The Animals of Opportunity Farm - Sheep

The Sheep

The only animals that were on Opportunity Farm when we arrived were a flock of hand-reared Wiltshire Horn sheep. These sheep are hardy and will tolerate poorer pasture, rarely need assistance with birthing and do not require any shearing or crutching.
As we increased the number of other animals on the farm, our flock of Wiltshire Horns has diminished to 12. We currently have one young ram, a wether that has somehow survived the freezer, eight ewes and two lambs.
We also have four other sheep:
Shaun, a Dorset wether who was a poddy whose owners couldn't eat him or look after him and begged us to give him a home. He is large and very friendly and will follow you anywhere if he thinks you have food.
Daisy, a merino coloured sheep who looks like a cow rather than a sheep. She was also a poddied pet and is very friendly. She seems to be barren as she has never had a lamb.
Gerald and Henry are a pair of Corriedale coloured wethers. They are both chocolate in colour and are designed for Michelle to spin their wool. They were brought to Opportunity Farm late in 2016 and the trauma of the journey has made Gerald's fleece snap at that point so currently he is moulting. Henry (named for Henry Lawson) is more confident and hangs out with Daisy and Shaun. Gerald (named for Gerald Durrell) tends to hang near the back with the more anxious sheep.
All the sheep come running when some sheep nuts are shaken and queue up each morning in winter for their lucerne biscuits and nuts.

How Now Black Cow - Sparkle arrives

Having learnt a very hard lesson with the demise of Hailey, our poddy cow, we were determined that if we had another cow, that we wouldn't make the same mistakes. Cows in calf need lots of feed. Our cow did not find enough grass to eat in our drought-stricken paddocks and our supplementary feed was not enough to sustain a cow and growing calf.

So when a friend offered us their spare pregnant heifer we were cautious and sought lots of advice. We decided to exchange the meat from one of our pigs for a fresh start with their heifer. 

Rainbow Sparkle may be black but she has plenty of Jersey in her.  

She is about 18 months old and she is due to have her first calf in October. Our cow expert told us that she is a little undernourished (her head is big for her body) but that she is healthy and should be a fine cow if we feed her enough. So we are feeding her a large bucket of lucerne chaff, some grain, some beef nuts mixed with some molasses twice a day. During the rest of the time she has access to unlimited fresh grass hay. She has a goat companion, Flossie, to stave off any loneliness and plenty of water.

Although she had been near humans she had never been handled. It took two days to get her comfortable with me touching her head and a week to be able to touch her all over. Last night I approached her from behind and she responded by lashing out with her foot. Luckily it hit a post and not my leg, but it reminded me that she still has a 'flight' zone and that if she cannot see me approach she will be much more wary.
She now eats in the dairy and my plan for the next couple of weeks is to get her eating in the stall comfortably. Then I can try the head bail.
The kids decided that she didn't quite fit the name 'Rainbow Sparkle' so she has been shortened to Sparkle or even Sparky.
If all goes well we may have raw milk once again come October.