Moving forward...

Well, that was fun.   
My illinoissheep.com on blogger disappeared into the stratosphere, and blogger's tech support bites. I mean, they are really, really  horrible. It took me hours of work and numerous phone calls to get my URL in the process of being moved to a new host, where I can begin building my website from scratch. It's a pain in the rear, but it had to be done. Yahoo was no longer working on any updates for Pagebuilder and they gave me the impression that it is soon to be obsolete. Since my site had been built on Pagebuilder, the pages had been failing to update for some time now. It was time to move.  
   My blog also fell off the face of the earth as well with the attempted transition? But I managed to get it back up again just recently by screwing around with the settings. I'm missing some photos, but I have everything backed up on disks.

   Sheep are doing great. My new Katahdins are filling our nicely on forage alone. I'll be ram shopping over the summer. Many of the Kat breeders are lambing in January and I'm being teased with photos of furry little lambs in so many colors.
   The Shetlands are doing great. I sold a bred ewe (Lil'Country BeeSting), Bug went back home in one piece, and I had a nice visit with Kelly Bartels and had the opportunity to visit with her fine flock of exceptional Shetlands.

    I really like my new Sydell feeder that I picked up at Jefferson, and I'm definetely going to add a few more. Much less waste.

   So I just wanted to touch base and let everyone know that all is well, and good things will be coming to Little Country Acres in 2012!

Shelteringpines Bug is here!!

We at Little Country Acres received a treat yesterday, as Bug arrived to service my Shetland ewes. Thank you Kelly Bartels of Ok Acres, WI for allowing me to borrow this gorgeous polled ram! He was very well worth the wait.   

 Bug's breeding groups consists of Twilight and her twin sister Victoria, their dame Cleopatra, and Shamu, Ava Adore, Alberta, and Bar. Bug quickly covered Shamu right away, so maybe she'll go first next year. There will be some exciting lambs here next May, hopefully a mini-Bug that I can retain as a flock sire here.

 Here is my home grown crossing sire. He is by Punch, our Suffolk ram from Mark Lelli's Muleflock.  

 "Bonnie the Mule" is on the left, she is our crossing ram's dame. Bonnie is by purebred BFL Shelteringpines Nightwatch, a natural colored BFL ram. Lambchop, a purebred Cheviot, is on the right and she is Bonnie's dame. They are being bred back to the crossing ram.  

 Rear view of the crossing ram. Nice little "hams". Hope to get some nice little market lambs by him, and some nice sized ewe lambs to retain.  

I am not breeding any ewe lambs this year. So they, including my four Katahdin ewe lambs, get to stay in the barn for 3 weeks where there will be less chance of an accidental breeding through the fence. North Winds Netty, who will be 11 next spring, gets to babysit and enjoy her retirement. Let the countdown to May lambs begin!

Taking a little break.

Until further notice, I will not be registering any more Shetlands.
I am planning on taking at least a year off of NASSA membership. I will be building my meat flock and playing with my Katahdins.
If you'd like a registered Shetland, you might want to buy before Dec. 31st. I have some rams available, may be willing to part with a ewe or two as well.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!

Sheep photos

    I know I haven't been blogging very much lately, sorry about that! Mostly, I've been using our farm page on Facebook since I spend more time over there. If you haven't already, please "like" our page on Facebook for more frequent updates on what is going on at Little Country Acres. There is a direct link to it on the home page of my website at www.illinoissheep.com

    I can't add too much more than what has already been said about the Jefferson show. As you can see, my ram Windy Acres Hickory, bred by Carol Bator, did very well, placing second in Mature Ram class. I am not a big show person, but I'm so very glad that I turned out to show support for Kate Sharp, Alan Hill, and my fellow breeders who worked hard to get them here. I absorbed a lot of information from them to help make me a better breeder, and I am comfortable knowing that my farm, and many others, are on the right path to preserve the Shetland here in North America. And personally, I am through with entrusting my sheep to the scrutiny of the average North American livestock judge who has cut his teeth on big white commercial sheep. We have something unique, I want to be a part of doing what is right and preserve them. 

     This is Lil'Country Bee Sting, (Fox Meadow Sheamus X Lil'Country BabyBee). I had planned on showing her in ewe lamb class, but she is as wild as a march hare and frankly I got tired of trying to halter break her. So she stayed home. (shrug)

 Lil'Country Victoria, yearling Shetland ewe. (Sommerang Eragon X Lil'Country Cleopatra).

                            Lil'Country Cleopatra (Bluff Country Kokomo X Justalit'l Lacey) Cleo is the dame of both Victoria and Twilight, my spotted twin girls who hopefully carry polled.

               Lil'Country Tanjo & Fun Luv, 2 year old moorit gulmoget ewes who are by Windy Acres Hickory and out of Shelteringpines Niobe.

                                                            Another shot of Bee Sting.

  I LOVE these two twin spotted ewe lambs by Whispering Pines Saturday Night, out of Lil'Country Shamu. Little concrete block bodies on them.

 Lil'Country Ava Adore, yearling spotted ewe by Sommerang Eragon, out of Shelteringpines Arabesque. I bred Ava last year, which I usually don't do (bred ewe lambs), she gave me a lovely black spotted ewe lamb, who is a friendly little bugger, featured below.

I still haven't named any of my keeper ewe lambs yet, guess I should get on that. :)

 Suffolk X Shetland cross wether, who will be butchered in November for one of my repeat lamb meat customers. Not thrilled with the growth on the crosses using a Shetland as a crossing dame. I cannot meet up with the demand for lamb, and so we have added.....

Katahdins!! Why Katahdins? For one thing, I think they're cool. Not only are they another attractive breed with their colors & spots, but this particular flock is 100% forage based, no grain. Their breed association, while they do have a breed standard, is a no drama association from what I can tell. Phenotype is less important than the performance and health of the individual sheep. Does the sheep shed, and how much do they weigh at 90 & 120 days? Upgrading through crossing is allowed. And most importantly, they are parasite resistant. These particular lambs were dewormed once, and they are sleek and have bright red eye membranes. I have been on a waiting list for over a year for these four registered ewe lambs. There is a lot of demand for them. I really like them.