Da da da da da da daa. Dut, da da da da da da…While I’m typing this I’m hearing in my head a well-known Game Show tune that goes with it. However, this game won’t be quite like that one.
I have a list of due dates based on observed breeding dates. I photographed most of the top contenders. My list shows the following ewes for February 25.
Mae from the front.
Mae from the rear.
Shelby from the side.
Shelby from the rear.
Esmerelda, front.
Esmerelda, rear.
Athena from the front.
Athena from the rear.
Marilyn is due 2/26. 
Here she is from the rear. She was shorn in November. I sure like the recently shorn views better for this.
Noel is due 2/27.
Fran is due 2/28.
Fran from the rear.
Spring isn’t due until March 5 but she always looks so big I thought I’d just give you a view.
Who is this? Trick question. That is Delight who is nursing twins.
And here is Dazzle with her single. You can sure see the difference in body condition of ewes that are nursing month old lambs.
There a few other ewes on the list for the first couple of days, but I didn’t get photos of them. Maybe if I didn’t pick them out of the bunch for photos then they really aren’t ready. In any case we’ll just go with the sheep that are shown here for the prize. Yes, there will be a prize. I’m thinking about that right now. Something easy to mail. How about a pair of socks (sorry, only medium left) or a t-shirt. Your choice.
You can guess here in the comments or on Facebook. Share this post with your friends. Whoever is the first to name the first of these ewes to lamb is the winner. We should know in a few days.
Dut, da da da, da da da…
Update: I didn’t think this through very well. The first person with the right sheep will still get the prize, but to add incentive to continue voting I’ll put all the names of all the people who choose that sheep in a random drawing for something else.
Last week as it was drying out I put the flock on the pasture and then turned the new lambs out with them.
One thing I watch for when putting lambs in the pasture for the first time is that they don’t get tangled up in the electric fence. 
I’m glad to see when they touch the fence because I know that they will have learned to avoid it.
This looks worse than it was. The whole incident was very brief and then…
…the nearby lamb was off and running.
Bertha, one of the yearlings thought this looked like a good game…
…so she kept up the chase.
Eventually this lamb found his mom who hadn’t been particularly concerned about him.
In the meantime the other two lambs stuck near their mom. I’m going to use colored tags again this year to give me more information about the lambs at a glance, mostly about sires. However, these first three have an unknown sire and the ram lambs (gorgeous as they are) have been banded. That’s what the red tags mean–wether.
When I asked how many alpacas there are, Mary said between 150 and 200. They roam the hills on the ranch, accompanied by guardian dogs.
This is one of the many ranch dogs that include guardian and herding dogs. We were told that this one is only 8 months old.
Our meeting was in the greenhouse located near the field where the bucks live.
This guy seemed pretty friendly.
Before we started the meeting we admired each others fiber products. This is one of the Twirl yarns produced by Mary.
This is what I brought to share–sheepskins, buttons, yarn, and shawls from my Jacob sheep. The new 
This is a felted hat made by 
Here is 
…and this is a piece she felted from the wool of Vicki, one of my Jacob sheep.
We were able to see the recently produced Wool and Fine Fiber Book. Each producer has a spread in which samples of their fiber is attached. These books will be circulated to designers and manufacturers who want to find out what kinds of fiber are available locally, how to contact the producers, and to learn how these fibers might be used in end products. This was an amazing undertaking by Fibershed.
While hearing about all this we were also doing what Fibershed producers do best, eating and baby animal snuggling. This is a two-day old kid who needs some TLC.
One of the dogs was feeling left out.
Even Rebecca found some goat snuggling time.
I hadn’t had a chance to do anything with it until recently. The first step was to gather some information.
The McMorran yarn balance is one tool to do that. You trim the ends off a strand of yarn until the arm balances.
Then you measure that length of yarn and multiply by 100 to get ypp (yards/pound). I repeated that a few times to get an average–1500 ypp.
Another measurement is wpi (wraps/inch). This yarn measure 15 wpi. However, from past experience I know that this isn’t quite accurate. Most yarn is scoured (washed) and skeined before it is sold in yarn stores. That can have a dramatic effect on the yarn. The yarn that I got from the mill on cones has not been scoured yet, so it is not really “finished”.
Look at the difference a soak in warm water makes. Now this yarn measure 1200 ypp (which is what the specs from the mill were)…
and it is 10 wpi. Based on those measurements I wove some samples.
These samples look pretty open on the loom…
…and I had to be careful to not beat the weft yarn down too much.
This is how the samples look off the loom. The 8 epi samples are in the top row.
And here is how they look after a quick wash. Dramatic difference from the loom to the finished fabric.
Here is how I had them displayed in the shop at the recent Shearing Day. The skein on the left has been washed. But these yarns aren’t just for weaving. My friend, Mary, bought some, washed it, and then used it for a Mystery Knit Along. Here is the shawl she knit.
This was knit over a few weeks with a new direction given out each week.
It is gorgeous in person and has a wonderful hand. I can’t wait to get some of this yarn on the loom and get to work with it.
Mustard blooming.
Mistletoe berries.
Almonds just about ready to bloom.
Looking west.
Taken earlier in the day. One of our two almond trees is in full bloom and full of bees.
This is Ginseng above and below.
This is Betty.
Esmerelda.
Lauren, one of last year’s lambs, almost a yearling. The yearlings look a lot skinnier than the older ewes with no wool.
Jillian, another yearling.
Jerry, a wether.
Isabelle
This is the yearling ram, Rotor.
A good comparison of a lilac Jacob (Nash) and black & white (Rotor).
This is Rotor’s fleece.
They aren’t all spotted. This is one of the BFL-Jacob cross ewes.
Lots of people help to make Shearing Day fun and easy for me. Kathleen weighed fleeces.
Stephany and Gynna wrangled sheep all morning.
Alison and many others helped at the skirting table.
People are welcome to skirt their fleeces before buying or ask for advice about fleeces.
It was a great day to stand in the sun with your hands in freshly shorn wool.
One more ewe to be shorn and then it was Faulkner’s turn.
His buddy, Jerry looked on. Faulkner weighed in at 235 lbs (down about 30 pounds from what he sometimes weighs in the summer).
Fresh Jacob fleece.
Faulkner’s fleece.
While the shearing and wool sorting was going on, friends were helping buyers in the shop.
Later we got everyone (almost) to the barn for a group photo. That’s a lot of enthusiastic friends!
The day before we were cleaning up the area around the barn and pushed the brush pile into the corral area where it’s safer to burn. The sheep thought that there might be something worth eating…
…or scratching on. I didn’t want them ruining a whole year of wool growth the night before being shorn so it was time to move them to the barn.
I called the dogs in and Ginny got to help with the big group.
Farm Club members are ready for action.
First sheep.
Mary is ready to grab and bag the fleece.
Wait a minute. These sheep don’t look right.
Cute, but not the right sheep.
We started the day with 10 sheep from another farm. We told John (shearer) that was his warm-up.
We got underway with the Jacobs. Farm Club members did all the work. Visitors watched. and I changed gates and moved sheep while playing with my camera.
Here John is shearing Dazzle…
…while Amy holds her lamb.
I think this is my favorite photo of the day. Peggy and Caroline babysit twins while their mom is being shorn.
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