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United Suffolk Sheep Association |
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April/May 2004 Question Question: How do you prepare Suffolks for show or sale? Answer: Below is a summation of interviews conducted with professional fitters from across the country on some of the procedures used to prepare sheep for exhibition. We asked each one five basic questions:
Guy Guillen, a native Californian, is the flock manager for Mayo Suffolk’s of Live Oak, California. Guy has worked with sheep all his life in addition to being a champion fitter of show dogs. Prior to working with the Mayo’s he worked with Rozilez Suffolks and Hampshires and High Imperial Oxfords, both from the Golden State.
Cutting a sheep out or “mohawking” (as Guy calls it) takes place about 100 days away from show day. It involves patch shearing the fronts, tops, sides, and butts. The goal of this task is to level the tops and hips while giving the animal eye appeal from the side profile. Mohawking is done with 13 tooth flare combs or standards on any electric shearers. Guy says, “The flares give the sheep a smoother finish than the standard comb”. Guy wets and scrubs the tops and butts with warm, soapy water, cards them, and fits them as if it were show day. The only difference is these sheep are not washed. Suffolks on a high plane of nutrition in hot weather have fleeces that tend to “burn”. This can also be caused by feeder rub or sheep that are naturally caring black fiber. The result is unattractive black fiber around the neck, the belly, and occasionally the tail head that will be discriminated against in the show ring. To minimize lost placings in the show ring Guy shears these areas at 30-day intervals with a Lister surgical blade in hoping the fleece grows back white. Cut out time is the time to think about shaping the feet on show animals. Since these individuals are on a higher plane of nutrition than non-show sheep there hooves will grow at a more accelerated rate. Therefore, corrective trimming is sometimes necessary. Guy’s suggests, “Sheep that are “hocky" need to have the outside heals and inside hooves on their rear feet trimmed as close as possible. Sheep that toe out on their front feet need a correction in which you leave the outside edge long and cut the inside short. It is important to initiate this process far enough from show day to allow for the trimming to accomplish the desired effect”. He adds that it is critical to bed the sheep well from the time you cut them out until wash day to assure a clean sheep for show day. Forty-five days prior to the show the sheep are placed on a fitting stand, scrubbed with a Dawn/water mixture to help breakup the fleece. After a long carding process, the sheep are cutout with a thin 13 flare tooth and the belly and throat is sheared and blended with a Lister. “Washing a sheep prior to show is one of the most critical points to a well-fit sheep” insists Guillen. He washes his show animals on a stand and uses a curry comb to break down the fleece. His washing protocol is as follows. Step one uses hot water to do a better job of breaking the grease, lifting the dirt, and leaving the user with a cleaner end product. Step two uses blue Dawn dish soap. He feels it has the highest alcohol content of all soaps and, therefore, feels it cuts lanolin the best, getting the sheep the cleanest. The soap is applied with a mixture of hot water for even soap application to assist with making the rinsing process easier. After a good lather is built up with the soap, the sheep is rinsed from top to bottom, front to back. Guy feels one of the best tools a fitter can own is a handful of shammies to take the excess water out of the sheep after rinsing. Once the sheep is rinsed a dog brush is used to take the knots and crimp out of the fleece. Then the fleece receives a deep card to facilitate the drying process and to help the fit job hold better after fitting. No artificial dryers are used, a blanket is put on the sheep immediately, and the sheep is placed in a clean well-bedded pen. The final phase of show ring preparation is the most time consuming, but this separates the contenders from the pretenders. Guy’s trick of the trade to help fleeces hold and to prevent show day cracking is to add “Blue Diamond” by Lambart (you can buy it at any Pet Smart) to your water mixture. It opens dense, uncardable fleeces by softening them and adds texture to soft, open fleeces. To be a successful fitter one must card, card, card, and then card, card, card. The only way to a smooth finished product without having cracks in your fleece on show day is to card. Once carding is done a dog brush is used to take out any pesky knots. Then you are ready to shape and cutout the sheep one more time. Afterwards, the processes of wetting, carding, and hand trimming are repeated once or twice more. A sheep may be taken off the stand and put up another day for the final fitting. Guy’s days of grooming dogs make him believe a sheep show should be a beauty pageant. To that end, he believes there are no limits to make a sheep look its very best show day. Boning the legs adds to a sheep’s stature and power. Adhesive is used to make the leg hair stand at attention and the leg hair is shaped just like the fleece on a sheep. After a show it is very important to remember that the adhesive needs to be broken down with WD40 or Hocus Pocus to prevent straw sticking the animal, hair falling out, and irritation to the skin. Show ring presence by sheep can be a key to winning. The good ones know when to step up. To enhance that presence, Guy feels “A sheep on a halter has a grace, aura, and freedom of movement that one being held with a hand on the jaw lacks”. He recommends halter breaking your best show prospects to give them a distinct advantage in the ring. Finally, Guy lists Leslie Nelsh and Candice Perriard as major contributors to his successes as a professional fitter.
Our next professional needs no introduction to the Suffolk industry, Jim Heggemeier has been a lifelong learner as he has mastered the art of fitting. The name has been synonymous with state and national champion Hampshires and Suffolks since 1935. Jim currently resides in Missouri managing the Heggemeier and Burke Suffolk Flocks.
He sets no dateline as for when to cut a sheep out. He feels show sheep need to be designed in a way that is most appealing to the judging sorting them and the prospective customers buying them. Certain judges want sheep that are whistle fronted, tight ribbed with a clean, streamline look. Others want them big barreled, rugged, with some spring of rib. Hegge jokes, “In my research most judges select sheep designed like them, either tall and skinny or shorter and thicker”. Knowing who the judge is and what they want in a winner can be the difference in taking home the purple ribbon and just dreaming about it. Jim states, “The easy way to cut sheep out is to slick fronts, sides, and patch the tops, but the ideal way is to sculpt a sheep by patch shearing and blending the whole body”. When Jim sets up to wash sheep three tanks are used, one to soak and soap, two to rinse. No pressure hose is used because, it mats the fleece. Ivory liquid along with hot water is used to create a squeaky clean show sheep. Jim prefers that sheep sun dry on a halter or in a clean pen at least half way before they are thoroughly carded, blanketed and returned to freshly bedded pens. The day after a sheep is washed Jim makes every attempt to cutout that sheep while the fleece is in good condition and not matted too much to make the carding process easier. Once carding has commenced, the sheep are cutout with a 13 straight tooth comb. He feels the straight tooth does a better job of going in and out of the fleece more easily and it doesn’t pull the wool from the side or drag in the fleece like a flare tooth comb does. Then on the next step, the sheep is carded and cutout a multitude of times until the desired look is accomplished. Very little hand work is done as he feels the electric machine is more efficient in accomplishing the end product while taking less time. The desired end product is a straight lined sheep with a similar line on the underline as the top line. Additionally, the sheep need to be correct on their feet and legs, with extra rib, natural muscling with a high tail head. Jim reiterates that washing and carding are essential to have the desired end product. Maintenance of equipment is essential to add life to ones fitting tools. Daily after use, hand shears need to be oiled with mineral oil. Mineral oil is Jim’s oil of choice when cutting out washed sheep while using electric clippers so the sheep stay clean. Sharpen blades daily on hand shears and once you are done with Shearmaster blades store them in a Tupperware container in new motor oil so they don’t rust. Obviously, Jim gives all the credit to his fitting skills to his late father, Bill. As the story goes, Jim was in his “naturally incompetent” stages of fitting when his father spent a little too much time on the phone while Jim was to “knock the edges off this yearling ewe” and the “maverick” kept blending, blending, and blending, until the only thing left to blend was the hide. In all seriousness, Jim gives a lot of credit to John Kroge a lifetime employee who aided in his fitting skills, being one of the first people to patch shear sheep. But as long as Jim has been around he truly has developed his own style. Back in his initial days sheep were fit with 4 inches of wool left on the tops, bellies and sides.
Tod Weaver has been fitting sheep all his life. Whether he knows it or not, when Tod was growing up in Ohio during the Ohio State Fair, he watched Rob Frost and patterned his fitting style after Robbie. Then at the Top of the Rockies as a teenager Steve Paasch, gave Tod some excellent pointers to sharpen his fitting skills. Tod has fit many sheep in many breeds, but most Suffolk enthusiasts are familiar with the fitting he has done for George Bros., Buckeye Acres, and most recently, 5 Star J Farms of Indiana.
Tod slicks sides, fronts, and patches tops and butts 6-8 weeks prior to a show. He uses a 13 tooth Shearmaster to accomplish this task. The tops and butts are “slopped with hot, soapy water, curried, and carded before they are shaped. He recommends washing sheep a week before the show, then fitting them two days after you wash them. When it comes to washing, he has no preference between a stand and a tank. After the sheep is wetted, curried, and hand soaped with Ivory, a bucket of warm water and powdered Tide is applied down the top line of the sheep. Rinsing is the most important part of washing, because if you don’t rinse all the soap out you will end up with a green-fleeced sheep. Tod rinses his critters with apple vinegar because it smells better than regular vinegar, but more importantly it helps break up the soap. Add 1 gallon of vinegar to one rinse tank. After a sheep is washed they are blown partially dry with a cattle blower to remove excess fines and to dry the fleece. Make sure you blow at an angle as to not knot the fleece. Then card the fleece diligently before blanketing. Two days after washing, curry, “slop” (with a Boraxo, white temper paint, and warm water mixture), card until it feels like your arm is going to fall off and then card 20 minutes longer. Bellies and cheeks are sheared and blended in with a 17 tooth goat comb. And the rest of the body is sculpted with a thin 13 flare tooth worn out and purchased from a local shearer. Repeat the process 2-3 more times and finish the finer details with a hand shearer. Clean all metal equipment and spray with WD40. The main objective Tod strives for in fitting is, “to make a sheep look longer bodied, longer necked, and flatter hipped.
Tad Thompson is a past president of the UJSSA. While participating in the junior Suffolk nationals, Tad was very competitive in showing and gained a reputation as one of the top young fitters in the US. Tad and his wife Amanda own and operate Silver Dollar Farms.
The sheep Tad shows are cut out 90-120 days prior to the show. They are patch sheared with a standard 13 tooth. Tad says, “In a perfect world I would slick shear the fronts, sides, and tops on all the sheep I fit, but do to differences in wool growth, structure, and body capacity each sheep needs to be cut out a little differently”. Before cutting out the top line that area is wetted and carded to give the sheep a smoother outward appearance and get rid of any tags. To cut the top out on a sheep, he starts at the high point of the loin and goes out through the rump to create a level dock. Then a line is created from the top of the withers to the loin to establish a level top line. When washing begins at the Thompson’s, hot water and tanks are used for volume washing, a stand is used when only a few sheep are washed. The sheep are washed twice before the show, once 2 weeks prior to and once a week before show day. One tank is for immersing and soaping with liquid Tide and another for rinsing. After the sheep come out of the rinse tank, they get haltered, tied to fence on a concrete slab, and get re-rinsed to make sure no sheep get turned green because all of the soap is not rinsed out of their fleece. Tad insists on using soft water. He feels it makes the fleeces easier to card, more likely to hold a fit job, and the sheep come out of the washing process bright white not dingy. After rinsing, the sheep air dries in the sun, actually Tad takes a shimmy to remove the excess water and then the clean critters are placed in a galvanized dog kennel to allow them to dry completely. The dog kennel can be moved to different spots so that each time a new set of sheep dry, the kennel can be moved to clean dry grass. Before a dry sheep is blanketed, it is carded or dog brushed. Fitting takes place a day or two after washing. First it is determined if the fleece is a hard or soft fleece. For hard fleeced sheep a wetting concoction of Tide and water is used. The attempt is to break up the fleece, so it cards easier. Tad says that a combination of Boraxo, Ivory soap, and water are used on soft fleeces that will not hold a fit job. Dog brushes are used on short fleeces, and longer fleeces are curried from top to bottom on the front ends and butts, front to back on the barrel. Then, card until you think you are finished, then, card another ten minutes. Cut out with electrics 2 times. Wet, curry, card, and finally hand trim for a glassy, smooth finish. Maintain equipment by spraying with WD40 on cards and light oil on hand shears. Tad’s words of wisdom: 1. Trial and error is the best teacher. It is hard to find a happy medium when cutting sheep out (too short or long). Practice allows one to find the optimum fleece length. 2. You learn more from your mistakes than from your successes. 3. When hand shearing, use one blade to control the depth (that blade stays still) and the other is used to cut the fleece. If both blades are used for cutting, a smooth finish is impossible. If anyone (especially juniors) needs to find someone to assist you with some fitting tips call me (Rob Zelinsky) 319-346-9845 or email zelinskyc@aol.com and I will do my best to find someone in your area to help.
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