Blog #20
Back-to-Back
So …, scheduling a few sheep to shear one day then a few more the next tends to happen in the Spring. (Almost) all sheep owners want their animals sheared right before Summer, and rightly so. It’s kind of like doing a periodic maintenance inspection (PMI) on your air conditioner. You know it’s got to be done, there’s never really a convenient time, and there’s always the chance that something undesired will show up in the process. Unfortunately, like the AC PMI in Georgia, with everyone wanting it now, a wait develops. Fortunately for this post's shearing gigs, no bad outcomes surfaced.
For good or bad, sometimes jobs have to be rescheduled
due to weather or other conflicts.
Sometimes one job will come up that’s physically right down the road
from a previously scheduled job and can get tacked on. And sometimes schedules change and a morning
or afternoon opens, and an extra job can get added. Some of all of those led to these two jobs
going so quickly and unexpectedly recently.
The first job started out straight-forward. The gig was close enough that I
didn’t have time to finish my latte or even let it cool down before I was at
the farm. Thank you Between Friends
Coffee—I always enjoy stopping for a sip and a nosh!
Once I got set up and ready to start, the animals still managed to surprise me. I’m always impressed with just how much wool can grow when a sheep misses a shearing. The second surprise is just how blessed big rams can be! The great thing about this gig was how much the owners knew and were in tune with their animals. They didn’t try to say the sheep were angels, but they knew their backgrounds and temperament, so they were ready to step in when help was needed and to work cooperatively to get the animals onto the shearing board.
One sheep that missed a
shearing had her fleece so matted it was already felted. If you see the way I’m holding it in the
picture below, the bottom half is the inside of the fleece that was next to her skin,
and the top is flipped over showing the outside. Now that her fleece is off and they’re on a
twice a year shearing schedule, her following fleeces should be beautiful and lustrous. In the post-shearing picture of me with the
ram, I’m happy he wasn’t edgy. He stood
so still for the photo-op, but if he was done, there’s no way I could hold him
with his lanolin-slick skin. Plus, that
huge neck is just one example of how muscular the Valais Blacknose breed can
be.
Along with sheep, Moreauville Farms has quite a variety
of animals: highland cattle, sheep,
goats, chickens, ducks, geese, guinea, and pea fowl. Add a place to relax and it’s a quiet little
corner of peace in middle Georgia. To
make this even better for the animals, the owners have a good working
relationship with a local veterinarian who will make farm calls, resulting in
these animals having the best possible care in a safe and comfortable
environment.
The second job for the weekend was a single ewe a little
way away from home, but she needed shearing.
Some shearing gigs aren’t the most economical, but each animal still
needs shearing every year, and sometimes twice.
Matted fleeces, hidden skin conditions, or health issues can be masked
when the wool is so thick that the animal can’t be felt or seen under the
coat.
Once we were loaded up and on our way, it was a bit like when we were first married. Early on in our lives together we enjoyed driving around the valley where we lived, seeing what all was there. Shearing this sheep had the same result. We drove one way to get there and another way home. We found ourselves in the town of Ellaville, quite a ways from home, where we took a quick break for coffee, then eased our way home. What a great way to spend a Spring weekend in Georgia.
Let’s see what’s next on America’s Top 40 next week!
C-Ya!
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