Monthly Archives: May 2010
New Acquisitions
Every year I bring in some additional blood to my Jacob Sheep flock and well, I’ve been continuing with my genetics coming from my favorite Jacob Sheep farm, Kenleigh Acres. I had originally got our first Jacob ram from Shannon and have continued for years now, usually with a new ram every other year. I’m more than pleased with what Kenleigh’s Raider has produced for us in 2009 and now again in 2010 so he will be staying and will continue putting excellent fleeces and horns in to my flock. The only bummer is that with the sale of my lilac ram Kenleigh’s Debonair, my colors have dwindled from lilac and black and white to pretty much straight black and white because Raider does not carry the lilac gene. My goal is to produce some of his offspring that are lilac so I am introducing Kenleigh’s Prescott to the Mud Ranch flock.
While this adorable little lamb is not lilac himself, he does carry the lilac gene and from a wholly different side of the country. Prescott is sired by Patchwork Abraham who hails all the way from Patchwork Farms in Georgia.
Not only will Abraham bring the lilac coloring back to the Mud Ranch genetics through his son, but he also brings with him years of flock planning for beautiful fleeces and nice horns. I’m excited to see these genetics inter-mingled with Mud Ranch. And hopefully, when Prescott is bred to my lilacs and lilac carriers, we’ll have a rainbow of colors again in 2011.
Also coming to Mud Ranch is Kenleigh’s Paisley. I am thrilled with bringing Paisley here to Mud Ranch, her contribution is the genetics of her very gorgeous sire, Greenwater Julian which includes excellent structure and beautiful fleeces. Also, Paisley is the daughter of one of my very favorite ewes, Kenleigh’s Infinity. Infinity is a very sweet ewe whom I met in person last year. I had always admired her though, from her very first lamb pictures on Kenleigh Acre’s website. Paisley is growing to be a very nice ewe lamb and I love how wide her horns are!
That is what is in store for the Mud Ranch flock in the coming months. Another exciting tid-bit is Mud Ranch’s genetics moving to Nebraska! A young man has purchased Mud Ranch’s Tobias for his Jacob flock and Toby will be going with me to show at the Black Sheep Gathering next month (In 21 days! Ack!) and then staying at Kenleigh Acres until his long drive home to Nebraska. I am very happy about this arrangement and hope that he produces lambs beyond his new owner’s satisfaction.
Fishing + Riding = Fun Weekend
We were able to squeeze in a fun couple of days this past weekend. Saturday we swapped kids, two for our one plus a nephew and his friend and headed out fishing. As it turned out, there was a kid’s fishing derby going on at the time and lucky for us it ended about two minutes after we arrived! Why is that good? Because every one packed up and headed out leaving us with the water to ourselves and all the large fish they didn’t catch.
Of course, Simon said Rodney needed to kiss the fish… I like the picture anyway.
I’ve also been working on my manual exposures on my camera and each of these taken have not been enhanced in PhotoShop except much needed sharpening for digital files… One must always sharpen!
We caught four fish, got snowed and hailed on, lost many a hook in the bushes and enjoyed an ice cream afterward in the freezing weather. What’s not to enjoy?
The scenery was gorgeous with all the flowers blooming… Much to my delight there was lupine!
But for a twist, a grounded fly who wasn’t too excited about the weather.
And many colors of bachelors buttons getting ready to bloom full speed ahead… I bet this week that little hill will be amazing. Maybe we’ll have to head back up for another fishing excursion.
The water droplets made for some fun macro pictures.
Then on Sunday after church I headed out with my friend Maleah for a few hours exploring a new trail I’ve been wanting to go out on. The flora there was about to burst too and there were many sightings of lupine, violets, larkspur, dogwood and I think strawberries. We’re going to go back and explore the many different ways to go so hopefully I will have more pictures.
Here’s one of the beautiful views that are to be had up on this ridge. And much to my surprise, it looks as though we were further back away from town than I thought.
My friend Maleah riding Tiki.
And me on Cookie. Kudos to Maleah for taking such a fantastic photo! Here she thought hers was going to look bad compared to mine… I like her work much better than mine!
And we also found a view of the lake which was also a pleasant surprise.
We had a lovely mommy-time-away and plan to go back and explore soon. I always love finding new places to ride especially since I grew up riding around here and it is hard to find some place new that isn’t privately owned.
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