Monday, November 8, 2010

Ewe a day - Onyx Velour

Well, it’s that time of year again. A time when we are forced to review our entire flock and decide which ewes to breed to which ram. I’ve always found this to be an exciting time. I enjoy planning for the future. It’s a time to reflect on the successes and failures of the past, so that we can build on them for the future. We do believe our breeding program is heading in the right direction. There are multiple signs that we are doing some things right, even if it doesn’t seem to happen as fast as we want it to.
With that said, we want to continue the tradition of introducing our flock, and then ease into breeding groups (which will give me time to actually come up with them). Our intent was to get our flock down to 18 ewes this fall, and we accomplished that. We ended up selling a couple that we really wanted to keep, but I feel more comfortable with 18 than 20. I would feel even more comfortable with 14, but I don’t know if that’s in the cards anytime soon. Maybe.

I'll start with the adult ewes and work our way into the keeper lambs.

Sheltering Pines Onyx Velour

She’s three this fall and still looking very nice. She’s nicely built for a Shetland, and her fleece is quite nice. As a three year old, we’re quite happy with her micron results. She has flaws, but most of them do. The important thing is that her flaws are relatively small by my score card, and breeding her to the right ram could produce extraordinary lambs, like this year. If you look at her overall value, she has a great conformation and nice fleece for a spotted gulmoget. Onyx is a Thelonius Monk daughter, and is an F2 Dillon.

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