Farm Day – One Week Until Shearing

Posted on January 14, 2024 by Robin

I scheduled a Farm Day today to take care of some chores prior to shearing next week. The ewes were ready to be vaccinated to provide the highest level of antibodies in the colostrum. I wanted to clip fleece samples from the yearlings (their second fleeces) to send in for micron testing. We also made sure that the ear tags were clean enough to read and that the tags would match the cards that go with each fleece.

Some long-time Farm Club members were there as well as some people who are new to Farm Club. It all went very smoothly and it took only a couple of hours to work through all the sheep and take time to take a closer look at some of those fleeces.

Farm Club members get a chance to reserve a fleece at this Fleece Preview Farm Day.

Deborah took the photos from above and this is me remembering to take at least a few photos. Often we get so busy that I overlook that.

While most of us were in with the sheep Susan, Chris, and Nikki volunteered to clean behind the barn. That’s always a big chore. When they finished here they moved to the ram pen and cleaned the ram barn.

Mary checked off the list on the clip board and made sure the cards matched the ear tags. Susan drew up vaccine into syringes.

Marina and Katy caught sheep, marked faces, and cleaned ear tags.

Rachel and Siobhan also helped catch and mark sheep.

The photos below are what it is all about. I had been thinking that the sheep are looking a bit bedraggled, but when I got hands-on those fleeces I changed my mind. They are looking good.

April is a yearling ewe, almost 2 year old.

Queen Q is the same age. The photos below are an on-the-hoof look at the fleeces of the four rams I have here.

Meridian Blizzard (Meridian Silverado x Meridian Bessie), 10 month old ram.

Meridian Typhoon (Meridian Turbo x Meridian Rocha)

Fair Adventure Horatio, 3 year old ram, from Colorado.

Hillside Gabby’s Barrett, 3 year old ram, from Michigan.

Shearing Day is Sunday, January 21.* We’ll be shearing about 70 sheep. Fleeces are available on shearing day and for a month or two afterwards as I skirt them and post them on-line. If you live in the area you can come here to choose a fleece. Contact me.

*I just fixed this. A friend pointed out that I wrote June 21. Yikes!

Black Sheep Gathering – Day 2

Posted on June 29, 2023 by Robin

Usually we show on the Friday of Black Sheep Gathering. Unfortunately I was the only Jacob breeder this year so I was bumped into sort of an All Other Breeds class on Saturday. That meant that Friday was a free day. I had books and magazines and a crochet project with me. What did I accomplish? Nothing, because everywhere I turned there were people to talk to and things to see. Sometimes its the best thing to have a break from “accomplishing” something.

Trophies and ribbons on a table in front of the tables full of fleeces in the wool show.

The morning activities began with the wool show. I listened for awhile because there is always something to learn. The Jacob class was #12 so I decided there was time to buy a BSG t-shirt before that started.

This has nothing to do with the t-shirts but it is what caught my eye at the t-shirt table. A women had an 8-day old kitten with her. She is feeding it every two hours.

Back in the barn, there were vendors as well.

The barn vendors have their booths near their pens of show sheep. I have not been a vendor because that would mean there is more organization required, more things to take, and I’d be tied down to staying there the whole time. I was having fun wandering everywhere.

Fleeces lined up on a table while being judged.

Back to the wool show. There were 8 fleeces in the Jacob class. Four were mine. I placed first with Brady (ram), 2nd with Janna (ewe), and fourth and sixth with two others. The first two sold there. I’ll have the other two on my website.

Wandering through the vendor hall I took photos of just a few things that caught my eye. My friend, Karen of Bide a Wee Farm, came up with unique products–lamb tail keychains and ram horn earrings!

She also does a much better job with ram skulls than I do. Mine are still brown and somewhat nasty looking.

Five wool samples from Indian sheep in small boxes with labels.

A friend from Davis is selling goods from India, including this box of wool samples from sheep I’ve never heard of.

An Oregon sheep breeder has started producing panels for use with sheep.

Colorful skeins of mixed yarns next to a sign that says One of a Kind Art Yarn.

I met a new vendor from my area who creates art yarn from leftovers.

Carded fiber in rainbow order of color from red through purple in front of the drum carder.

Last but not least, it’s a rainbow batt from my friends, Roy and Henry Clemes!

Sheep Show and Spinners Lead tomorrow!

Close to Home–Post #16 The End

Posted on December 4, 2014 by Robin

Monday I took down the show. Two dedicated and fabulous friends came to help. They tagged and wrote price labels for all the pieces and sorted sold from unsold. I took out nails, patched holes, got the museum putty that held signs off the walls, and figured out how to condense this whole gallery….into the corner at the end of the room. I didn’t finish until the next day.This is some of the blankets all tagged and ready to show again.

I was able to keep a lot of pieces there. I hope a lot sell because in January it will be someone else’s turn for a show in the gallery and my things will go back out to a smaller space in the main part of the store. Here is what I did. The chenille scarves came back to the display, although baby blankets are still in the other room of the store. One wall. The other wall.Remember this?Now it’s full of wonderful comments. I like Breanna from Fair Oaks mindset, don’t you?

Thanks to everyone who came, who commented, and who bought, and supported the local sheep industry and your local weaver/farmer!!!!

Close to Home…Post #10 – Sincere Sheep

Posted on November 20, 2014 by Robin

One of the first yarns I used when weaving for Close to Home was Targhee wool sold by Sincere Sheep.

Story: Brooke Sinnes of Napa began Sincere Sheep in 2003 and focused on natural dyeing yarn sourced from local wool. Since that time she has included other lines of yarn sourced farther from home.
Sincere Sheep’s Bannock yarn is a 3-ply worsted weight yarn that features 100% Targhee wool from Montana and the Dakotas that is milled in North Carolina and spun in Maine.
The Targhee sheep is named after the Targhee National Forest near where the breed was developed beginning in the 1920’s. The goal of the U.S. Sheep Experiment Station in Idaho was to develop sheep with uniformly heavy fleshing and high quality fine wool that was adapted to rugged conditions of the Western range. Developed by crossing Rambouillet, Corriedale, and Lincoln sheep at the Experiment Station, the Targhee breed was expanded by selection of “Targhee type” ewes from large bands of range ewes crossed with Targhee rams. The flock book was closed in 1966.
Targhee sheep produce 10-12 pound fleeces with very soft, bright white fiber that measures 21-25 microns. Sincere Sheep’s Bannock yarn was named for a Targhee Native American Chief.This is one of only two yarns in this show that are not grown in Solano or Marin Counties but I included it because of the variety of colors, naturally dyed, and the quality of the yarn, and it is grown in the Pacific Northwest, which is Closer to Home than many places where wool is grown. I love the color variation in this yarn… …and the variety of designs that you can get on one warp. Sincere Sheep blankets That means that each of the blankets above was woven on the same warp threading in white yarn, but the patterns change by varying the treading and, of course, the color of the weft. Another series of blankets. And another. Sincere Sheep Targhee At the end of the warp I just wove in white instead of making it plaid and then I felted the fabric. That made great fabric for pillows.I also wove a series of blankets on a rusty red warp with a white weft

Targhee yarn is very soft and perfect for scarves as well. After the Artery show whatever items are left will be for sale on my website.

Three Days of Weaving Classes

Posted on September 7, 2014 by Robin

I taught a Chenille Scarf class for the Hangtown Fiber Guild in Placerville on Friday and Saturday. Eight weavers and eight very different scarves. Each is beautiful. You can’t go wrong with chenille. Most of the chenille scarves are plain weave, but Joni used clasped weft (that’s where the purple and blue meet in a diagonal line) to create interest in part of the scarf. Today I taught the second day of the new Spin to Weave class here at the farm. In the first session a few weeks ago spinners, most of whom had never woven before, had a crash course in weaving terminology and warping technique. They came today with handspun yarn and a sense of adventure. This is dyed angora warp with a gray weft. Amy used her yarn from space-dyed fiber from Fiber Confections for warp and a commercial wool weft. The idea was to choose a weft that did not detract from the warp. This one is perfect! Chris warped with a Jaggerspun Merino yarn and wove a twill with her handspun yarn.This photo doesn’t do Alison’s warp justice. The true color is purple and blue so I’ll have to get a daylight photo later. She warped 18″ wide at 15 epi in her handspun silk. We chose Jaggerspun Zephyr, a fine wool/silk blend for weft.

Road Trip – 2nd half of Day 8 – Oregon

Posted on July 6, 2014 by Robin

After touring Pendleton Woolen Mill we got on the road again. Just as we were getting on the freeway to head west we saw this scene:Herding cattle next to the freeway and across lawn? Look again. These are beautifully made full-size sculptures.Not far from Pendleton Highway 84 meets up with and then follows the Columbia River. We followed the Columbia River. This is the John Day Lock and Dam. In some places we saw windsurfers on the river, but elsewhere there were huge barges. I don’t have photos but we also saw several bighorn sheep on the rocky cliffs just south of the highway in this area. We turned south onto Highway 97 which would take us all the way to California. More stunning landscape, sky and wide, open spaces. Rolling hills of wheat. Isolated ranches and distant mountains.

We passed the town of Shaniko (population of 36 at 2010 census) which was known in 1900 as the Wool Capitol of the World. The largest landowner at the time was R.R. Hinton who had first homesteaded in the 1870’s and continued to purchase land until his Imperial Stock Ranch became the largest individually owned ranch in Oregon. The Imperial Stock Ranch eventually ran 35,000 head of sheep in 12-14 bands that would winter on the home ranch and be trailed to summer range on Forest Service land. Hinton was involved in breeding programs that led to the one of the first sheep breeds developed in the U.S., the large-framed, fine-wooled Columbia sheep, originating from Lincoln and Rambouillet ancestors. The newly formed town of Shaniko (built as the railroad reached the area) was less than 15 miles from the Imperial Stock Ranch’s headquarters, and its wool warehouse shipped 4 million pounds of wool by rail in 1901.Imperial Stock Ranch is now owned by Dan and Jeannie Carver and they have developed the Imperial Yarn Company using Columbia wool produced on the ranch and elsewhere in the state. This is some of my favorite yarn in the shop and I have recently been using it to weave blankets. Since we were going to be driving through this part of Oregon I had asked if we could visit the ranch. The photo above is the road into the headquarters.

Keelia, lives on the ranch and was there to show us around the headquarters. This is the house built by R.R. Hinton, now headquarters of the Yarn Company.The headquarters complex has been entered into the National Register of Historic Places and the history of the buildings and the Hinton family are available for review.

The grain silo. See the detail of the construction below. This is one sturdy building. We also saw the shearing shed and other buildings that are still in use.A few bottle lambs hand out under the house to greet visitors. As we left the ranch headquarters some of the sheep were near enough the road to get some photographs of them in this majestic setting.Back on the road on the last leg of the trip.

Next post: California’s scenery isn’t too shabby either. Mt. Shasta and home.

Road Trip – Day 8 – Pendleton

Posted on July 4, 2014 by Robin

It’s been several days since I wrote the post about Day 7 of our vacation. The vacation wasn’t quite over. We needed to be back home on Tuesday but there were two places to visit in Oregon. (Actually I had marked many others on the map in my head–Hell’s Canyon National Recreation Area, John Day Fossil Beds National Monument, a friend in Boise, a cousin near Portland–but those will all have to wait for another trip.)

We arrived in Pendleton… …and easily found the woolen mill. There is also a mill near Portland. That is where they weave cloth for the Pendleton clothing line. At this mill in Pendleton they spin and weave blankets. There were about a dozen people there for the tour even at 9 a.m. on a Monday morning. It was interesting to see the workings of the mill but now I have a lot of unanswered questions. We all wore headsets so that we could hear the tour guide over noise of the mill machinery but that meant that there was no opportunity to ask questions while we were walking. And the tour was fast. I would have liked to stop and watch what was going on with each loom. Now that I’m looking at my photos I realize that I have even more questions about what I was seeing. I guess I’ll just have to go back!The Mill uses Rambouillet wool from Oregon and surrounding states and Merino wool from New Zealand and Australia. The wool is scoured in Texas and then comes to Oregon for spinning and weaving. The carding and spinning equipment was on the second floor. That room was quite humid. The guide told us that high humidity lessons the quantity of airborne particles so employees don’t have to wear dust masks. Now I wonder if that is the main reason for the humidity or if it makes carding and spinning more efficient (or both). The photo above shows the carding equipment operating behind plexiglass.Pencil roving is spun onto big spools and the yarn is later transferred to cones. The yarn is steamed to set the twist. Now I can’t remember the details. I think it was steamed for an hour or so. This is a view from the second floor looking down on the looms that are on the first floor.Above the looms are the computers that operate them and fans that keep the lint from settling and, thereby, prevent overheating.Here is where I now have more questions than answers. This is one of the Jacquard looms. A Jacquard loom can weave complicated patterns because all the threads operate independently. Notice the selvedge threads that are wound separately.It is only after looking at this photo that I see the selvedges being cut off as the cloth rolls onto the cloth beam. At least I think that is what I am seeing. (This will only have significance to those of you who are weavers.) This is one of the dobby looms. I think that guide said that with their newer dobby looms a blanket takes 15 minutes to weave.The blankets in a continuous roll are inspected for flaws as they roll over a light table (middle of the photo where the bright light is). Blankets ready for finishing touches. Bags of selvedges ready to sell to people who want to make rugs.We left with a few bags of our own. Dan wanted to point out that his purchase (BBQ sauce) fit into that little paper bag.

Next post: Second half of Day 8–sheep.

Weaving More Blankets

Posted on May 14, 2014 by Robin

This was the last order of blankets from BC (Before Christmas). Now there is only one more thing that I have committed to weave for someone else (that’s you, I.S.). Then I can focus on my LVIP (Looming Very Important Project)…pun there, but not intended.

This is six throws on the same warp. I don’t remember what the wool is, but there are some longwools (or maybe it’s mohair) in here as you will see in the detail. They add luster as well as weight to the blankets. They also act very differently when fulled. Some of that has to do with the extra twist in the yarn. The top two blankets in the first photo are in plain weave, but at a glance they may not look like plain weave, in which every other thread is over and under. There are diagonals in here that are not characteristic of plain weave. This is called tracking and is not uncommon when weaving plain weave with yarns that are over-twisted and woven at a relatively loose sett. Detail of a plain weave blanket. You can see that the weave structure is plain weave, but the over-twist of the threads is causing them to migrate and twist after wet finishing.More detail because with this lens I can. Do you see the “hairiness” of those fibers? That is more characteristic of a “long wool” breed. More blankets and details.

At the Loom

Posted on April 8, 2014 by Robin

It hasn’t been all hiking and lambing. I’ve been at the loom too. This is a king-size blanket I wove for a customer who had their llama/wool yarn spun at Yolo Wool Mill. I also wove 2 throws for this person. These are two lap blankets woven of wool from sheep at the Barinaga Ranch, a sheep dairy in Marin County.This is a close up of all four blankets on that warp. The brown weft is Jacob wool dyed with black walnut. I’m always trying to get better photos. The photo above is shot on AWB (auto white balance). The one below, shot on the cloudy setting, isn’t that much different, although on my computer the AWB photo has more of a bluish cast.

But look at the next one. The white balance was set to “shade” which is where I took the photo. What is reality? I think it’s closer to the top two. I just finished a warp for three shawls. This is CVM yarn in the warp with different locally produced weft yarns. Same shawls with white balance set to “shade”. Detail of shawl on the left.

This is on the loom now. An experiment. Hopefully all those holes will fill in when it is finished.

The pieces above will be for sale on my website and at the Fibershed Marketplace after our photoshoot that is in a few weeks.

Spring Shearing in a Big Way

Posted on March 24, 2014 by Robin

A couple of friends and I went to see shearing on a commercial sheep ranch about 30 miles south of here. We got there in just enough time to see the last part of shearing 3000 sheep in 2 1/2 days.The original flock was made up of Corriedale sheep and over the years was crossed with Targhee and other commercial white-faced sheep. Sheep going into shearing trailer The sheep are gathered at the back of a trailer that is hauled from ranch to ranch with all the gear. They go up the chute with the encouragement of……Border Collies as well as people.Here is a view from the other end of the trailer. That sheep in front hangs out for awhile in that position because the other sheep are more likely to go forward if they see a sheep in front of them. Notice how the sheep walk on a raised alleyway while the freshly shorn fleeces are shoved out of the trailer below them.Here is a photo of the inside of the trailer. There are seven shearers at work. The sheep walk forward on the raised alley. Fleeces are pushed out beneath.When the shearer is ready for the next sheep he pulls the door down with his foot and flips the sheep off the alleyway into position for shearing.

After the sheep are shorn they are sent out the doors on the other side of the trailer.

The fleeces are scooped from the trailer and quickly examined by a sorter/classer who determines where they end up. The fleeces are thrown into the appropriate pile. My friends who owns the ranch had requested that the finer fleeces shorn on that day be put aside for us to look at. It turns out that even the not-so-fine fleeces seemed just as nice to us. Last year’s core samples indicated that most of this flock’s wool graded in the mid-20’s (microns) and the finer fleeces were in the low 20’s. For reference Jacob fleece ranges from about 25-35 microns and most of mine is probably about 28 to 29 microns. So all of this wool is finer than what I am used to using. The fine fleece pile is the one nearest the table. The pile to the left are tender fleeces (fleeces that have a weak place usually due to nutritional stress or illness). The pile just barely visible behind the plywood is the “not as fine” pile. We chose our fleeces (all of the fine pile and a lot of the one behind the plywood) and the remaining wool was quickly baled. The wool is shoved into this wool press…

…and compacted… …and sealed into bales that are marked with the pertinent information. I forgot to ask how much these weigh but on-line sources say they would hold 240 to 450 pounds each. Before we left the shearing trailer was pulling out and everyone was getting ready to go to the next job.Freshly shorn sheep turned out to graze.

In about six months I hope to have blankets woven from this wool. They will be available at the Artery and the Fibershed Marketplace.

Meridian Jacobs' Blog

Life on the farm and at the loom.

Category Archives: Wool