Sheep Shearing 2011

Today we had all of our sheep sheared and after a few days of fine weather, yesterday a sea fret came in, soaking all the sheep. This morning it was dryer, but the sky did not look promising, so we got all the sheep into the barn before breakfast.

Here is Gus waiting to be sheared

Freyalyn and Mark (complete with Lunil & Bil) came to assist with the shearing this weekend. Mark is learning to shear and so was looking to pick up some pointers from our shearer.

The Ewes and Lambs penned up in the barn, with the Ewes awaiting the shearer.

One of the Teeswater Ewes after her "hair cut"

This is the aftermath of shearing, a full fleece bag and all the daggings. After the winter we've had most of the fleeces were in good condition, a couple of Scottie fleeces were felted and came off as a mat. Interestingly, the older Teeswater's fleeces were still wet this morning, whereas everyone else's fleeces were dry after yesterdays sea fret. These Teeswaters have been shown last year, not by us, and we wonder if the "stain" that is put on the fleeces has some effect on the lanolin of the sheep's fleece as they seemed to have absorbed an aweful lot of water.
I was very restrained over the fleeces, keeping back the Teeswater's, Ariadnne's, Anya's and a couple of the gimmer fleeces for me to use for the rest of the year. Not quite sure what I'm going to do with them, but they were too good to send to the Wool Board.
Just need to get the Alpaca's sheared which should happen sometime in July.