Thursday, June 29, 2017

More New Lambs!

New Ewe Lamb at Wild Rose Farm!
Well, who knows what happened, but we have a group of 3 ewes that are now lambing. These are their first lambs and we figured that they were not bred for some reason. Then they seemed to be getting a little bigger, so we penned them in the barn to keep a closer eye on them. Sure enough, their udders started to fill in and we now have 2 new lambs. The first one from #146 was born on Tuesday and last night #147 had a ewe lamb. One more ewe to go!  We pulled the ram out on February 4th, once he started to rough house with the bred ewes, so it was possible for these three to get bred. Let's just say that this saved them from the auction as non-breeders (and the lamb & rice "natural" dog food bag).

Friday, June 23, 2017

Farm Activities ...

Sheep Watching The Cherry Picking!
We've been busy with all kinds of activities here (and not here) at Wild Rose Farm. On the home front, the sour cherry trees were loaded this year and we got a lot picked and "put up" as they say.
Cherry Picking 101!
 So far the count has been 2 cherry pies, 8 quarts of frozen cherries, and a dozen half-pints of cherry jam.  We've been sharing the tops of the trees with the birds and the season's not done yet ...
1st Fresh Baked Cherry Pie of the Season!
During some pruning work along our road frontage I discovered a previously unknown (to me) mulberry tree.  The branches were hard to reach, but a quart of mulberries managed to find their way into the freezer too!  A few of the ewes and lambs found their way over near the fence line while I was picking the mulberries and kept an eye on things ...
A Few Of The Ewes & Lambs Morning Grazing
 Do you ever wish you'd done something 20 years ago?  On one of our rainy days, we drove to D-S Livestock Equipment in Maryland & picked up this piece of equipment to add to the end of our processing & sorting chute. We've been an operation that makes the sheep pay for their equipment and this will make processing and hoof trimming a lot easier for us ...
D-S Livestock Equipment "Roll O'Matic"!
Finally, this week we took what I call our "non-committed" wool to the Washington County Wool Pool. I volunteered with check-in for both days. It's a great way to get to talk & meet with regional shepherds!  This year the high bidder for the pool required that the wool was NOT GRADED and had to be shipped in plastic wool sacks. They will re-weigh & grade the wool and then send checks directly to the producers.  This was a big change and some folks were not happy since they had already bagged their fleeces according to past practice.  We made sure to separate all of our fine Rambouillet wool in one bag.  We'll see how it goes.

Monday, June 5, 2017

Just Routines!

Wild Rose Farm - Done Grazing Here!
The ewes & lambs have settled into a routine now that everyone has been processed with ear tags and they're out grazing. They spent the evening & overnight in the "hospital pen" near the barn to graze it down. When you do a graze with high stock density in a limited area, they say it's a third, a third, a third. One third eaten, one third trampled, one third remaining.  That looks about right, lol, and now we'll mow off the stems & seed heads.  The sheep were off to the pasture on the other side of the Loafing Shed ...
Leading up to the Waynesburg Sheep & Fiber Fest, I noted that we were running low on our Rambouillet combed top and needed to have more made. We quickly skirted and took 20 pounds of raw fleece out to the Great Lakes Sheep & Fiber Show in Wooster, Ohio over the Memorial Day weekend. We dropped it off with Zeilinger Wool to be processed ... yay!  They make a lovely combed top for us and we'd sold a bunch at Waynesburg.