Shearing Day

Shearing day is one of the busiest times on the farm. Since sheep must be dry when they are shorn, we keep an eye on many weather reports that cover the days before shearing and keep them in the barn whenever there is the slightest chance of rain. Sheep are then penned in a relatively small area which makes it easier to catch them and have them ready to hand to the shearers. This is also much less stressful to the sheep. After each sheep is shorn, Carolyn works at a feverish pace to place each newly shorn fleece in a clean bag and then sweeps the shearing board so there are no bits of wool left which might be worked into the next fleece. This is no small set of tasks given that there are two shearers who are very skilled and who take very little time to shear each sheep. Our shearers, Jim McRae and Liz Willis are two of the very best. As a team they shear thousands of sheep in New England each year. The result of their skill are fleeces that come off the sheep in one piece, with most of the soiled parts (bellie wool, etc.) thrown out and few, if any, second cuts. Jim and Liz live in Pittsford, VT just north of Rutland but travel all over the area shearing. We highly recommend them to anyone looking for an excellent pair of shearers. You can reach Jim at 802-483-9357 or email him at vtcamwks@comcast.net (Jim also owns a camera repair business if you need that type of work done).

 Jim shearing one of our white ewes

 

Liz shearing and clipping hooves

After the shearers have departed we spend many hours laying the individual fleeces out on a skirting board and picking out any remaining bits of debris or unwanted parts. This is called skirting the fleece and you can read and see more about it in our section on wool.

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