Flock History
Our sheep farm began when we moved from a typical neighborhood in suburbia with our two spoiled suburban dogs to some acreage at the edge of town. We started our sheep farm with Little Mr. Katahdin Ram, who came from a quality farm with super nice owners. He is the gentlest, sweetest creature we have yet to meet. (Well, the barn cat that came with the property when we bought it is very loving too.) Within hours two ewes from another farm that has Dorpers and Katahdins joined our flock - one still a lamb, the other a yearling.
We weren't going to name ANY of our sheep EVER, seeing as how we'd eventually have to sell or even taste some of them, but soon sweet Mr. Ram became Jacob, the older ewe Leah, and the ewe lamb Rachel. (If you know the Bible story, Jacob preferred Rachel but had to also marry Leah.) Jacob, at the age of four months, showed us his calm personality and gentle leadership by putting himself between the two ewes when Leah kept butting Rachel and taking the blows himself from the ewe that was close to twice his size until he slowly pushed her away from Rachel with his head against Leah's.
Next to join the flock was Buddy, our livestock guardian dog (LGD). He can be an energy ball of white fur. Desperate for playmates, he figured out how to get the sheep to chase him, rather than ignore him. (They'd ignore him even as he jumped and climbed all over them - while they were standing or lying down - or nipped at them to try to get them to play with him.) Somehow the sheep (and cat...and goats) know he's not a threat, even though he still will pounce on them from time to time. However, they ran from our tiny 16 pound dog, who's a fraction of their size and who therefore now isn't allowed near them.
Then came our weed eaters, two goats. They were soon named "Escape Artist 1" and "Escape Artist 2". They (and our LGD) showed us how easily an animal could get through an impossibly small space at the bottom of our fencing. We think we finally have one whole field fenced well enough to keep them inside and hope to have our other fields escape-proofed soon.
That one well-fenced field seemed so huge with only those six small animals roaming it. So, soon we traveled to another farm to pick out a few more lambs. We came home with Katahdin Dorper crosses D, E, F, and G who were soon renamed Half-n-Half, Painted Face, Caramel, and Little Cow. That group of four lambs stayed separate from the other three sheep for a few days, but slowly they started moving like one flock.
Even with four more lambs, the animals still looked like spots on that one big field, ...and we have more fields for them. So, about a month after getting our ram lamb, we doubled our ewe population. We wanted to get some 1-2 year old proven ewes and ended up with six more ewes from a Katahdin farm. We think our initial flock has now been completed. Our adventure has officially begun!