Shearing, Day 2

We sheared Cocoa today and I was so disappointed with how it went that I almost decided not to post about it. But I decided it wouldn't be fair to leave out the negatives of our experiences here. So, I will tell you about our job today. This is Cocoa before we sheared her. She's such a beautiful sheep, and really pretty well mannered even though she is shy.

Now "they" say that you approach the sheep on a certain side, grab hold of the shoulder and the rump and use your leg as you lift to flip the sheep on his or her rear end. They also say that once the sheep's feet are off the ground, he or she will not struggle. THEY LIE and don't believe a word of it! Maybe this is how it works for professional men and their professional helpers (handling docile and trained sheep), but here it was just me and the older kids, and it didn't work that easily at all! We laid out a tarp on a relatively clean spot of their pen, but before the job was a quarter of the way through Cocoa had kicked and struggled her way off the tarp and onto the ground into the straw, wet grass, and "berries" a.k.a. poop... For some reason instead of coming off in one nice fleece, her wool came apart in chunks. I'm not sure if maybe I was pulling it too hard in rolling it back out of the way, or maybe it was just that the quality of her wool wasn't as nice as I thought it would be. Here's a picture of us about done with the first side.

For shearing I used a good, sharp pair of material scissors. These have proven easier for me to handle than the design of the traditional shears which look like the cliched medieval torture device and feel about like that when they are making your hands cramp up! The actual shearing is accomplished by taking small snips with the scissors, cutting the hair one tiny row or section at a time. The hair rolls back away from the skin, usually in one piece although as I mentioned that's not how it worked for me today. It is so luxurious to run your hands over their freshly sheared areas! The lanolin really does wonders for your skin, and the sheep are so very warm and soft! I personally even think they smell good, but I guess that's a matter of opinion. I only cut her once, and almost nicked her another time, which is really pretty good. I feel bad about cutting them, though. It has to be frightening enough to be tackled like that, but then to have your body shaved and get cut in the process just adds injury to insult!

The end result is a bag of about two pounds of wool and a sheep that looks like this:

It's really rather comical, isn't it? Like a wet cat, LOL! She even has a smug little look on her face- I think she is wishing she could have kicked me one more time while she had the chance. Ha, ha! I didn't trim nearly close enough under her neck, so it is hair that's hanging there. It was very difficult for me to see where her hair ended and her skin began in that area! I'd rather leave some wool and not cut them, personally.

Now, you may be wondering why I felt disappointed about the job. Well, first, what you cannot see in the above picture is a small patch on her back that I somehow missed altogether. I tried to cut that off while she was eating her after-shearing treat, but didn't quite get it all. Also, I was really expected the fleece to come away properly and not end up in pieces. I think it will still be usable, but maybe not sale quality like I was hoping for. Oh, well...

I also found out that I am not in very good shape; I am so sore! On account of that I decided Spot will have to wait another day. Instead of shearing him, we worked on cleaning the garage. Trust me, it was easier!

One other thing I did yesterday evening was put together some scrap lumber to make next boxes for the chickens. I was rather proud of my achievement. My neighbor came over, took a look at it, and offered to put together another one for me. LOL! I should be thankful for these humbling experiences that teach me I'm not all I think I am!