Breeding Groups!

Hah!!!  I just found this post in the drafts pile.  Well, better late than never to publish the post.  It'll explain the lambs a bit better as they're posted in later blogs.


...written in mid-October, 2011
Today was "move the sheep into breeding groups" day. AI was 2 weeks ago, and it was time to get the backup rams in. The "main man" is ram lamb EVR Flint - an 87.5% Gotland/12.5% Finn. Flint has soft, soft blue-grey fleece on a refined body. His dam is EVR Gem, the 2010 Island County Supreme Ewe, and his sire is from New Zealand - Ralph. Three of the AI'd ewes are closely related to Flint, including Gem, so they went into the pen with EVR Dancer.

Here's hoping Flint only has one ewe to breed - ewe lamb Delilah, and Dancer has none!

I also put the Shetland ewes into a pasture by themselves, soon to be joined by Nightcap and Babybee.

Flint has:

EVR Bits (50% Gotland/ 50% Finn). Bits is one of our favorite ewes. She has a soft handling, curly white fleece on a very nice body. She is friendly and produces well. We now have a 75% daughter of hers, so it's possible she'll be for sale in a year or two.

EVR Bossie (50% Gotland/ 50% Finn). Bossie is another of our first year Gotlands. She has the finest fleece of any adult we've kept. Bossie, too, is very friendly. We haven't kept a ewe lamb from her, so fingers are crossed for next spring!

EVR Bunny (50% Gotland/ 50% Shetland). Bunny is the third of our first year Gotlands that we still have. She has produced very well for us. We have three of her adult ewe offspring - Angie, Alice and Marie, and used a ram from her, Jack, for two years. This year she gave us triplets including 2 ewes. It's likely we'll keep at least one of them.

Owl Hill Deepti (50% Gotland/ 50% Shetland). We bought DeeTee as an adult and have yet to keep a ewe lamb from her. Hopefully, in 2012!

EVR Angie (50% Gotland/ 25% Shetland/ 25% Finn). Angie has the best fleece/body combination of any of our 50% Gotland ewes. Her head and expression are gorgeous!

EVR Delilah (68.5% Gotland/ bal Shetland/Finn)

EVR Alice (the 2011 Island County Supreme Ewe, 75% Gotland/ 25% Shetland)

EVR Marie (75% Gotland/ 25% Shetland)

EVR Eclaire (32.5% Gotland/ 67.5% Finn)

Dancer has:

EVR Chamois (50% Gotland/ 50% Finn)

EVR Gem (75% Gotland/ 25% Finn)

EVR Jewel (75% Gotland/ 25% Finn)

Nightcap has:

Dodge Electra (grey, double coat)

Bitterroot Bessie (fawn katmoget, long fine double coat)

EverRanch Blanca (white, fine crimpy, poll carrier?)

EverRanch Toffee (moorit, fine crimpy intermediate, poll carrier?)

EverRanch Spark (grey katmoget, intermediate, poll carrier?)

EverRanch Popcorn (white, fine & crimpy, poll carrier?)

Lil'Country Babybee (moorit, fine & crimpy, poll carrier)

The Maiden Yearlings

The group of Gotland lambs born last year at the end of May started the winter keeping company with the Shetlands.  As the Shetlands had their lambs, they went into a separate pen, more suitable for raising lambs without competing with the unbred yearlings.  These girls are actually not quite 1 year old, since they were born near the end of May, 2011.

Crystal, Ruby, and Pearl - Crystal is 87.5% Gotland by NZ Ralph and EVR Gem.  Ruby is 87.5% Gotland by NZ Hoppy and EVR Jewel.  Crystal is 75% Gotland by NZ Ralph and EVR Bits.  Ruby is for sale.

Here is another photo of Ruby.  She has nice length of body, like her dam, Jewel.

This is Ruby's fleece (top/side).  Soft, silky, grey curls.  It feels good and she likes to have  fingers run through it.

This is Ruby's twin, Sapphire.  Sapphire has a little more variegation in her fleece.  Otherwise, they're very much twins.

EVR Sapphire 87.5% Gotland  by NZ Hoppy ex EVR Jewel

EVR Sapphire

EVR Kanin, 75% Gotland by NZ Ralph ex EVR Bunny.  Bunny has been one of our best producers. 

EVR Kanin

EVR Conejo, Kanin's triplet sister.  Conejo didn't want to show her face this session, just her curls.  Connie is for sale.

EverRanch Popcorn.  NASSA Registered Shetland.  Popcorn is  by  Firth of Fifth Barish ex EverRanch Blanca, a V Creek Buddy daughter.  Popcorn has lovely, crimpy, fine fleece and might carry polled genetics.

EverRanch Popcorn

The yearlings share their pasture and feed with "Goose Goose".  After his friend disappeared, GooseGoose adopted the sheep as his flock.  He' protects' them from the barn cats, the dogs and the other sheep.  It's very funny to hear him answering the sheep "baaaaaa's" with his honking.

Katrina watching the photo taking with interest.

These photos were taken in the back yard.  The sheep are very good at taming the jungle of spring grass.  As a bonus, they've stripped the needles from the downed fir branches!

What did we do on our January "vacation"?

The Pacific Northwest has been in the news over the last week with the first big storms of the season. First we got hit with snow - less than predicted, but enough to paralyze the area. Then, instead of the warming and melt that was forecast, we had an unprecedented 12+ hours of freezing rain! Heavily laden trees came down everywhere, along with many, many branches big and small - and many power lines. Over 300,000 homes and businesses in our area were left without power, and roads were impassible with all the trees and wires down.

Our pasture looks like a war zone with branches littered everywhere and fences crushed. Fortunately, the fences keeping our sheep in are still intact. We lost power on Wednesday evening and regained it yesterday (Saturday) evening. For us, that means loss of water, as our well operates on electricity. There was enough snow and ice, that we could keep water buckets filled and somewhat thawed. Inside water was harder, but we filled gallon jugs before our system lost all pressure, and filled them up again at a nearby gas station.

It was cold outside, so no immediate danger to our freezers (thank goodness!), but for us... it got cold. We cooked on the gas stove, and the bed is piled with fleeces on top of the down quilt, so we had hot meals and were warm at night. Staying occupied and warm during the day was a challenge.

We ended up in my rather small wool room, powering a space heater and a couple of lights with the little gas generator, and were quite comfortable, if rather cozy.

Here's the setup: Dave brought in a little table for modeling and several books, I had my spinning wheel and knitting, the dogs had their rug/bed. Of course, the wool and fabric around the perimeter was very useful for thermal storage...

I spun - some Cormo and Cormo/Pygora blend for the Ravelry group - Knitters Book of Yarn woolalong. Cormo is the February breed - and knitted on my boucle shawlette.

The dogs slept. Dogs are good at sleeping when nothing else interests them.

Clifford could skinny into places the Labradors couldn't, so sometimes he slept with them, and sometimes he slept in the "cave" under my table.

Dave mostly read, and worked on his models.


Kat wanted in...


...and Kat wanted out.

Then, Saturday evening, while we were quietly knitting, reading, sleeping and (Kat) staying out with brother, Toby, the room light came on! Light! Heat! Water! Hot showers! Facebook...

Update

In September, I took almost 3 weeks for a trip to the midWest. Clifford and I shared my pickup truck out and back, and we picked up 2 Shetlands to share the ride home. The major goal of the trip was to attend the 2011 Iron Welsh Challenge in St. Louis. Clifford was entered in three of the events, though not in the Challenge itself, since I was judging the agility portion of the IWC.

Before the IWC started, I gave a tracking seminar in Mountain Home, AR. The enthusiasm of the attendees was infectious, and I hope they continue on! I then spent several days with a friend in the area before driving to Sullivan, MO, for the IWC tracking tests - the first events in the 2011 IWC. We had 2 VST entries, including Clifford, 1 TDX entry, and 1 TD entry. Both the TD and TDX dogs PASSED, but Clifford failed after going well astray on the first leg then coming back to miss the first turn.

The Iron Welsh Champion was also the breed's first CT (earned her VST in May) - Ripley with owner/handler Lisa. Highlights of the weekend included the Welsh Springer winning Best in Show at Sunday's all breed show, Meghen's baby shower, and the "Boys" winning the Rally Team class. Clifford's highlight was the hunt test, held on Monday. He was one of three qualifiers, though the important part to him was BIRDS!

On my way home, Julianne and Tom Budde met me with Lil'Country Nightcap and BabyBee. They got the pickup bed "suite" on the way home. NightCap (below) is a very handsome, moorit, polled Shetland ram with incredibly soft and crimpy fleece. Babybee is a lovely, dainty moorit Shetland ewe who's produced well for Jules and now gets a chance to move the EverRanch flock toward polled rams.

By the time I returned home, a shipment of long awaited Gotland semen from Sweden itself! had arrived in the US. Early in the month, we got 12 ewes ready for AI, 11 of them received semen from 4 of the elite rams represented in the import. Now we wait.

It's a constant struggle to keep sheep numbers down. With so many really nice ewes - and rams, too - it's hard to decide who stays and who goes. This year, Shetlands Mindy (left below) and Astrid (right below) fell below my "keeper" line. Very nice sheep both, they found a home in a flock who has 3 other EverRanch % Gotland sheep. They might even get to participate in Living Nativity at their new home.

While I was gone, the garden reached its peak of the summer. Tomatoes, corn, beans, squash all were at their best while I was gone, but held on long enough for me to enjoy them, too! Actually, there are lots of green beans in the garden, hard to believe it's late October and the beans still look like this:

Tomatoes finally gave up with way too many green ones left on the vines. We grew a number of "Beefstake" type varieties this year, and they don't survive storage well. There are just too many folds and lobes, though the cherry tomatoes didn't survive well either. I harvested quite a few pumpkins and squash - Sweet Meat, Spaghetti, Delicata, Sugar Pie and generic pumpkin. The sheep fight each other for the bean plants, corn stalks and Brussels sprouts leaves. Soon, they'll get to clean up the garden except for the cold hardy plants - parsnip, Brussels sprouts, carrots, beets, chard, leeks. Yes, we'll still be eating from the garden for a while!

- Franna

The Garden at the End of July...

Oops! Looks like I forgot to finish a post. How fun to look back at the mid-summer garden!

... looks a lot like a "normal" June garden. We're eating lettuce, green onions, chard, baby beets, summer squash, and broccoli. There is abundant promise.

...Zuccini and blossoms...

...yellow squash and more blossoms...

...shepherd's potatoes...

...with blossoms. Potato blossoms are very pretty, and are obviously in the nightshade family!

...squash blossoms. Someday I'm going to try fried squash blossoms.

...tomatoes, if not ripening, at least there are now green ones.

Garden view looking SSW. Onions, lettuce, beets, broccoli, leeks, squash, corn, sunflowers.

...corn with tassles!

...more potato blossoms. This time a red potato - Carmine.

...beans to come! The Royal Purple are gorgeous plants. Red stems and the lovely violet-pink blossoms! The little bean is still green - soon to turn dark purple.

This has been a great year for broccoli. Not too hot, not too cold.

Pole beans climbing up the sunflowers.

A closer look at a baby Royal Purple bean.

That was where I stopped, but I figured it is still worth sharing. The garden of 2011 isn't quite done, though long past its peak. It's not too early to look forward to next year's garden!

- Franna

I Finished the Tour de Fleece!

I started Le Tour de Fleece a couple of previous years, but didn't stick with it to the end. THIS YEAR...

...I spun a little or a lot every day the riders rode. And most days, I watched the "other" spinning - bicycles, lots of bicycles. It was an exciting Tour with many sprint finished, lead changes, accidents (boo!), and wacko fans lining the roads.

I started spinning batts from a class I took this spring, and FINISHED them all! Those are the colored skeins in the photo.

Then the next week, I started spinning my "peloton" yarn - Shetland! The white on the bobbin is fine top from Shetland sheep living in the Shetland isles via Jamieson and Smith. My other Shetland spinning isn't shown - it's bulky yarn from one of our first Shetlands - Electra. I'm making a lap blanket with two of her fleeces.

My stretch (difficult climb days) spinning was on the spindle shown above - a cashmere and silk blend. I only got a few yards spun. It's quite fine and I had a lot of "help" from the cats and dogs. They wanted to help spin that spindle - hah!

This was my favorite image from the awards ceremony - the three winners with raised, clasped hands, jubilant in their victory, and I'm sure more than a little glad the Tour was over for another year.
- Franna

Garden Bounty

Remember the photo above from mid-May?

...and this one with the baby broccoli, Brussels sprouts and leek hairs newly planted?

Here it is today - July 4th, 2011 - the 235th Birthday of the United States.

It's a bit behind the usual Western Washington garden and growing well with our recent warm weather. ...just add water!

Today, I harvested this "bounty" - our first lettuce and scallions.

The lettuce, one leaf from each of three different types of lettuce, went straight into my lunch - pastrami and mustard on Dave's Killer Good Seed bread!

Mega-flavor and crunch!!!

Below are the "shepherd's potatoes", growing in a tower made from old fencing, then lined with mulch quality fleeces, and filled with compost as the potatoes grow.

The tower below, third from the left, holds Carmine potatoes. I'm so tempted to check the bottom layer for new potatoes! It won't be long, they've got flower buds! The broccoli LOVES this weather!

...and so do the Brussels sprouts. They've grown so tall, that they fall over and I've added stakes and big rocks to prop them up! Tiny Brussels sprouts are starting to form - promises, promises!

More promises - the tomatoes are doing better than expected. They have lots of blossoms, and even...

... one little tomato! It's an heirloom variety beefsteak type - Persimmon.The corn is doing average. The rule of thumb is that corn should be "knee high by the Fourth of July". Welllll...

... with a little help the first planting of corn is knee high. The last planting is just emerged. I'm hopeful... the local corn mazes aren't up yet, either.

Beans - looking good! after a shaky start with no help from the moles. grrrrr!

One little zuccini with a big blossom! ... well behind "normal" for this area.

Carrots and Beets coming along. I can't blame the weather for these, they were planted late. Beet thinnings to come!

This goodie is one of four... count 'em... four parsnip plants that came up in 8' of row. At least there's still time to plant more parsnips.