Sunday 18th June 2017
Sun out, fleeces off!!!
As mentioned yesterday, today we were in for a scorcher and the weather forecasters were not wrong. Temperatures were in the high twenties at the hottest part of the day and we were VERY glad that today was the day we had booked for shearing the sheep and alpacas.
First thing this morning, we got both sets of animals into the double field shelter at the top of the 3-acre: alpacas in one side and sheep in the other. This part went really well, despite the reluctance of the alpacas at being ‘ushered’ into a small space with their young cria. We moved slowly and quietly and within ten minutes had both groups penned in with water and hay, all ready for the shearers’ arrival.
Sara and Aaron of A&S Shearing and Livestock Services arrived mid-morning as planned and set to work. The alpaca shearing is hard, both for the animal and for the humans. Alpacas are NOT tactile at all and of course are a good 70-80kg in weight and as such, they have to be totally restrained in order to be sheared. We began with Saturn who screamed throughout and ended with Neptune who virtually went to sleep with his head in Sara’s lap. Jupiter acted all offended whilst Mercury and Venus looked quietly in shock. Meanwhile the two cria were hilarious: Pluto just dozed whilst his mum screamed and Mars just trotted around being really nosey! The lovely thing was, when all five adults were done, they trotted off out, the cria had a good run and then it was business as usual.
NOT so the sheep!!! Shearing them was fab, it was all soo quick, the problems came as the lambs struggled to re-recognise their ‘shorn’ mums. This can be a bit of an issue when sheep are shorn and we tried to minimize the problem by keeping sheep and lambs penned in the field shelter still until all animals were done. Nonetheless one of Mrs Brown’s ewe lambs and Bressay’s adopted Suffolk Mule cross really struggled and spent most of the rest of the afternoon bleating. This was despite being back with their mums and snuggling up to them, it just seemed as though they were not 100% sure they were in the right place!!
Fortunately by the time we sat outside to eat our evening meal, things were much quieter and calmer and we ‘think’ everything was back as it should be…
Tomorrow we get even hotter so thank goodness we removed all those fleeces today!!!
First thing this morning, we got both sets of animals into the double field shelter at the top of the 3-acre: alpacas in one side and sheep in the other. This part went really well, despite the reluctance of the alpacas at being ‘ushered’ into a small space with their young cria. We moved slowly and quietly and within ten minutes had both groups penned in with water and hay, all ready for the shearers’ arrival.
NOT so the sheep!!! Shearing them was fab, it was all soo quick, the problems came as the lambs struggled to re-recognise their ‘shorn’ mums. This can be a bit of an issue when sheep are shorn and we tried to minimize the problem by keeping sheep and lambs penned in the field shelter still until all animals were done. Nonetheless one of Mrs Brown’s ewe lambs and Bressay’s adopted Suffolk Mule cross really struggled and spent most of the rest of the afternoon bleating. This was despite being back with their mums and snuggling up to them, it just seemed as though they were not 100% sure they were in the right place!!