KSpirit Farm Cedar's breeding group (group 3 of 6)

When Donna and I first started enabling each other a few years ago, she teased me with this horned gulmoget ram. Since most gulmogets with fine wool are polled, i was a bit skeptical over how much crimp or fineness or softness this ram would have. She sent me a sample last spring and I was really pleased with it. Well as enabling happens, she ended up getting one of my favorite ram lambs last year and it was agreed I'd get Cedar this year. We both know his horns are close (not touching) and that we would need to consider that, as well as keep back ram lambs with good horn spacing (not too wide, but not too close). I had planned on eating him after this years breeding groups, but he's pretty nice so will hold on to him to make sure we get something gulmoget with nicer horns.

There are 11 ewes in here but only 9 are mine/will be staying here.
WhitePine Des'ree is going to Iowa as a bred ewe, and GlenTam Ganymede is here to get bred. She's a knockout ewe, so honored they brought her here to be bred.

That leaves 9:

WhitePine Taconite - black gulmoget (OK Acres Cadillac x Black Forest Tilly). Throwing all my gulmoget chances to one breeding. Let's hope they produce them! She really produces.

WhitePine Ady - black light badger face (Whistlestop 1123 x FirthofFifth Ashegon). She is a great producer so whatever she throws will be nice.

WhitePine Pacena - musket - (FirthofFifth Nekomis x Owlhill Pranilla AI). She's a sweetie who also produces well.

Whistlestop 1241 "Heylor" - fawn/moorit (WS 1108 x WS 0922). constant producer of high quality modified sheep, i'm hoping for some lovely miogets or gulmogets from this.

WhitePine NinaSky AI - gray katmoget smirslet sokket (Todhill Jericho x ShelteringPines Nirvana). She's been a fantastic producer as well and so i'm hoping she'll really click with Cedar.

WhitePine Niamh - fawn (WhitePine Carver x WhitePine Neriah) is a beautiful yearling with the perfect fleece length, crimp, handle, silkiness, density. She's also friendly. Hoping she produces like her mom.

WhitePine Frigg - fawn smirslet sokket (WhitePine Carver x WhitePine Foley) is another yearling who really came in to herself this year. I'm excited to see if she'll produce some spotties or modifieds

WhitePine Kali - fawn (WhitePine Carver x WhitePine Isbister) is another beautiful yearling who really came in to her own this summer. she's a beautiful ewe and hoping for more greatness here.

WhitePine Adicia - fawn katmoget (WhitePine City High x WhitePine Aywick) is one of the typiest ewes i've had with phenominal looks and fleece from birth right on through to adulthood. I really wanted to put her in all four groups but had to make up my mind. Let's see some magic happen here too.

Overall the ewes in this group were put here for either more fleece length, more density or if nothing else, because they are great sheep and I hope for more modifieds (so I can offer them to friends who produce those colors more specifically)

In my quest to move out my moorit based sheep, Niamh, Frigg and Kali and 1241/Heylor, will be available midsummer of 2017. If you would like to put down a deposit, I would be happy to hold  them until that time for you.

1927 Standard, breed typical fleece

There seems to be a lot of misinformation in regards to just what exactly is a 1927 standard typical fleece. While it is obvious there is a spectrum of what a correct fleece could look like, they are all undoubtedly standard typical fleeces. No 1927 standard Shetland should have a dual coat. Those are considered atypical. I am extremely happy with the progress I've made in conforming to the 1927 standard, considering my original stock was not to this caliber. Every year the sheep continue to get better. Micron testing has helped for sure. And never being afraid to be wrong, but always learning, reading articles online, visiting with other breeders, visiting the UK and the Shetland islands, has all helped to cement in my mind what we are trying to preserve and protect. Which is the 1927 Standard Shetland Sheep.

Shetland Islands Day 1

On our first day of being on Shetland, we met two very important people, in the history of the Shetland Sheep breed.

The first stop, was with Hamish Hunter. He is a 3rd generation Shetland Sheep shepherd and runs the flocks of Vementry. These flocks are older than the SFBT (Shetland Flock Book Trust) and older than the 1927 standard.

The moorit flock is well over 100 years old, and the white is nearly as old. An interesting tidbid is the estate is called Vementry, in part, to the island named that is part of the estate. On this island, there are no buildings or people or electricity or roads. Just the entire white ewe flock of Shetlands. This is where the entire purebreeding of the white Shetlands is done. Hamish takes the white rams across the bay in a small fishing boat during the breeding season and collects them again with dogs after its complete. The only time the ewes are taken from the island is when they are injured, will be used for cross breeding, or sold. We were lucky enough to see the white rams and ram lambs and the photos we took I hope help show just how typey and breed standard this flock of sheep are, being maintained for well over a century.

The moorits are kept closer to the homestead and we were able to see the entire ewe flock, the adult rams and ram lambs. There were several beautifully fleeced sheep in this group of ram lambs, but Hamish wouldn't sell the ones Kate and Phillip wanted :) Hamish did have several available for the Annual Ram Sale in Lerwick, however.

The ewes used for crossbreeding are also kept on the Shetland 'Mainland'. this is to make sure that none of the white ewes are crossed by accident. Since only rams are inspected and passed for the flockbook knowing which white ram bred which white ewe isn't necessary. When Hamish told me they run 660 pure Shetland ewes, my mouth dropped. You will see that with the crofts as we go, most are run by men (or families) and are in the hundreds. They retained 44 white ewe lambs this year (so basically the cream of the cream of the crop).

Shearlings are around 45-50 kg, adult rams 50-60kg. only fed grass or haylage (different name that what we use in the States).

Hamish and his family typically roo all the rams, and keep 3 fleeces to enter in to the Annual fleece show, held the night before the Ram Sale. They have traditionally won the Champion Group of 3 White fleeces than not, in the past 25 years. They had some really really nice fine fleeces entered at the show, and we were able to see them beforehand when we had tea and biscuits up at their house after looking at the animals on foot.

Hamish and his family are top notch people. Very knowledgeable, extremely friendly and catering hosts, open to all sorts of questions and we were able to take photos of anything and everything AND take fleece samples :)

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The second stop on our journey around Shetland was with Jim Nicholson. For those of you not familiar with Jim, he has been the Secretary of the SFBT for the past 19 years. His father and uncle had crofts as well. Some of his genetics still go back to those flocks, so also back since before the 1927 standard and the SFBT creation. Jim still keeps around 280 ewes, 140 of them Shetland, with the balance NCC x Shetland ewes that are then taken to a suffolk ram for market lambs. He maybe has 20 colored Shetlands with the rest whites.

Jim has found his shetland-cheviot crosses to lamb at 140%, his suffolk x NCC/Shetland 170%.

Jim was extremely helpful in telling us about the SFBT and its beginnings and some information and history on the association, the crofters on the islands and more. I will be blogging about that in a separate post.