Monday, May 14, 2012

Looking for flock additions?

The three lambs are 11 weeks old now and could be weaned. The boys will be banded first (unless someone speaks up soon!) so they can have mama's milk for comfort. All three have had great looking fleeces from birth, and continue to impress me with their density, crimp and consistency.

Bing is black as black can be. His scurs are longer than Bittersweet's are; the right one is longer because he knocked the left one off early on. He is solidly and squarely built, nearly the same size as his petite dam, with a typey Shetland tail.

Bittersweet took my breath away when I first laid eyes on him, and with his super-crimpy fleece from head to tail and elegant, correction conformation. He is the most skittish of the lambs so I don't get my hands on his fleece as often as I do the other two, but it is as delicious as his name. Once banded, intensive taming will begin!

Little Miss Bloom is difficult to photograph, but I did get this one that shows her square hindquarters and typey little tail. She is petite and friendly; her fleece color appears modified even though I don't know where that would have come from.

Bittersweet's and Bloom's dam Annabelle (Whistlestop 0338) is an amazing producer; I have her offspring from three different years and by three different rams here, and all have fine, crimpy fleece with good length (at least 4") and good conformation. I would like to keep a ewe lamb from her, but I already have two other gulmoget ewes so am willing to wait for a solid or white ewe lamb.

If any of these and/or Annabelle's light grey yearling wether Bart interest you, please contact me. The three boys together would make an amazing fiber flock. I plan to cover those precious lamb fleeces soon, because if they stay here, their fleeces will be hot commodities come next spring.

That's it for today from . . .

8 comments:

Leigh said...

Great idea about letting the banded boys have mama for comfort. I need to remember that.

Your boys' colors are mouthwatering. Too bad we live so far away, LOL. Dan is taking Jasmine's broken leg pretty hard and is ready to throw his hands up with goats. Of course he takes all the losses hard. I just wish he wouldn't keep count.

Michelle said...

You sure have had a lot of disappointments with the goats, Leigh. I have a little experience with goats; the Shetlands seem much more trouble-free.

Franna said...

Little Miss Bloom is still very tempting, even though Bee didn't give me anything to trade. How does her fleece feel? She looks like she had a halo on her birth coat. Is that her on the third fleece shot down? I miss having a gully in the flock.

Michelle said...

Yes, Bloom's fleece is the third one down in the next post, Franna. She probably has the softest handle of the three lambs. She did have a halo at birth, but the crispy coat was visible at skin level all along. Now she looks completely consistent front to back.

Michelle said...

CRIMPY coat, not "crispy" coat! Rascally auto-spell-correct!

thecrazysheeplady said...

I've always wanted a true black...

Michelle said...

Sounds like it is time for that trip to Oregon then. (-;

Kim said...

Oh they do look so good!