Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Meet the ewe - RiverOaks Eliza

River Oaks Eliza - S19622

AwtAa, B?Bb, SSS?, white ewe, single born 5.2.05

18.75% UK

Eliza was originally purchased to use in AI last fall. The night before the sponges were to be pulled, hers fell out, not enabling us to use her in the AI. So THIS year we have CIDRs instead of sponges and those things do NOT come out easily! She will be bred to Campaign Timothy this fall.



Eliza was purchased from her breeder, Becky Utecht for her greyling genetics. At the time I knew of very few animals with any of his line left in my neck of the woods and thought I should get her. Her fleece is around 4" in staple length, it is very soft to feel and crimpy. She's a nice bodied ewe who carried and raised twins nicely and quickly on grass alone. She has one of the largest udders I've ever seen and told Becky often that she had 'Holstein udders' on her Shetland ewes :) Obviously Becky has a great forage system!

Below is Eliza's 2009 micron. This was her fourth fleece. In my opinion you can't get much better than that! I don't for see it moving much more as she matures, but I'm sure she'll like to prove me wrong!

Thanks to Becky, these next two micron reports are from her. Below is her 2009 micron report.


Eliza's yearling micron (full lamb fleece)

I really am hoping for a cute white ewe lamb out of her, or a wonderful moorit or black ram. I just don't see many good white ewes out there (or any white ewes for that matter) and think that everyone should have at least a few white sheep on their farm!

6 comments:

Jen and Rich Johnson said...

I couldn't agree more Garrett. As you know, I looked high and low for a good white ewe. Eliza is a good one.

Rich

Becky Utecht said...

Oh Eliza, sniff, sniff. Yes, everyone needs a nice white ewe or two. I hope she does well for you with the AI this year.

Rayna said...

Same...still searching :( *sigh* Eliza's definitely a keeper! :)

Juliann said...

Beautiful ewe. I'm still looking for the perfect poll carrying white ewe.

Cait said...

What a pretty sheep! :P (And I know nothing about sheep, I just think she's pretty! I'm trying to learn, though!)

Can you recommend a good site to read about what all the micron numbers mean, and what the names of the various colors are?

Jared Lloyd said...

I know! A good white is as hard to find as a good black...

Let's see what we can find across the pond to remedy the situation!

Keep me in mind for a stylish Jamie lamb.

A long time coming!

 It has been a long time. Too long in fact. We lost access to our farm website and ebonwald website when WEBS.COM was closed by VistaPrint. ...