The Fiddlin’ Farmstead

Today I'm talking with Kelly at The Fiddlin' Farmstead with an update on her Valais Black Nose sheep babies! You can also follow on Facebook.

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00:00
This is Mary Lewis at A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters. If you're enjoying this podcast, please like, subscribe, share it with a friend, or leave a comment. Thank you. Today I'm talking with Kelly at the Fiddlin' Farmstead, and Kelly was my, I think, third guest back in August, and she was the third episode released back in August. How are you, Kelly? How you doing? I'm doing pretty good.

00:29
I'm good. So, Kelly raises Valet Black Nose sheep. And back when we talked in August, you were working on having full bread. I guess that's the right word. Valet Black Nose sheep. Is that what was going on then? Yes, I think we were in the process of purchasing a purebred ram. Okay. So what's happened since then? Because I know, but I know you're excited to talk about it.

00:58
We had our first purebred lambs and they are everything and more that I had hoped for. I couldn't be more just tickled by them. So that was super exciting. How many did they did you end up having? We ended up with three. They both had twins. Unfortunately, the little ram lamb on my second ewe didn't end up making it. He was just tiny, stillborn. So we ended up with.

01:27
three ewe lambs total. Okay, awesome. So are you going to keep all three or are you gonna sell a couple? No, we've been working on listing a couple of them. We ended up with a bottle baby again as well that lived in my house for a couple months. So she's a tough one to let go, we'll probably end up keeping her. But yeah, I think it just went so smoothly having a ram here. We're hoping to do the same breeding again next year.

01:57
Okay. And are you going to, is it going to be the same, the same number of ewes bred or are you going to be breeding more? Yes, it'll just be the same too this year because our bottle baby, you know, our ram would be a herciter. And then we have two polypay ewes as well that we've been experimenting breeding. That would be a first generation valley. So half polypay, half valley. Okay. And

02:26
I read something about that blend that there's a reason you wanted to do that. Yeah, I got into it. Well, with the Valley, their personalities and their friendliness just really caught my attention for somebody like me who was not very experienced with livestock. With the Polypay cross, their milk supply and their fiber is excellent. So my idea was to kind of create a perfect homestead sheep with those qualities you want for production.

02:55
Also the friendliness and well-maneu-rism. And they're also a polled breed, the polype, and because polled is a dominant gene, this cross will always be polled. It won't have horns, which also makes people more comfortable on the smaller homestead. Okay, do the valet ones have horns? Oh yes, they have massive horns. And they, you know, they're not mean with them by any means, but when they come run into greet you, they really get you in the back of the leg sometimes, and they get caught in the fences.

03:25
all the fun that comes with organs. Okay. All right. So for those who haven't listened to the original interview with Kelly, tell me, you were saying something about there are very few full-bred belay sheep in the United States and something about the country that they originated from. So can you refresh my memory? Yeah, so we come, they come from Switzerland. The UK had a breeding program. They were able to import

03:54
the actual animals were in the US, we were not allowed to. So we worked out something with the United Kingdom to purchase frozen semen. That's where the breeding up comes in. Artificial laparoscopic insemination. Lately, though, we've been able to import embryos as well. So there are more purebreds. They actually call the embryo ones pure blooded. But there's a lot more of them in the US now than there was two years ago.

04:22
just because of the availability of the embryos, more rams live here. So they're not quite as uncommon as they were a couple years ago. A lot of people really got into the program, but they're still hard to come across, that's for sure. OK, and why couldn't the actual sheep be imported? Because of disease resistance. It's kind of a closed.

04:52
with, I think with sheep, I'm not sure what other livestock that applies to, but mainly to keep disease out of the US. Yeah. And plus, I'm assuming that it's very stressful on the animal to be put on a boat or on a plane and shipped here. And that would make them vulnerable to being sick on top of being vulnerable to being sick with things they haven't been exposed to before.

05:18
Right. We had a similar situation with the valley. A lot of people are still transporting them around the country. So when we brought in the poly pay is actually with some more valleys last fall, they ended up having a detour from where they started all the way to southern US and then up to Minnesota. And it took so long to get here that they did come not feeling well. They had no cops and stuff that we had to treat. And it's just really hard on an animal to, you know, live in a.

05:47
confinement like that and travel. And all the noises and all the movement that they don't understand. Yeah. I mean, it's hard on a puppy when you pick them up from somewhere that's half an hour away, put them in a kennel or a crate, put them in the back of your vehicle, and drive for half an hour, because the only place they've ever been to is the vet, and it's typically five minutes away. So I can't imagine what it's like for

06:15
for a cow or a sheep or a goat.

06:20
Yeah, even a puppy's five-minute trip to the vet can be a handful. Oh yeah, exactly. Because they just, they don't understand and they haven't had enough experience with being in a vehicle to know that they're safe. So yeah, it's stressful and the last thing you want for livestock is to stress them out. So you do it as little as possible. Absolutely. Yep. Okay. I was talking with some people. Well, I've talked with a few people since I talked with you.

06:50
Um, like over a hundred. Not. Not all of them have sheep, but some of them have had sheep and they've been telling me that the wool market in the United States is not great. So, so what are the valet sheep used for? Are they for milk? Are they for wool? Are they for meat? Right now they are basically just a, a fancy pet for, you know, to mow the lawn. Um,

07:20
The wool market, I mean I think anything agricultural is a really tough market right now. I think people are finding more unique ways to utilize their fiber. I had just connected with a lady who is purchasing a wool pellet machine to actually break the wool down into pellets and it's supposed to be really good for plants. You know, it retains moisture, helps the soil, house plants, gardens, all that kind of stuff.

07:47
So there's definitely alternatives to just sewing the fiber, but it is, it's really hard to, unless you have the time to, you know, go from start of the animal to a finished yarn. Then there's not a whole lot of market for it, no? Yeah. I was very surprised when I heard this from the second person. I was like, you are the second person to tell me this. And I went out and did some research and I was like, oh, okay.

08:17
I guess my son's hope of getting a real wool cloak at some point might be not as likely. You can definitely still find it. There's so many advantages to sheep other than the lack of a market for wool. That's been just really fitting for us. So there's definitely still wool out there. You could probably get some for free. You just gotta learn to spin it.

08:41
and card it and clean it and all the pieces and parts. Spin it. Oh yes. It's a very long process, but I think it's a beautiful one to, you know, tradition to keep alive. Yeah, we, I've mentioned this before on the podcast, we went to a historical reenactment kind of thing event and there was a lady there who has been spinning wool for years and she had her spinning wheel which was beautiful.

09:11
And she had the carding tool and she was teaching people about how you card the wool, how you clean it, how you spin it, and how it's not soft once it's yarn. It's not soft. It's kind of scratchy. It is, yes. And I knew that, but I knew my son didn't know that because it was, geez, probably 10 years ago at least. And he was fascinated watching her spin that clump of wool into a piece of yarn. He was like,

09:40
Oh, it's amazing when I had learned to do that after we started with alpacas. And the wool is a lot more coarse, especially the valley fiber in itself is, but I have kind of a reaction to the itchiness of wool myself, which is why we started with the alpacas. Their fiber when you spin it is very, very soft and very luxurious. Mm-hmm. I have not. No, no, I have not actually. Um, I have.

10:10
Pet a llama but not an alpaca and their fur is different. Yes, llama is very different too. Now the thing with the Valle fiber that intrigued me because of its coarseness, it's actually one of the best fibers for felting. And felting is a much easier way to process fiber into a finished project. You can fill purses, hats, bags, blankets. I also recently connected with a lady who

10:39
when you shear the animal, you try to take it off in one big piece, and she felts the bottom of it into like what would be a pelt, but without harming the animal, without the skin. Yeah. And it's just, it's beautiful with the valley that get like really curly locks that, you know, get like 12 inches long. Wow, okay. Twice a year you shear them, so it's, I have my ram's fiber actually in a tote, hoping that she'll teach me how to do that one of these days here. That would be great.

11:09
Okay, so tell me about the babies, because I gotta hear about the babies. Are they friendly, was it amazing seeing them be born? Would you see them be born? So I started working back in December, and this has just been really bizarre for me because I've been a stay at home mom and you know, farmer for so many years. So I set up a camera, Wi-Fi, so it could peek on them at work and I actually, I think that the first, you must have lambed literally the moment I left work until I got home, which was only about a seven minute drive.

11:39
I got home, I looked out and I just saw these little legs behind her. I thought, oh my gosh, they're here. So the second one lambed in the middle of the night and I did run out to help her back in March. It's so cold. They quickly became so curious and so friendly. We would allow them and they used to be in our main yard with their dogs and cats and other animals. And they got to the point where when my dogs would run along the fence, as cars went by or people came by.

12:06
They would run along behind them and chase them. Like they were barking at the object too. They run up to my kids and play. They follow you around everywhere. And it's not really different, my bottle baby that was inside versus the ones that were dam raised. They're just naturally curious and friendly. Okay, I have a question about your dogs. You told me before, but I don't remember what breed of dogs you have. I have a smooth collie.

12:35
hurting dog, but he, the only thing he likes to hurt is tractors and big machinery. Um, and then we have a livestock guardian dog that is a cross between a collie and a great Pyrenees. Oh, wow. Okay. And she is amazing. Um, she just adores the baby animals when she even gets a whiff that there's a new animal here or hears a little baby outside her butt wigs, the whole back end of her, she's very calm and gentle with them and, uh, yeah, I couldn't ask for a greater farm dog, really.

13:05
Yeah, that's what I was going to ask you about because our barn cat last fall, last September, had kittens and she had them in the barn. And we have Maggie, the mini Australian shepherd dog that I talk about all the freaking time. And she kept the kittens in the pole barn until they got curious enough to climb out underneath the door because there's a place where the cats can get out under the door. And Maggie saw the kittens and she sat down.

13:33
She did like that point thing that pointer dogs do, except she was sitting, and her whole rear end was just wiggling on the ground. She doesn't have a tail, she's got a docked tail. And tongue hanging out, smiling like dog, smiling just waiting for the kittens to come over. And that was awesome. Floof, the barn cat, got pregnant again, because we're stupid and waited too long to get her spayed. And she had babies back in...

14:03
very first part of April and she had them in the pole barn again. And Maggie could smell the kittens on our hands when we would pet them when we were out there, but they weren't coming out of the pole barn yet. So she knew there was a new set of babies in the pole barn. And I'm telling you the minute one of those kittens stuck its head under the door and meowed, she sat right down and waited patiently with her rear end, just wagon on the ground for the next batch of friends to come visit.

14:33
So I was very curious to see how your dogs were with the baby lambs. They're good, Pop. They are really great with them. We got chicks recently too, and Dolly the livestock dog. She's the same way even with the squeaky baby chickens. She'll hover over them, wave her tail and make sure the other dogs and cats don't get too close. So I'm happy for that because with lambs, foxes are one of their main predators. Of course, along with neighborhood escapee dogs.

15:02
you know, coyotes and stuff. But we have a lot of foxes around here, so that's always been a concern of mine. So it's great to have, you know, that dog here to keep them safe and. Yeah, absolutely. It just, it surprised me that Maggie was so excited to see the babies and so motherly to them because she's never gonna have. With that breed too, yeah. She's been spayed. She's never gonna have babies. She's never gonna be a mom, but.

15:30
I think she probably would have been a really good mom based on how she is with her cat babies. Yeah, that's what I thought too. And we did introduce her to a baby rabbit, which was a big mistake because rabbits are prey animals. They don't like dogs. That poor baby rabbit, Maggie was so curious and I was holding it and I put it down near her nose and that rabbit went, Oh, I'm stupid. I shouldn't have done that. So no more introducing Maggie to anything. That's a prey.

16:00
animal because they can have a heart attack and die. Oh, yeah, and that's not fair. Well, yeah, it's nice to have a dog that's friendly around them too, though. Yeah, she loves anything little. Yeah, and she hasn't really been around any big animals. She's met her, she's remet her parent dogs because we took her over to visit from where we got her and she had no idea what to do with those dogs. We got her during COVID so she was never around.

16:30
other dogs and she's barely around other people during COVID so she's not the most socialized creature on the earth with people. So it's just weird to me how some dogs see something smaller and they're like attack and eat it and some other dogs are like oh it's a baby I need to be gentle. Yeah that is bizarre isn't it? Yeah so I don't know whatever. Got my Maggie conversation in for the day. There you go. I love her so much.

16:59
And love having barn kittens, but I'm really not looking forward to more. I don't want any more barn kittens. We're going to try to get flu spayed here very soon. Yeah. It's tough to control when it, when it gets. Yeah. I don't need a, what is it called? Uh, there's a word for a bunch of cats. A colony. I don't need a colony of cats. I'm good. So anyway, uh, so what did your kids think of the baby lambs?

17:28
They adore them as well. It was nice this time they were old enough to really help out with the bottle baby, you know, with feedings and such. They've been working on, if we do keep the bottle baby, we named her Luna. The valley names all the lambs a different letter every year and this year was L, so we found moon names. We have Luna, Larissa, and Leda. I think that's how you pronounce it. But they run around with them. They've been trying to halter train them and they've been.

17:57
really enjoyed the friendliness as well. They were excited when we started with alpacas, but they could never really have this kind of a relationship with the alpacas. Yes, because the alpacas get bigger than sheep, right? Yes, and even when they're little, they're not easy to, and with alpacas, especially baby males, you don't want to make them friendly and bond with you because they can hurt you later on in life. Mm-hmm, yep. Alpacas have...

18:24
Alpacas have super long legs when they're born, right? Yes, we had our baby alpaca last time I talked to you, I think. I think so, yeah. Okay, I think she had just been born. And yet they're basically like a baby deer, you know, stand up right away and start running around and they're pretty much all legs. Yeah, they're super cute too. So we still have her here and she's actually the baby alpaca that was born last year.

18:54
also obsessive over babies that are born here. Oh, funny. She'll just stand and stare at the babies and try to get close and just looks at them with this look of awe and then the lambs follow around and she'll run around and play with them. And we actually were looking to sell alpacas and just focus on the sheep. But it's they're a tough one to sell. They're so great with the lambs. Yeah. And they can also help protect against foxes too when my dog can't be outside. Really? Oh, yes.

19:23
Do they yell? Do they kick? What do they do? They'll stomp on them. Some places actually have alpacas specifically as protectors for their sheep, keep the fox away. Not all of them have the personality to do so. But yeah, I know when we had our boys, we had to be careful of friends spread over smaller dogs. They would try to stomp on people's dogs. It was like openness. Let's not do that. Yeah, no, that's probably not a great plan.

19:52
Yeah, they fit in well together. We just end up with a lot of fiber between all those animals. I'm sure you do. You're swimming, swimming in it. So what I don't this is going to sound stupid, but it's the only question I think to ask about this. What is the end game for the valet sheep? I mean, what's what's your goal with this? So, yeah, I was going to get into that, too. Naturally, you know, just like with alpacas, the more.

20:19
availability, the prices aren't going to be as crazy. And I'm really hoping that they do become more of a normal shape that you see. I was pretty impressed. You know, I make milk based soaps and lotions and such. And I was decently impressed with the size of the udders on my valley when they land. It's not anything like a dairy goat or even the polypate you that I have. It's not that big of production. But again, depending on your demand and what you use it for, if I'm just making soap.

20:49
I think they'd be great to milk too because with that friendliness comes the ease of milking them. You don't need to lock them up or put them on a milk stand. They basically just stay in there. So that's kind of my goal is to keep the farm business going as far as milk products. I really wanted to dive into cheese making eventually. Another reason I prefer sheep over other livestock is the nutrient values of sheep milk is...

21:17
far surpasses any other livestock. Okay. So there's that factor in it too. I think they're just a great, you know, I guess I would say dual purpose, but also if people raise them for meat, could be a good triple purpose animal to have. Sure. Hoping kind of just to work on Luna as far as getting her out to shows. And I've always wanted to utilize, you know, like at nursing homes and hospitals

21:47
that type of route. Yeah. And then eventually have our little flock of sheep to mow the grass and enjoy. Yeah. Are you OK? I have two questions. Are you intending to grow the herd bigger or to keep at your place? Or are you going to just keep doing a few and selling some and maybe keeping one? I think for now, we're going to keep it a small flock. With our acreage being smaller and.

22:14
Just with our lives being busy right now with two little kids too in sports. Eventually I would love to have a larger farm and a whole flock of these sheep. Okay. And when you, when you take them places, when that happens, are you teaching about them as well as just letting people experience them? Yep, absolutely. Um, people are quite fascinated by them. Um, Luna, because it was cold out, I didn't get to bring her around as much as I would have liked to.

22:43
But we'd go through drive-throughs together often. People just adored her. You know, they get the long curly locks right away and they're just really sweet sheep. But yeah, I love telling people about them and I work in assisted living as well and just the reactions that people get when I bring up that I raise sheep and have lambs. I just think there's so much that could be done with them as far as enrichment for, you know, other humans. Yeah.

23:11
I was going to say I was a Girl Scout co-leader for a couple of years. And I suspect that if you have any Girl Scout troops in your area, if you talk to the leaders about the fact that you have these sheep, they would love to have the girls learn about them. Oh yeah, absolutely. And it's really hard to find unusual, interesting things to expose the girls in the troops to.

23:41
cold process lye soap at the time. So we had the girls come over to our garage and he showed them how you do that. And they were interested and they each took home a bar of soap that had already cured. And one of the girls came back to me and she was like, do you have any more of that soap? And I was like, yes ma'am. She's like, can I get into the bar? I was like, yes, you can. And so they learned that from us. I had a friend who knew knot tying.

24:11
real knots like the ones you use when you're sailing and things like that. And so they taught the girls some basic knot tying skills. And then there was a guy that we knew who had an orchard and he also keeps honeybees. So we took them up to show them how the honey is extracted from the hive with the centrifuge thing. And they were into that too. They thought that was super cool. Oh, yeah.

24:38
But we did not take them to see belay sheep because there aren't any belay sheep around here. Right, and that's the bonus about them. They're so friendly. People get to actually touch them too, and I think that can be very therapeutic. I used to teach kids with fiber processing as well, and that was always fun to educate. Yeah, yeah. So I don't know. I'm sure there are so many places you could take them to.

25:06
to show them off to people and teach people about them. And I think it's super that you did this, you're doing this. And I know back when I talked to you in August, you were so excited about having babies. Yes. And I'm so glad you took the time to come back and talk with me about it. Yeah, thanks for having me back. Absolutely. All right, well, kiss Luna for me. I will. And have a great afternoon next to you time. Yep, thank you. All right, bye. Bye.