A new Adventure into Hair Sheep

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We have had goats off and on through the years.  But, recently I have been hearing a lot of really good thing about raising Hair sheep. I looked into it and did a lot of research. To me personally it seemed that Hair Sheep would be easier to raise in some ways than goats. I still have 2 dairy goats and a Boar buck, so we can milk, but the hair sheep really caught my eye, as far as for profit. So after some discussion, we decided to jump into it. We found a breeder and purchased ten Katahdin Hair Sheep ewes that are all going to lamb any day. We already have 3 ewe lambs on the ground! Ok, so why did the hair sheep catch my eye?
#1 They are virtually parasite resistant (Rotational Grazing is basically key)
#2 They can lamb 3 times in 2 years and each ewe can have 1 to 3 lambs each lambing
#3 They can live off good pasture grass with little to no grain
#4 They are hardy and you don't have to shear them
#5 You don't have to trim their feet as often or at all depending on your ground
#6 They are very profitable and the meat market for them is very high.
Another reason they caught my eye is that they are pretty easy to care for and are easier to keep in the fence than goats are!
So far they have been really easy! They seem to know where we want them to go whether we are loading them into a trailer, herding them into a stall or rotating pasture. I will continue to write about our experience with them, so stay tuned!

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