Michigan Thread - all are welcome!

Busy, busy weekend here. I sheared my sheep. This was the first time shearing in the stand with the electric clippers (last year was by hand with hand shears). I'm still learning and hope to be almost as good as a professional some day (I need to find someone with a flock, who wants free shearing, who doesn't care what they look like after shearing, to practice on - lol). Their wool is so thick that getting down near the skin is really hard work. The electric shears cut like butter near the surface but in the thick of it, they struggle to get through. The hardest thing is having the strength to wrestle a sheep and then manage the weight of the vibrating shears while just coming out of such a hard winter (I admit to being a lump inside most of the time). You really need to be in shape and I was not in shape. So I'm a little sore today, but more sore from boiling sap actually, than wrestling sheep (all that bending over the fire for a day). Good spinning wool though! Nice staple length this year, about 5", 6" in spots. Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full!

Tartan requires a caption. He's saying something but I don't know what. Probably something about the indignity of his owners leaving that top knot on his head, the nick on his right leg, or maybe something about the girls head butting.



We also finished boiling the rest of the maple sap. No more! LOL. We ended up with 15 quarts total (not including what we've already eaten), the earlier batches of which may be on the thin side but oh well. Still, we got 5 quarts out of yesterday's batch that was DARK and THICK and RICH and I LOVE IT and I'm NOT SELLING it.
droolin.gif
It's mine.



Our egg sales have been abysmal as well. I have probably 12 dozen eggs in the fridge. Last year I donated to a food pantry. I'm thinking it's time to consider doing that again. It's a pain though because they don't want the green and blue eggs (they have to look like they came from the grocery store, even in grocery store containers). Maybe I could find a more lenient food pantry though?
 
Last edited:
Busy, busy weekend here. I sheared my sheep. This was the first time shearing in the stand with the electric clippers (last year was by hand with hand shears). I'm still learning and hope to be almost as good as a professional some day (I need to find someone with a flock, who wants free shearing, who doesn't care what they look like after shearing, to practice on - lol). Their wool is so thick that getting down near the skin is really hard work. The electric shears cut like butter near the surface but in the thick of it, they struggle to get through. The hardest thing is having the strength to wrestle a sheep and then manage the weight of the vibrating shears while just coming out of such a hard winter (I admit to being a lump inside most of the time). You really need to be in shape and I was not in shape. So I'm a little sore today, but more sore from boiling sap actually, than wrestling sheep (all that bending over the fire for a day). Good spinning wool though! Nice staple length this year, about 5", 6" in spots. Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full!

Tartan requires a caption. He's saying something but I don't know what. Probably something about the indignity of his owners leaving that top knot on his head, the nick on his right leg, or maybe something about the girls head butting.



We also finished boiling the rest of the maple sap. No more! LOL. We ended up with 15 quarts total (not including what we've already eaten), the earlier batches of which may be on the thin side but oh well. Still, we got 5 quarts out of yesterday's batch that was DARK and THICK and RICH and I LOVE IT and I'm NOT SELLING it.
droolin.gif
It's mine.



Our egg sales have been abysmal as well. I have probably 12 dozen eggs in the fridge. Last year I donated to a food pantry. I'm thinking it's time to consider doing that again. It's a pain though because they don't want the green and blue eggs (they have to look like they came from the grocery store, even in grocery store containers). Maybe I could find a more lenient food pantry though?

If you lived close, I'd buy your eggs! I used to have a friend that does chickens, but she stopped because of declining health, so I have been eating store bought eggs until I can get my own coop up and running.
 
If you lived close, I'd buy your eggs! I used to have a friend that does chickens, but she stopped because of declining health, so I have been eating store bought eggs until I can get my own coop up and running.
What's close? I'm in SE Kent Co., just off M50
smile.png
 



We also finished boiling the rest of the maple sap. No more! LOL. We ended up with 15 quarts total (not including what we've already eaten), the earlier batches of which may be on the thin side but oh well. Still, we got 5 quarts out of yesterday's batch that was DARK and THICK and RICH and I LOVE IT and I'm NOT SELLING it.
droolin.gif
It's mine.

What kind of sheep is that? Don't their horn usually grow towards the back?

Is your thicker darker syrup from boiling it down farther....or a later tapping? I love the rich dark stuff!
 
My ducklings are growing up so fast! We have decided that one of the 'Pekins' we got from TSC is actually a Runner duck (drat) but we will adapt. Amazingly all three seem to be female (assuming we checked correctly) and that's never happened before! The current count is 3 Pekins, 4 Khakis, 1 Runner, 1 Rouen and 2 Muscovies. We also decided we were overfeeding so all the adults are on a diet! We have a Pekin that is especially bad so she is on the extreme regimen.
sad.png


We took the plunge and ordered 12 Freedom Rangers from the local feed mill. I am hoping we don't regret doing that. I swore up and down I would never get chickens again but I think I can deal with them for the 2 1/2 months it takes to get them to butcher weight. Anybody have a good plucking method?
D.gif





 
Last edited:
I'm in Oakland County - across the state, just south of Flint.
That's not very close.
tongue.png
But you're still welcome to them!

What kind of sheep is that? Don't their horn usually grow towards the back?

Is your thicker darker syrup from boiling it down farther....or a later tapping? I love the rich dark stuff!
Jacob sheep. Their horns grow in all sorts of directions. But because growing forward like this makes living difficult, if not impossible, we had this guy castrated. Extreme growth of those horns, a secondary sex characteristic, will not occur and he will be able to eat. Normally, sheep like this one would go to the slaughter house but his wool was so incredibly fine that I couldn't see that happening and snatched him up. He's actually got a second set of horns on the side but they are very short as he keeps knocking them off on the feeder.

That's our last batch of syrup so it's the older sap.
 
You did a great job Lady... the guys who sheared mine have been doing it for 57 years and they still leave clumps and nicks behind. Luckily the Jacobs are on the smaller size! I have a deposit on a 4 horn ram lamb for October, in time to breed for babies in the spring, can't wait!
 
Does anyone in the Kent Co. area have a chicken plucker they might be willing to let us borrow this summer? I really want to do a batch of freedom rangers but DH says no without a plucker :( I would be willing to share a chicken or 2 ;)
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom