I need to decide what to do with him now - clearly if he over-winters, we'll have another chance in the summer, but then he'll be a shearling rather than having nice soft lambswool. Any thoughts?
If you let him regrow for about a month after shearing, the length will be ideal for a baby’s rug. Checkout the prices; these rugs fetch even more than the longer ones.
And, IMO, it’s a myth that lambswool is necessarily softer or more wonderful than a fleece after shearings. And I speak as a spinner of fleece with a
lot of fleeces under my belt.
What I observe is the following :
- first fleece (or skin) is often soft but also can have brittle tips, or tips that are hard to clean, depending on what sort of a start in life the lamb had.
- the first sheared fleece quite often has a break in it. This can be due to the lamb finding its first winter hard, or can be because the sheepkeeper doesn’t get to shearing the hoggs early enough - they’ve been growing their first fleece longer than the older sheep, and are usually ready a while before older sheep, especially if the older sheep are ewes rearing lambs.
- a ewe’s first fleece after having lambs is often pretty awful. She will have put a lot into growing, birthing and rearing her lambs, and the first thing to suffer is her fleece.
- in subsequent years, many ewes balance their workload better and may have wonderful fleeces as they get older. Some of the very best fleeces I’ve had have been from ewes after their 3rd or 4th crop of lambs.
- evil winter weather can make for fabulous fleeces next summer, provided the sheep had plenty of nutrients to get them through the winter. The reverse can also be true, however!
Also, I learned an important lesson on Friday. When a colleague asks you what you have planned for the weekend, on no account should you absentmindedly tell them what you have planned for the weekend .