Crutching time

Actually should've been done about 10 days ago, but we had to let the ewes pick up after standing in snow for so long.  They are looking good really, and everything has been through the shed with no problems - well none for the ewes anyway, just quite stroppy and full of themselves according to the shearers.  They reckon we should've shorn them just after it snowed when they were still civilised!  And they have yet to do the hoggets - so that is a real treat, will feed them well (shearers that is).

                                                                                       The Belly wool coming off

                                                                                                   All finished

We belly crutch to keep the ewe clean of dags (poo stuck to wool)  over lambing and up to shearing, although some often need a dag (just chopping off the woolly poo) in the yards before shearing; to expose the udder properly so the lamb has no problem finding the teat and milk supply; with no warm belly wool hopefully the ewe will go to a drier spot to lamb (dreams are free!); and to speed up shearing.  We want to speed up the shearing as the ewes have their lambs on them at that stage, and the faster they are through the shed and back with the lambs the better. 

The hoggets just get what we call a "buttonhole", that is just around the anal area and down the legs a little, but not around the udder area.  With breeds of sheep that have a woolly head the shearers will do an "eyewig", around the eyes and up the forehead to stop the sheep becoming woolblind (not being able to see due to wool covering the eyes), there are fewer breeds these days requiring this as people try to breed woolly heads out.

The last decade crutching has really only been for animal health reasons, as the price we have obtained for the wool has only covered 1/3 of the shearing costs, hopefully this year with a lift in the wool prices this will change.