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Welcome to our farm! On Salmonberry Farm in upstate New
York, we raise Icelandic sheep. We are relatively new to the Icelandic sheep
world, bringing home our starter flock of unregistered sheep in the spring of
2006. With some experience and confidence under our belts, we added registered
breeding stock in the summer and fall of 2007. We use only registered rams on
both our registered and unregistered ewes.
Spring
2008
How we got started……
After purchasing our small, run down, abandoned farm and
fixing it up (this took several years),
I found myself thinking that it would be the perfect place to have some
animals. While growing up, my parents had a small farm where we raised a few
cows, pigs, turkeys and chickens to produce food for us to eat. My brothers,
sisters and I all had “chores” to do. It gave me a respect for animals and an
appreciation of knowing exactly where our food came from. The only experience
with sheep that I had up to this point was hearing someone shout “Hannibal”,
then watching the grass fly before my eyes as my siblings and I would run for
our lives to jump on top of the picnic table before our Aunt and Uncle’s ram
Hannibal (he got out of the fence again) could take us out. With that said, the
learning curve was steep for us.
Out of the many sheep breeds, why did we select
Icelandics? After reading through Storey’s Guide for Raising Sheep and doing
some online research, we selected Icelandics because of their unique appearance
and the triple purpose breed testimonials. We were not disappointed. Icelandics are easy keepers. Our sheep do exceedingly well on grass, hay and
minerals alone. This fits in nicely with our rotational grazing system. Our ewes have proven
themselves to be easy lambers and excellent mothers. We have just
concluded our
second lambing season and find that again, our ewes lamb successfully. The ewes are protective of
their young but not aggressive toward us.
We have found assistance and advice received from fellow
shepherds, breeders and Cooperative Extension very helpful. We participate in
the Voluntary Scrapies Program. We are members of the Canadian Sheep
Breeders Organization, ISBONA and the Farm Bureau.
When building
our flock, we decided to look for proven ewes that were milky and had
nice wool and excellent confirmation. For our rams, we looked for
easy dispositions, excellent confirmation and fleeces. The former
can be deceiving, and both can be difficult to judge if selecting ram
lambs. Our rams have easy dispositions and have never been
aggressive toward us. However, I do not
permit children in a pasture or barn pen occupied by our rams, nor are children
permitted to be in an area where we are handling our rams. We have a variety of colors and
patterns in our flock. Be sure to check out our lamb, ram and ewe
pages!
Spring
2009 Update
This winter has been a
long and snowy one for us! The calendar says it's spring, so lambing must
be just around the corner! Over the past several months, we've had the
opportunity to listen to the cacophony of coyotes surrounding us and actually
saw one. We've also viewed some bald eagles making a pass occasionally.
So far, neither species has intruded on our farm, and hopefully will choose to
get their dinner elsewhere.
A few of the measures we
have in place to protect against predators include our four foot page wire fence
with a strand of barbed wire on the ground (to deter digging) and a hot top
wire. We also have two guardian llamas that are very watchful, agile and
strong. (I was surprised to observe one of the llamas flip a ram over on
his back in one felt swoop using only his front leg. The ram learned not
to butt the llama, they just avoid each other). Currently, this appears to
be enough. Hopefully it will continue to be.
Spring is one of the
busy times at our farm. The sheep were shorn and vaccinated in mid March
and we are anxiously awaiting the arrival of the 2009 lambs. The lambs
from the crosses this past fall should be promising. In addition, we will
be receiving our pelts and rovings from the fall back from processing in the
next week or so.
We are always striving
to improve the efficiency of our operation with the least impact to our
environment. In the past, we have contracted with the NRCS to make
improvements to our farm and will do so again this year. We have pasture
and hayfields improvement projects that will be starting soon. Not only
will this give us the opportunity to enhance the grass/legume varieties
available to our sheep, but it will decrease the chances of erosion of our
valuable soil resources. I've found the Stockman Grass Farmer as well as
some of their books to be excellent resources for these improvements, as well as
our local Field Crops Extension Educator.
Links and Resources
Below is a small listing of the sources
we have used and continue to use for information and products.
Storey’s Guide to Raising Sheep by Paula Simmons and Carol Ekarius - a great source of information for
getting started with sheep
CLRC (Canadian Livestock Records
Corporation
http://www.clrc.ca/index2010.shtml
By first joining the Canadian Sheep
Breeder's Organization, you can then register your Icelandic sheep here.
Online Membership Application
http://www.clrc.ca/MemberEnglish.shtml
Fee Schedule
http://www.clrc.ca/30fees.pdf
Printable Application Form
http://www.clrc.ca/G-47memberapp.pdf
This should be sent from post office because it requires additional postage
Canadian Sheep Breeders Organization
http://sheepbreeders.ca/
USDA Aphis
http://www.aphis.usda.gov/
Premier 1 Supplies
http://www.premier1supplies.com/
Wellscroft Fence Systems, LLC
http://www.wellscroft.com/
Skyview Fencing and Pole Barns
http://skyview.biz/
Blue Seal
http://www.blueseal.com/
Jug Waterers
http://www.thejugwaterer.com/
Pipestone Veterinary Supplies
http://www.pipevet.com/
ISBONA
http://www.isbona.com/
Cornell Sheep and Goat Program
http://www.sheep.cornell.edu/index.html
Sheep
and Goat Marketing
http://www.sheepgoatmarketing.info/PageLoad.cfm?page=news/northnews_200508.htm
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