Festival) and met a bunch of Shetland people. We went to get different ram genetics and managed to pick up 4 new boys (3 purchased and one rental). While there, we spent time with some Shetland folks we hadn't seen in at least two years, if not longer and got to meet others that we only knew through the web. One of those people was Garrett Ramsay, a fellow Sagittarian, who's blog resides here. He made my first and only comment on the blog and told me to update this thing. So here goes, Garrett, this blog post is for you. :-)

Look what I did!

2007-05-29T14:01:00.001-04:00

Hi, my name is Maybelle Sabrina and I'm a white Shetland Sheep. Today was my day to shine. It's now official, I'm a MOM! I gave birth to a healthy ewe lamb at 9:21 a.m. Shepherdess mom was patiently waiting for me to give her another wonderful baby and I did a good job. Shepherdess mom was coaching me through my labor. Here's some shots of my sweet little baby girl. She's white, just like me!

Lambs are growing!

2007-05-20T22:50:00.001-04:00

Here's a few pictures of the lambs. The one below is Belja (musket blettet ram lamb with possible scurs) on the left and #7 (black krunet ewe lamb) on the right. They are from Mulan and Wilkins.

This is a picture of Flik (musket blettet/flecket ram lamb) on the left and #9 (moorit or musket ewe lamb) on the right. They are from Sassy Too and Wilkins. This is a picture of Bergelmir (gre blettet/flecket ram lamb) from Sylph and Wilkins.
This is a picture of #11 (moorit or musket ram lamb) from Celebrian and Wilkins.

The second round of lambing will be starting shortly. Keep posted for more lambs.

Keep them guessing

2007-05-03T11:20:00.001-04:00

Hi all, my name is Sabbath Farm Celebrian and I'm a moorit Shetland ewe. Moorit is a nice chocolatey brown color. I surprised shepherd dad with a ram lamb in the field when he got home. He had to do some quick work to get a lambing jug ready, so he evicted Sassy Too out of hers and cleaned it up. That is right, I don't want to be having MY baby walking around in the same straw and hay that Sassy did. If you look at the picture below, you'll see the little cutie. He weighed in at 7 pounds. I know that Sylph wanted a post next of her ram lamb's "cute" face, but you can't beat a face with no spots. Dear me, what a horrible thing to happen to a lamb! Mine is perfect with just a few white hairs on the top of his head. I blame that white completely on his father. I can't control everything, can I? Well, enough of this, here's a picture of him (I think the s.m and s.d are calling him #11 or some such).

Bringing in May in style!

2007-05-01T21:01:00.001-04:00

Hi, my name is Sabbath Farm Sylph. I'm the grey ewe on the left hand side. I had a really hard morning today. I started to go into labor at 2:40am and finally at 3:10am gave birth to a very big ram lamb. He weighed 8.2 pounds at birth. He is really cute and I've asked shepherdess mom to post a picture of him. Here he is:

I'll try to get shepherdess mom to take a better picture of his adorable face. She thinks I'm a great mom as I did well lambing him and have been very attentive to his needs.

Sassy Too's Lambs

2007-04-30T08:33:00.001-04:00

Well, shepherdess mom (and dad if truth be told) finally got a chance to get pictures of me and my babies. The one above shows me with my darling charges. The one on the left is the ram lamb and the one on the right is the ewe lamb.

Here's a shot where you get to see their cute faces a bit more close up. Now the ewe is on the left and the ram is on the right. If you notice the ewe has a white mark between her eye and nose. They little guy has marks all over his face, hence he's blettet.

Well, better get going and feed myself to keep producing milk!

What happened this morning

2007-04-29T10:46:00.001-04:00

Hi, my name is Sabbath Farm Sassy Too and I'm the cutie with the feminine looking horns right in the middle of the picture. Of course, this was taken just before I was sheared this year. I gave my shepherdess mom quite a surprise this early morning. I know that she'd been dying to see more lambs, as she's been hanging around us girls so much lately. I thought that this morning would be my chance to surprise her. Unfortunately, she came out to the barn and peeked in on us girls and found me with two babies at my side at 2am. I was still in the process of cleaning off my second and was caught red handed. Okay, I don't have hands, I guess you could say I was caught mid lick!

My first lamb is a ram and he's the cutest looking guy with a greyish looking body (he'll probably turn into a musket color just like me) with blettet markings on his face and flecket markings on his body. My second lamb is a ewe and she's got a cute brown face and a darkish brown looking body. She'll probably also look just like me, but time will tell. I know that shepherdess mom is trying to get some great photos of my babies, so I'm sure those will go up on this funny page as soon as she's got the best ones.

Well, carrying and birthing two healthy, adorable babies is great, but I'm all tuckered out now. I think I'll step away from the computer and take a little nap. Got to keep my strength up to take care of these lambs now. This is my first time with lambs, but so far shepherdess mom says I'm doing just great.

Mulan's babies

2007-04-21T18:27:00.001-04:00

Hi, it's Mulan again with a picture of my ram lamb. Isn't he a cutie pie? Below is a picture showing his adorable light colored belly.

Below is his sister's face shot. She's an adorable black girl (her tongue is a nice purplish/black. Sylph and Sassy Too are looking quite large. The sheperdess mom is hoping they'll be the next to lamb. I'm just content to be out of my lambing jug into a larger mixing pen. This makes me more comfortable when shepherdess mom enters the pen.

Within due time

2007-04-19T09:36:00.001-04:00

Hi all, my name is Underhill Mulan and I'm a fading grey Shetland sheep (Ag for some of you). My shepherdess seemed to be hanging around me waiting for more than a week for me to lamb. My motto is "within due time". Just yesterday turned out to be the day. At approximately 4:50ish in the afternoon, I gave birth to two bouncing lambs. Each weighed a little over 5 pounds. The one on the left is a ewe who appears to be a black color. The lamb on the right is a ram who may be a musket (oatmeal) colored sheep. Time will tell their true colors. I'm as happy as can be as now I get some animal crackers for all my hard work.

I believe my shepherdess will take more pictures of my babies and hopefully get some shots of their adorable faces.

Thanks for listening. I'm such a proud and attentive mom.

Welcome to Contented Butterfly

2007-04-15T12:58:00.000-04:00

Welcome to Contented Butterfly's first blog post. Today the shepherdess is posting as the sheep are sick and tired of all the snowy rain and have refused to come to the computer. We are a Shetland sheep farm in Windsor, Vermont. Generally speaking this blog is for the sheep to speak about their experiences on our farm.