What a shock! We had Horrace, our big stud ram who fathered all of our lambs this year, sheared. And he shrunk! He is tiny under all of that fleece. Herdies are much smaller than they at first appear, I guess that is because they are a hill breed then have plenty of fleece to keep them warm during the cold winters. Horrace is much smaller than basil and I would have said they were about the same size! He is the size of a big angora (goat not rabbit).
To compound his misery, in order for him to be able to roam free in the field where Debbie keeps her ram, they need to get acclimatised so they don’t fight. And as such, poor little Horrace was kept overnight with Debbies ram lamb who is huge! Looks like a proper bruiser! Horrace is about a third of his size. We think that Debbies ram might be called Hovis, which means that Hovis and Horrace might be bonding together in the stable. Or it could mean that there was one of those misunderstandings over who was called what and did Debbie think that we were calling Horrace Hovis?
It was quite exciting watching our sheep being sheared. Debbie is very quick, the sheep seem to be quite well behaved and not fidgeting too much. The pups could learn a lesson or two – as could angoras of both breeds!
Debbie gave me a couple of her fleeces to practice spinning on and sheared one other of our sheep. There are a couple left to go who need shearing as of course some of sheep decided to shed their fleece unaided.
Crumpet did not produce Rabbits, so was reintroduced to Muffin. Much to her horror. I left them alone for about 20 minutes and hopefully there will be the pitter patter if rabbity feet in about 30 days.