MORE Fleeces for 2021 Waynesburg Sheep & Fiber Fest!

 

Wild Rose Farm Rambouillet #563 - Beautiful Fleece!

The better part of the day was spent getting ready for the 2021 Waynesburg Sheep & Fiber Fest, including skirting more fleeces!  The little notebook in the picture above is our farm "barn book".  On sheep shearing day - this year in March - each fleece is evaluated and notes are taken on promising "show" fleeces. Every fleece isn't suitable for hand spinning or for fleece judging. This makes it easier to pull out the cleanest & best fleeces to skirt and bring to the shows and fairs.

Wild Rose Farm Rambouillet #574

Wild Rose Farm #764 First Shearing Lamb Fleece

Here are a couple of bundles of lamb fleece that will be bagged for smaller projects. A whole fleece can last quite a while and various parts of the fleece may find different uses like spinning and felting. 

Wild Rose Farm #783 Lamb Fleece Bundles 
Lamb in the Background ...

Ewe Watching the Skirting Table - Almost 90F Today! 

Moving Pastures

Wild Rose Farm Horned Ewe #134 & Twins

We're in the process of moving the sheep from the pasture nearest the barn over to the pasture connected to the Loafing Shed. We lamb close to the barn, but we've now rotated through all of the grazing in sections. We'll probably wean about half of the lambs later this week after the temperatures drop a little. We're having 2 or 3 days in the 90's and there's no sense in causing additional stress in that kind of heat. You can see by the picture above that the lambs are getting pretty big now!

Watching The Pasture

Snow White With #134 & Her Lamb

We had 3 ewes that lambed today. Thankfully, no one lambed yesterday during the drenching downpours and high winds. Snow White was on duty again ... here she is near our #134 horned ewe and her single lamb. It was windy today too. Just get a look at those clouds!

Snow White Watches #134 & Her Lamb Going To The Barn

While the other sheep act silly and start to follow along, Snow White watched us carry off the lamb with the ewe following. Almost as if "it's ok to take the lamb if you're going to the barn".  We just came back in from the barn where we brought in another ewe & lamb in the dark.  The ewe had lambed under the trees ... and Snow White was camped out just below the pines.

Update & Filler Material!

Snow White Takes A Dust Bath!

No, that's not a new silver gray llama in the Wild Rose Farm pasture! Snow White found the ashes after we burned some pine tree limbs on the hill behind the barn.  She did a pretty thorough job of dusting herself - everything is covered except her head.  It seems to work - no flies were bothering her last night.
Our friends had another lamb born today, but we are still waiting. We're supposed to get a thunderstorm & possibly hail this evening, so we'll see what happens. :~0

While We're Waiting ...

Photo Credit To Devin M. 

A Good Mother With Her 1st Lamb!

Here's a guest picture from Devin. This 1st time lambing ewe came from Wild Rose Farm and did a great job for her new family. Devin was kind enough to forward this classic picture of them comfortably bedded down ... She is one of 4 ewe lambs purchased here, so we'll wait to see what happens with the others!   As of this evening, we're still waiting for lambing to start here.

Wild Rose Farm 2-Ply Bulky Art Yarn - Getting ready To Knit!

Meanwhile, our 2-ply bulky Rambouillet art yarn has been purchased & knit up into a hat & mittens by our first customer for this batch. It was custom processed and sold right off of the mill by Ruth at The Mill At Meadowlands.  The rest of the yarn was shipped to us and boy, is it "soft & squishy". 
Here's another picture that was forwarded to us ... it looks great!

Wild Rose Farm Rambouillet 2-Ply Bulky Art Yarn

Knitting by Dee - Thanks!

We'll have this yarn for sale at the Waynesburg Sheep & Fiber Fest - May 20th & 21st.  Come squeeze it for yourself, lol!

The Storks Arrive At Wild Rose Farm!

A Pair Of Geese Arrive Early This Morning!

The storks geese arrived this morning just after the 6:30AM pasture check.  Huh? I know that storks bring babies, but I guess geese bring lambs! We had heard the honking and didn't see any geese in the sky. Then the dogs saw them & started to bark. We've had geese land in the pasture before, but this was a first.  :)

Dorset Ewe #1445 Separated From Flock At Dawn

 This is what a ewe close to lambing does ... she begins to separate herself from the rest of the flock.

Glenda On Patrol In The Next Pasture

Finally, this evening around 6:40PM, Dorset ewe #1445 went into labor. By 7:10 she had a single ram lamb, the first of our 2016 lambing season. This is her first lamb and she immediately started to take care of it and clean it off.

Wild Rose Farm Ewe & Newborn Lamb Nearing Dusk

Wild Rose Farm - Snow White Is Fascinated By The New Lamb!

Snow White couldn't take her eyes off of the new lamb. After several of the other ewes had sniffed the new lamb and moved on, Snow White approached and gently sniffed at her new charge.  Ewe and lamb are now in the barn resting ...

Watching The Calendar!

Wild Rose Farm Lamb Fleece

We need to put a calendar up in the barn. Our lambing season should start any minute now, so we need to let the ewes know what today's date is! As of this morning, no new lambs ...
With the sunny weather & temperatures in the mid-70's for two days, it's time to skirt some fleeces. This is a nice lamb fleece from a twin daughter of Rambouillet #405, so it is a 50/50 Rambouillet/Dorset cross. The skirted fleece now weighs about 4 lbs.  The 0477 number is her lamb ear tag. We will put permanent flock tags in over the next month or so ... I need to order another batch of tags.

0477 Lamb Fleece Close-up

U & 2 Others!

Wild Rose Farm "U" At The Barn Gate

As we suspected this morning, U was ready to lamb and had this single ewe lamb around 4 PM.  Then two more ewes had singles out in the pasture today.  When we brought the ewes in for the night, one of our Rambouillets had a single lamb and she stayed there with it.  Here are the sheep below coming in at dusk.. The ewe in the lead is #47 & she's due any moment now.  We also penned up another ewe in the Loafing Shed - she had separated off in there, so we set up a pen around her.  It helps to keep other expectant mothers from stealing a lamb!

Wild Rose Farm Flock Coming In At Dusk

After we got some pens cleaned out in the barn, Mr. WRF went back out at 9 PM & brought the Rambouillet ewe & her lamb to the barn.   She was a bit skittish and I watched the LED light moving slowly towards me at the barn while I got water & feed ready for her ... we came in from the barn at 9:45 PM.

Lambs & Dams Out Grazing

The 2nd "batch" of ewes and lambs were out grazing this evening while another round bale of hay was being placed in the barn for them.

Wild Rose Farm Ewe #136 Grazing With Her Lamb

Those who buy our spinning fleeces know that the tag that comes with the fleece has a picture of the actual ewe that produced the fleece.  I'm always looking out for the picture that shows the ear tag and tells a little story ... here's a picture of X-bred ewe #136 that will be saved for the ewe photo file!