August/September 2003

August/September

I had a kid ask me if I was afraid of anything. After giving it some thought, I told him that the only thing that really scares me is getting old and useless. I am beginning to think that my writing in purebred sheep magazines may fit the useless stage at this time in my life. We have sheep people going in every direction, some good, some bad. Today, there is no set standard or type of sheep like there was years ago. People raising and showing purebred sheep come from all walks of life. Trying to reach such a broad group of people is not easy. For those of you who take the time to read my rambling articles, I’m sure that you realize I’m giving you my opinion of a lifetime of farming and raising livestock, or, as my title says, this is only “Story Telling Time.”

At this time, I should relate a story about my grandson, Jeff, who loves the purebred side of the sheep business, especially the shows and sales. I threw him the Suffolk News just to see what he would read or look at. Of course, he looked at all of the ads like we all do, read a little of my article, then put the magazine down. I almost had to make him read my article, just to hear his opinion. After he got through, I asked him what he thought. His answer was that my articles are always different than others, that they were blunt and sarcastic and that they were probably entertaining. Could it be that my worst fear is happening, and I am getting near the useless period of my life? The night before, he was telling me that I should write a book. He told me about Hilary Clinton, how she was getting 8 million dollars just to write it, plus I think $2.80 for every book that sells, and her publishing company was expecting record sales. I told him that I could probably write a book, but he must remember that the only reason that book will set records is because of her husband’s wild infidelity and escapades with younger women. My next remark was that I met his dear Grandmother when I was seventeen, married her when I was twenty, and she was the only love of my life. You can be sure that in those days, there were no wild romps. In short, sex sells: books, TV, movies. Just about everything is based on sexual innuendos. I don’t have a clue about such carrying on, and I never did, nor do I want to. The only sex I know is about breeding sheep or cattle.

For the past two years, I have been very critical of long, tall, narrow sheep who take close to three years to reach full maturity and don't do well on pasture until they reach this age. On the bright side, I feel that Suffolk breeders are trying to correct this problem in their frame sheep by getting them thicker with more capacity. Think what these 40 to 42 inch rams are going to weight in the future. Will 500 pounds be the average weight while the ewes weigh over 400? Of course, when this happens, I’ll be old and senile, and someone else can worry about shearing and taking care of them.

To my amazement, there were two articles in the Suffolk News backing me up on these rock-hard, long-necked, clean-fronted (or hardly any chest), tubular lambs that are winning many of the market lamb shows. Jim Jensen and Craig Burrell of Utah State did a lamb carcass comparison proving that these fine-boned, gun barrel lambs were a joke. Then, former president Farrell Wankier, made many suggestions to correct this bad situation. Could it be that we should let a lamb buyer or packer judge our market lamb classes and come back to the real world. Better yet, let a good lamb feeder do the job. You can be sure that you would not hear the silly phrase, “hard as a rock,” used when talking about these lambs. These men should not be expected to judge the showmanship classes which are so popular. Let the people that love to judge the shows do this.

We are in the commercial sheep business plus feeding lambs. I hate to tell you, this is a different world than the breeding and showing of purebred sheep. The commercial man is thinking about pure pounds and putting these pounds on as cheaply and quickly as possible. I feel bad saying this, but I doubt if the people breeding show sheep and wether-type sheep give a hoot about the commercial man or have a clue that the lamb market is not only great, it’s wonderful. In the last month, I’ve seen 80 pound feeder lambs bringing $1.40 a pound, or at least $1.12. Finished lambs weighing 140 pounds bring $174.00. Talk about making money.

To my disbelief, our dull sheep magazines are filled with so much information on charts and graphs that our brains become jelly. With their discouraging articles about every trouble a sheep can have, they are not picking up on the unbelievable price of lambs. Just once, I would like to see an article that would tell of the real money that can be made in the sheep business.

The lure of the big sheep is overwhelming. It’s the American way, maybe our very culture. For the past five or six years, I have been talking about down-sizing our frame ewes. I want to turn back the clock and go back to the 1970’s where the Suffolk ewe was a money-making machine, not only with the purebred breeders but with the commercial people too. My thinking is once again to breed middle-of-the-road type sheep that are easy keepers and would thrive on grass, live to be ten or twelve years old, and mature at an early age. I convinced my sons to go see Tom Slack of Indiana, a master breeder of wether-type sheep, and now more and more bigger and stronger sheep. Tom had 50 rams or more. We finally selected two three-year old rams that he had been using for stud bucks. You can be sure that these rams did not come cheap. They are 35 to 37 inches tall, depending on how one measures them. To get our wether-type sheep more size, I was of course going to breed them to our frame ewes.

Let this be a lesson to all of you wether-type people who are not registering your sheep. Tom Slack not only sold us two middle-of-the-road sheep, he told our old friends, the Chapmans, on the following day, “Look at the success Bob Kimm of Iowa is having with his powerful sale of middle-of-the-road sheep.”

All this thinking and planning sounded great in April. Now my sons and grandson aren’t so sure that they can stop breeding the beautiful tall, long sheep. At this time, we have decided on breeding our best 25 frame ewes to a frame buck. I have gone along with their thinking. We don’t play golf or go fishing or hunting. Everyone needs a hobby. What greater joy can one have than having these ewes and their lambs around to look at and play with. Going to these sales or the fairs is a great way to develop the friendships and camaraderie that makes it all worth while.

As this is nothing more than “Story Telling Time,” I’ll share a story that was very special to me. It made me once again appreciate my chosen field of farming and raising livestock.

The special sight and joy was that we had a seven-year old Shropshire ewe have five strong, healthy lambs. I knew that she was getting ready to lamb, but I expected that it would be at least an hour. I came back in forty-five minutes, and one lamb was getting up, and low in behold, there were four more in a pile. We quickly dried them off with paper towels, and all five were trying to nurse. The ewe had a huge bag, so I milked her out and gave each lamb four ounces of her milk. At this time in my life, I never take lambs away from their mothers because of their mother’s love and affection is so very important. If I have triplets and they need milk, I give it to them until the ewe is in full production. I continued to bottle two, then three once in a while. I’m sure that this great producing ewe could have raised four lambs on her own.

This was a fun project. We kept her in a large pen for 30 days, let the lambs have a creep, and then fed the ewe close to five pounds of grain per day, plus beautiful third-cutting hay. This ewe has been remarkable the last four years, having triplets twice, last year, four, and this year, five. One of the lambs weighed 11 pounds, three were 10 pounds, and the last one was almost 10.

One of our friends called our local paper, then our television station found out about it. Our lambing barn became a three-ring circus. Then, the great old newsman, Paul Harvey, had it on his daily program. It was even on Jay Leno. We got calls from Shrop breeders all over America. We may sell all five at our National sale. When these lambs were 30-40 days old, lying around their mother was a sight like I have never seen in my long lifetime of raising sheep. In short a joy, a fun project.

Because of my writing, I get a lot of letters which I always answer. It seems that Andy Asberry and I share letters about every two years. I wrote Andy last April thanking him for all of the things that he has done for our association, and I told him how much my sons and I enjoyed his skunk story in the Suffolk News. To my surprise, he wrote back a typed letter of four pages which was very enjoyable to me and told of his boyhood and his special father. I plan on writing Mrs. Benson and hope that she will get Andy to share his story with the readers of this magazine.

Andy and I both agreed that people can’t say thank you or hand out a compliment like they used to. Andy writes that it seems they are afraid to show any emotion because it might be perceived as a flaw in their armor. Courtesy and kindness are something that you can give away and still have. It costs nothing and means so much, and it says as much about the giver as the receiver.

Hey, you can forget everything that I wrote, but don’t forget Andy’s remark: courtesy and kindness are something that you can give away and still have. Think about this statement.