Jest Another Day in Pear-A-Dice - Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm in Alberta

[perchie.girl]

boy I bet they are glad to get rid of their winter coat....

deb

 

[drumstick diva]

That's cool Tara. It looks like you removed an entire sheep, from the sheep ,when you sheared. I expected the shearings to stand up and walk away. Spooky.

 

[drumstick diva]

What does it take to get the fleece clean ? Must be quite a job.

 

[perchie.girl]

What does it take to get the fleece clean ? Must be quite a job.

http://www.tengoodsheep.com/tutorial.html

this was the first one I read on washing wool... I just did a string search.... Listed key words like "cleaning fleece shorn from sheep" and it was the result at the top of the page.

I do know there are a couple of things you can do with wool. Bot take clean wool.... die it and spin it... or spin it and die it.... dont know which order its done. then use it for knitting crocheting or weaving.....

You can also make it into felt... either the kind used for hats. or the kind where you use needles to creat shapes and artisitc forms.

deb

 

[CanuckBock]

boy I bet they are glad to get rid of their winter coat....

deb

Not shook off winter till like this coming week. We got huge heat in May, wretched temperatures...me hate that, can't work in the heat...hate it. But oldtimers say, we get a hot May, we get a cold, wet June and that was the case. I even had myself questioning if I was missing an opportunity to plant and get a jump on the growing season because I listened to my MIL...no plantings out and about until AFTER June 1st...but ten days later, the ground was white like winter...so me being cautious and careful has paid off in huge amounts.

If'n I had sheared the sheep any earlier than I did (which there is like this window of a week when everything needs doing...from plantings out to shearing done...you know, hurry up and wait and then it explodes with everything screaming needing doing at once!)...the sheeps with wool, the Jacobs, would had to endure four days of killer frost (not killer of sheeps but uncomfortable even IN their comfort of their barns with oat straw bedding). I have in the past coated my sheep...the rams that we use to use as draft for the Bighorn parade...those were shorn in May for the longweekend then in May. Cruel to run sheep pulling wagon in winter fleeces...besides, the trimming and the harnesses I braided up are so much nicer to see with short wool (never did clip close, always left the rams with some coverage when in the parade). Working draft animals require maintenance and I would coat them after and even up to the time the parade started (over their harnesses).

I regularly shear the sheep in the middle of June to end of June. That is the prime time here for fleeces to be gone. Keeping in mind...a full wool coat is insulation...so for heat and cold, it moderates their internal temperatures against extremes of temperature...both in COLD and HOT. People have to realize that a fully coated sheep in summer does stay cooler than a shorn one. As the same applies in winter to a full fleece, keeps them hotter in winter.

I personally am glad to see their winter fiber gone. Get on the grow of a new one and because we have use for the wool, we want to harvest that replenishable supply. If you let the wool length, the staple get too long, fiber mills cannot use it. Handspinners can but even carding it, the machinery and not the hand carders (maybe even those would fail, dunno) have length limitations. People with fiber goats like Angoras, they harvest fleece twice a year. The goat's fleece grows so quickly, the harvest twice to keep the length down. The long length gets gummed up in all the automated machinery used to make wool, clean and process it for industry. Does that sorta make sense on why we harvest wool in a timely fashion.

Reasons in animal wealth fare for shearing...does mention overheating too...we don't have fly strike issues here...never seen it but not tempted fate on it either...yuck!

That's cool Tara. It looks like you removed an entire sheep, from the sheep ,when you sheared. I expected the shearings to stand up and walk away. Spooky.

I never looked at this spooky...I love to shear my sheeps...always round about the time I am off for the summer and we have our precious moments...they get shorn, I bag up another fleece, they run off looking ever so kewl...love, love, love and joy. Standing there admiring the big fleece, seeing what they were able to make because we have the right conditions for them to excel and supply a superior product...just a huge reward...like an egg so precious, nestled IN your hand...the bonus part of animal husbandry. I find nothing negative to the endeavour at all but I guess I am in the thick of it.

There is a groove I get into...shearing sheeps. When I was younger and had less on the go, I'd even bath the sheep prior to shearing. Less hard on the equipment, clean fleece plus I could not help but laugh as the sheep shake just like wet dogs do.

I get into this groove where I am in the midst of taking off the fleece in a kind and efficient manner, some pro shearers have been know to lop off sheep parts...teats and such and gouge and cut the sheep. Plus the call in shearer has come from other flocks, so you risk exposure to all sorts of communicatable disorders and external parasite infestations (lice and keds don't live long on a human BUT can and DO hitch a ride if the person is at a new location and flock every day) when they come visit to clip the sheep. There is also booking a shearer...again, everyone wants them all at one time...shearing sheep is a window of time when it is prime PLUS it is dang hard work and so many humans now don't want to pursue a profession that labour intensive...they either love the job or they would do something way easier to earn their pay. I have never had so many sheep to be shorn to entice a shearer (max was 27 ruminants tops)...so I learned to do it myself thru trial and error and doing it because I figured it benefitted us in huge ways--biosecure, take MY time, enjoy the process, reap the benefits of the brags "I learned how AND did this on my own!" Hilariously, some shearers will refuse to shear horned sheep too. Makes me grin as I just work around the horns, and actually find they are a handle (careful as young ones will often fight so hard they can tear off a horn and then bleed all over the place...ghastly!). Men shearers, I am told don't like where the HORNS end up being...makes me giggle...hee hee...me, I miss the horns in the Dorpers and crosses...so useful to be able to use that as a vantage point when I handle them...HANDLE = HORNS!

What does it take to get the fleece clean ? Must be quite a job.

Super simple. You shear careful to avoid second cuts. You never toss feed on their backs...I avoid feeding noxious things like Timothy (the seed heads have a way of working down into the fiber like a mini lint brush...can't avoid all Timothy but I certainly don't order it up in the feed or seed it to pasture).

You toss the fleece on a sorting table (simply a square made wired or wood slatted table top that allows vegetable matter and other non-wool items to fall thru), take off the tags (I shear the bellies off and remove that area so it does not contaminate the good wool) and skirt the soiled edges off...you can use wool like this for gardening as a mulch. When I sheared my Jacobs for the first time, they were kept unwell and fulla sheep lice & keds...so I took the entire clip and mulched with it. Treated the sheep for lice/keds (nasty noxious things) and never looked back at that easily avoided nasty again.

You avoid felting by not having the three components...that make felting...of wool.

http://www.tengoodsheep.com/tutorial.html

this was the first one I read on washing wool... I just did a string search.... Listed key words like "cleaning fleece shorn from sheep" and it was the result at the top of the page.

I do know there are a couple of things you can do with wool. Bot take clean wool.... die it and spin it... or spin it and die it.... dont know which order its done. then use it for knitting crocheting or weaving.....

You can also make it into felt... either the kind used for hats. or the kind where you use needles to creat shapes and artisitc forms.

deb

Ah yes...here is my other thread on what I am to do with the EIGHT HUNDRED POUNDS of Jacob wool I currently posses...and more every year... DD should remember, she even posted to this thread of mine...

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/1075978/counting-sheep-gonna-wanna-sleep-bedroom-by-moi-critters

There are even links to soap calculators...yeh, really...what to do if you capture the lanolin off the wool (Jacobs are not huge producers of this grease). Wool is a natural dust mite preventer and moisture repellant...natural fire retarder...strong, etc. etc... I could rave on and on but read the thread if'n yer interested...

The pdf file of how to make yer own wool mattress is delish...I loved this little side adventure I did end of January...now to find the time and energy...har har...

Anyway speaking of time and energy...too much chatting and I need to get gone again...

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[drumstick diva]

I followed Perchie's link also re: cleaning fleece, etc. Much too labor intensive for moi. Thanks Perchie.

 

[perchie.girl]

I followed Perchie's link also re: cleaning fleece, etc. Much too labor intensive for moi. Thanks Perchie.

I believe Tara takes it to a company that does this for her... In my mind well worth the cost dont you think?

 

[CanuckBock]

I followed Perchie's link also re: cleaning fleece, etc. Much too labor intensive for moi. Thanks Perchie.

Tut tut tut DD...I looked at this person's fiber and it is not as clean as ours are...or the same breed (Jacobs have very little lanolin/grease in their fiber...why the are such a premium choice for handspinners AND their meat is suppose to be very UNsheepy because of that) or the same conditions...we have a park like property...even when the sheep are done grazing an area, Rick goes in and MOWS it all down...getting rid of seed heads and cutting the grass to one length so it is ALL palatable. Park sheep...indeed...like they live in a pristine manicured PARK.

My Jacob mowers in the bird yard..."Hmmm....hear the roar of the mowers?" ​

This is a fleece off of Lilac ram Regis...from 2008...

The yellowing is lanolin...you put some hot water to that and she's gone...gone good!​

I have binders fulla fiber samples packed up...I'd take clicks if they were accessible but this is summer time, not winter and I have pressing tasks of multiples to see to. I have samples of newborns, each year I have samples on my Jacobs...some washed beside not washed...etc. I adore wool, fiber and the research and studying of it. I'm weird in that way I guess.


Oh well...by taking care to start, you don't need to work that hard at the end of the processing to get a CLEAN fleece.

You skirt it, you never throw feed on their backs, you feed good quality feed, you house appropriate, you run your sheeps on manicured property...yada yada and you end up with this...

UNWASHED...wish you could feel the softy-ness of this sample!​

Can yah SEE the luster even in this UNWASHED Jacob fiber?

You skirt out the soiled parts...gonna be those...you use that for stuff like mulch and you reap what you sow...we take GREAT care of our sheeps...and they reward us for our efforts.

I cannot STAND people's personnas that somehow sheep are dirty. Har har...not ours. Others might keep any creature in poor conditions, and that be that.

I remember once getting some "sheep creep" and I had told the person, I wanted UNmedicated. I was in a hurry, grabbed the bag, got home and it was medicated. Sheesh...I went back and the person told me that "I had to have medication IN my creep, because sheep are dirty." Not mine, give me my money back and I made up my own...whole grains, some molasses and some soy meal...easy peasy. Sheep are dirty...yeh, OK...yers might be, ours aren't...sheesh.

Time, time to wash a fleece...try taking a raw fleece right off the sheep and working that. There are many places (do a search on "sheep to shawl") that give sheepy demos...especially this time of year...so you shear off the fleece and hand it over to a team of like four OLD and I mean that...OLD persons that card it (get the fibers to lay straight so it can be), ply it into yarn and then woven to a shawl...magnificent and inspiring. Not see one yet but some day, eh.



http://www.royalfair.org/sheep-shawl-competition:

"I like sheeps...quit messing about and let's go see those sheeps..."​

I have to segregate the unshorn from shorn sheeps...until the full fleeced or the non-fleeced ones SMELL each other and know that whilst they L00K different (after I shear them), they are the one and same flock member.


They even smell MOI...I hurried one evening, was going to town with Hero for dinner and ran down to Sheep Dip Inn to shut door...I got the whole flock smelling the air...smelling the air as to "Who is that?" "Can't be our keeper...this ones much too nice looking to be her...!" "No rags and tags, but suited up and smelling...what...is that CLEAN?"

Sheep use scent just like dogs smell...to detect danger, to determine who is who...to know where others are, to bond with babes, to know who is breed worthy, who is ill, what is good to eat, drink, is this our mineral/salt combo, etc...



Quote:
Not just between batches would I have lost wool to that processing (big place, and many wait an entire year to get their fiber back), my SIL that went with us noted that they were paying jest a little too much interest in the quality of my fleeces. I brought several samples with me and Jacob is hard to come by let alone the type we have would be next to impossible to source if it even exists...we don't get cobwebs of fleece like Jacobs down in the Southern States do, we get huge thick amounts of fiber off ours (we feed exceptionally well and it shows in the wool the Jacobs produce) and whole things like luster, crimp, handle, softness, superior length, tensile strengths....etc, etc, etc... My SIL freaked and told me, "No way do I want to take MY fiber to a mill!," as she figures I'd not get all MY fiber back with some parts like the best sections removed off the fleeces before they even hit the processing plant. I get that you lose some in processing but the end decision I made was I would use my fiber for my mattress anyway. Not even sure I got enough for that project, so why sell socks when it appears I can use it all myself and benefit from it that way--a $15,000 mattress I know is healthful is an awesome return on investment in our Jacobs.

With our Jacob fiber, you take a small piece, you stick it say on your bra strap and you can't notice it is there...so soft, so wonderful...like a cloud. There are lots of types of wool and all wool has a use, even the ugly make you itch, that kind makes great carpet wool. The fiber we have is so soft like a cloud, it is all the next to your skin kind wool project destined. My vet who did the eye surgery on Rex said he knew I would have clean healthful animals, but he says he near fell asleep working on Rex's eyelid notches...so soft and dreamy touching his wool. Made me and the techs laugh....

Nope, no way I am shelfing out my fleeces to a mill for processing. Like knowing where my animals have been exposed to and things like knowing what they eat. No noxious conditions, no noxious exposure, no mix ups of my product, no shortages, no unknowns from someone harvesting the best parts. I can use a pure good for you soap or just plain hot water to remove the lanolin in the fleeces. Easy peasy and I will know all my fleeces start and end up in my hands Kinda like why I begin from nothing to the resulting end processing of our own meat and veg/fruits here. Never because we save money...we spend ever so much more but we get the bestest premium products and know a goodness beyond just feeding our faces or using products our animals give us. We all leave this world a better place by caring for our critters ourselves and making the products, ourselves. Not because we save resources doing this (way more expensive to do than factory farms or industrial enterprises who have bottom lines concerned about profits), we work harder with bigger costs at it but what is doing good worth in reality past mere monetary amounts? I know you well know all about this.

I know what happens in the entire process and nothing is left to chance or guessing because "I" was there for the whole process. I think we the people can do ourselves a huge favour by doing it ourselves...then we know the care because WE DID IT, start to finish. Besides, pride in doing it yourself the whole kitten kabootle...makes you feel good about yourself in so many ways.

Self-sufficiency...at its finest because we had our hands on it.

Anywhoo...got way loads of work to go get back to...

is done...

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[perchie.girl]

I made an assumption based on the company you were talking about....

 

[CanuckBock]

Heel low:

I made an assumption based on the company you were talking about....

No worries...I was hoping for healthful granny knitted socks I could sell but not meant to be.

​

June 27, last day the four robin babes were in their nest...fly time, be free!

Saw them last night out with parents and see them flitting about the Man Porch this morn...ever so kewl. Be fun to see them when they discover the Rowanberry fruit...come this fall before the group migrates to warmer digs for the winter.

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Taking clicks of all the flowers...these are wild roses by the fence between the human yard and the bird yard...when I spy a dog that thinks it is a DUCK...or at least has the same rights as the ducks...treat it like a duck...yeh, sure Emmest...are you really wishing for a transformation?

"Ah...are you on the wrong side of the gate...Are you dog or duck?"



"Sign says DUCK crossing...you don't smell like a duck?"



"QUACK QUACK?" Lacy can't even bear to see Emmy...she is so ashamed...
QUACK? Really...

Monday morning after my bus run...sit in the Man Porch with the dogs sipping a java...before deciding what was on the agenda fur the day, eh.

Lacy playing with soft plushy toy...TOSS and RETRIEVE...
She loves toys the same colour as her...
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Part of Porch Time is to sit on me...me or the furniture...make me black and blue and dog hair up the cushions! ​

Y'all KNOW there are like five plushy toys jest like this one they are creating mischief over...right?

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"I" don't get to decide when coffee time is over...that decision is always made FOR me by the dogs.

"Fine...<<GULP>>...coffee cup is empty...out of the Man Porch we must go...!!" ​

Shenanigans begin...Fine...break time is over...or BREAK time becomes just that...wreck something with romping dogettes... "Who let the dogs out...I hafta...and quick like."

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I think my fav plant this year in the Man Porch, is this potted pink petalled strawberry...ever few days so far, one ripens and I divide it up between the girl dogs...fun times.

Now recall my shock and outrage that ONE small Hosta in the city was priced at like $32,,,so here is what you can get in the country if you are patient...wait, watch, and seize the day, eh....so too think of the future in the case of perennial plants that thrive in our climate...

Carpe Diem...​

Sunday evening, Rick takes me to Crappy Tire and there they are...Hostas...half price...

$8.49 each and healthy...oh my!
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So in my cart is like just over $34 worth and there are FOUR Hostas...and three times the size of the one in the city. Only complaint...I am paying for the plants and the cashier is whining...young girl and looks less than pleased she has a job...oh well...should be thankful I figure...comment that gets me goat. "I can't wait till all these plants DIE!" Not that she can't wait for her shift to end or they get all bought up at 50% off...but that she wants these living things to DIE! Yeh...I guess the dirt on her counter was her issue and she didn't like sweeping up after the dirt...Icrumba...no matter. I whisked these suckers outta there...happy like no tomorrow to rescue them and give them a new life where we try to keep them alive--not dead. Last Hostas I purchased have lived here happily for near two decades. Whatever...

Mix of new and old hostas...beauty in the shade!​

New home for the hostas...three here, and one behind the garage where Rick and I sit waiting for the pond area to get shaded up...

Lush and GREEN...pretty eye candy ​

I guess Monday was plant day.

June 27 2016 - Ring around the posies...​

They had a planned power outage from 9:30 to 11 that lasted to 12:30, but the girl dogs and I went out to the New Orchard to putter so I did not truly notice the outage lasted longer than planned.

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I figure mulching before the summer heat really comes on is a good plan...got busy and did not click a close up pic of the herb bed mulched but will get to that soon enough I suppose...

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Day prior I had hauled over three pails of small lengthed oat straw for mulching...got all strawberry bins and raspberry and blackberry mulched with straw and brought another three pails to do the herb garden. Jest the corner done in the piccy above.

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Put up some tomato cages in the greenhouse...gonna use one cage for every two plants...

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Just not gonna have the physical room for each tomat to have its own cage...done this in the past and it seems to work well...as long as the supports are there, tomatoes can grow and head for the skies.

Hauled in more tomato cages...recall the time Makins as a youngster came bounding down the hill by the Veg Garden and up and landed right inside a tomato cage I had used to surround one of the fruit trees so it did not get mowed under when Rick was making his rounds in the ride 'em mower... I thought to myself, dangerous thing, these tomato cages...had to haul Makins outta the wire...she leaped in and remained perfectly still...so I could go rescue her, no worse for wear...just having ME scared...what troubles can a dog get into next? Poke in the eye?

Eeeek....

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Tossed these over my fence so I could retrieve them immediately (no "Oh my eye!!!" renditions thanks!) and transport this to the greenhouse...I see cages are still running about a buck a piece...in some places the coloured up huge ones are like six bucks. I like the looks of them expensive ones but to do 100 plants at even half the rate of caging...not in my budget, eh. LOL

Whoo...heavy load, more like precarious load...might cage me a mutt dog...in the bloomin' EYE!

Grinning because yup, I hauled these from when we lived on the WEsT Coast...some 30-35 years ago... So tomatoes are turning out to be major fun. Like thirty varieties to experiment with...100 plants to give it a good go on. Had all the necessary equipment...bought peat pots, got all the black pots for transplant from over the years, have the cages...yeh. Kinda fun to reuse what you got and have it all matching and decent shape. Makes me happy to be able to play and not have to pay all at once to begin it again.


So whilst awaiting the power to come back on...I raked and cleaned up the New Orchard...noted some loco weed was flowering in the New Orchard grasses...pretty but toxic to ruminants and a constant battle to keep them outta our place...I see the ditches are heavily infested up the road a ways...blah, eh.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locoweed:

Charles, Jun 8 2012​

I was clicking pics of some I had rooted up and my Buff Chanty roo Charlie actually NIPPed a leaf! He lived to be like 5 or 6 years old but never seemed to suffer from that near miss...dang roo make me afraid...

Girls resting in the shade of the greenhouse...No Emmy still does not smell like a DUCK!

It was a very fun day Monday...planting, getting good layer of dirt under the fingee nails. Good for the soul, playing in the dirt and seeing the tidy tidy getting completed...

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I found it interesting...the Honeyberry we originally had for years never produced fruit...found out they need a pollinator and bought several over the past few years.

This is the pollinator and yes, those are berries on it!​

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I see there is a U-Pick Honey berry place down the road...what I have found is the berries on this particular plant are terrible...very soapy and sour...but read you gotta wait or...

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So I guess while the one place is asking for people to pick berries, they may have different type of Russian Haskap (Lonicera caerulea) than we do...or they are sour berries too...hee hee...

Gonna wait and see if time fixes the sourness...er not!

Hmm...did a quick search and found this...

http://www.fruit.usask.ca/haskap.html:

Hmmm...so the first one we got, obviously is this a TONIC WATER one...gonna have to sample all the plants we have...got quite a few now (ten or so??)...and see if any taste like the name'sake....hee hee...serves me right for getting on the band wagon so quick. Haskap...first ones were obviously an experiment and I got duped...hee hee...

View at the school front doors​

What I don't find enjoyable is this place across the street from the school...yeh, an elementary and high school and this thing is parked in plain view...

Really and you figure this would make you hireable...really?​

What can you say but yeh...

So part of summer time for me is getting my electranetting strands out...
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Grazing the sheeps but protecting the plants from uh, well the grazing sheeps. LMBO

What I wanted to do was expose the hair sheep to the ele netting in a controlled area before even thinking about using the netting to contain them. Respecting an electric fence is a "taught" behaviour and each sheep, as silly as it sounds and mean to a point...they must learn to know not to get near the fence. A small zap once and the sheep then know to respect it...I use it to keep them contained but moreso to ZAP a maurading predator or stray dog...a life and death situation to keep the sheep from being predated.

Here above is the hair sheep grazing next to the elenetting that is protecting the caragana shelterbelts I planted.

This is Melissa and see how she is shedding out her coat! ​

I pulled this area off her back and shoulders last night and brought back a chunk...

Chunk taken off yesterday...the yellow is the lanolin...​

I'll take pics of it compared to the Jacob fleece (Nix's I need to haul out and dry off...got caught in that thunderstorm & waiting for a nice bright sunny day to dry it out before storage). For now, see the yeller tinge to her fibre from her back...that is the lanolin...the sheep grease... Keep in mind that the Dorper was created from the Horned DORset sheep ... a woolled breed and it would have lanolin, more than the Jacobs do. The YELLOW is the grease that washes out in hot water and is the stuff that is great for human skin...an oil product extrodinaire.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lanolin:
Lanolin (from Latin lāna, ‘wool’, and oleum, ‘oil’), also called wool wax or wool grease, is a wax secreted by the sebaceous glands of wool-bearing animals. Lanolin used by humans comes from domestic sheep breeds that are raised specifically for their wool. Historically, many pharmacopoeias have referred to lanolin as wool fat (adeps lanae); however, as lanolin lacks glycerides (glycerol esters), it is not a true fat. Lanolin primarily consists of sterol esters instead. Lanolin's waterproofing property aids sheep in shedding water from their coats. Certain breeds of sheep produce large amounts of lanolin. There is an inverse correlation between fiber diameter and wool wax content.

Lanolin’s role in nature is to protect wool and skin against the ravages of climate and the environment; it also seems to play a role in skin (integumental) hygiene. Lanolin and its many derivatives are used extensively in products designed for the protection, treatment and beautification of human skin.

Here are the four geriatric Jacobs...grazing the swan, ruddy, and goose yards...and doing a GREAT job mowing...good Jacobs!

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Man am I ever spoilt with these sheeps. I merely hafta open the gate and off the four run...straight v line for their barn and the pasture. Last night, Rick had the girls in the pasture for run runs and the sheep raced off ahead of me, right past the commotion and to the barn gate...hurry up to me and get them inside for the night. Each one is halter trained and I walk up, grab a horn, put on halter and off we go, in search of greener pastures, eh. Love the old ones...don't need to teach old sheep new tricks...they got all I want outta them...grass eating, easy to catch, easy to lead out and put away at night.

And so it goes to train the new flock to be the same way. They will learn the routine and dang it all, nothing beats the luxury of a learned group of critters. But one has to teach and by the end of this summer...the new band of Ovis aries will know what is expected of them.

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So on my to do list...click pic of mulched in herb bed (plants have near doubled in size now!)...click pic of Jacob fiber compared to Dorper fiber. Amongst lots of other friviolous and frolicking SUMMER time thing a ding dongs...yee haw...and slop the chooks, eh. AWAY!

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada