Here’s a video featured on Canadian Geographic talking to the shepherds at shearing time at Topsy Farms.

Ian has been wrapping up haying, working to bring home the bales from all the far-flung fields that we rent, while Don and Chris have been working hard on sheep handling (checking feet, separating those that need any treatment, vaccinating, keeping a daily eye on all flocks, watching the pasture they are in and having […]

We finished haying yesterday, so now the fall activites begin.  Chris does good work overhauling farm equipment in the winter, and this year so far, there have been no really long or really expensive equipment setbacks. One major breakdown was solved by scrounging a major part out of a tractor that’s been retired for parts […]

One of the rather glorious aspects of being the caregiver for foster lambs, is that it requires me to sit quietly outside, morning and evening and just take in the world. (The daytime feedings are often more hectic with lots of visitors or events on the go.) At six in the morning, during this stretch […]

Our shepherd, Christopher, says that the gestation period for lambs is 4 months, 3 weeks and 4 days. We calculate when to put the rams in, based on when we want the birthing to begin. (Ideally, once the weather has warmed and there is sufficent pasture to keep the flock groupings well fed – the […]

We are lambing entirely on pasture. The fields are glorious in this early spring, with the sheltering trees well leaved out, and the lake, to the west and the north of the fields, shining with deceptive warmth. The pasture is early, but already showing the effects of the lack of rainfall, especially on our shallow […]

In the autumn, our focus includes marketing lambs. They were weaned in the third week of August, giving their moms a much needed rest. The lambs blatted for a bit; the ewes gave one token call then bent to graze, a look of relief on their faces. As the lambs were rapidly catching up to […]

Yesterday, my grandchildren, Nathan and Michael helped me dig the rest of my crop – boys and carrots make a good combo. N loaded them into a milk crate in his ‘jeep’ he’d brought specially for the job. Then we dumped them all and pulled off the green tops, with N passing me tough ones […]

Life has been hectic with planting and foster lambing and hosting the hoards of visitors who come during lambing time. My first foster appeared about a week after lambing began, May 10th. He was a lovely looking piebald, part Suffolk, with a black nose and one eye and one ear, and splotches elsewhere. His mom […]

We have three healthy foster lambs now. (We lost a couple, and 6 have gone to another home on the Island where they will be raised all summer.) They stay in a big blanket-covered dog cage on the verandas at night. The wind still blows cold off the lake, and this gives them warm cuddle […]