[Jacob-list] Shearing

[stonecroft235 at juno.com]

Gary,

We use a sheep fitting stand for shearing - it's a lot of trouble to find
a shearer who will bother to come shear only a few sheep.  The stand
works great - we can crank the sheep up to a comfortable height, the
animal is secured by their head and is rendered helpless and it works
great - and has two wheels for moving it around for storage.   Our first
attempts at shearing were pretty pathetic - the poor sheep was in the
stand for about an hour and a half and my husband (the fledgling shearer)
was pretty sure he wasn't going to give up his day job!!!!  It's like
anything else - the more you do it the better/easier it becomes.   When
the animal was in a stand of this sort, we sheared by first cutting right
up the center of the back, following the spine.  Then, sheared each side,
starting at the top (spine)  and working down the sides of the animal. 
You can first shear off all the yucky stuff around the behind and hanging
down on the belly and discard it - with this method you pretty much
discard as you go and eliminate skirting later.  For a beginner it's hard
to learn how much pressure to exert on the shearers because of your fear
that you will end up skinning your animal - but in time it starts to feel
more natural.    We only have a few sheep, so by the time my husband
starts getting pretty good, he's finished - and 365 days later he has to
start all over again!!!  Last year we were doing an older ewe whose
fleece was pretty oily and it was taking longer because the shears was
getting gummed up - the impatient lambs were getting up on the stand to
get a drink from mama - and when we finally had one side finished and the
fleece laying in the lawn, the little lamb curled up with the fleece and
took a nap!!!

Our shearing attempts have given us GREAT respect for the professionals
who peel fleece off of animals who appear to sit dociley on their butts,
completing the job in 60 seconds -- and make it look like a piece of cake
- those guys receive little respect and recognition in the real world but
to our way of thinking we rank them right up there with neurosurgeons!!!

Sue Martin
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