The Rural Voice, 1999-04, Page 18Southdown breed. They've imported
stock from as tar away as Alberta to
bring fresh blood into the flock.
After they met at the Royal, the
couple married 10 years ago and
rented a farm for several years before
buying their current farm five years
ago. It was a handyman's special,
Judy says, but it had rolling hills for
good drainage and a river runs
through it.
Unfortunately it also means this
is prime coyote country and
they took a heavy toll three
years ago. The Shelleys' Iambs are
kept in the barn so they were safe but
the breeding flock was devastated in
1996 when 31 ewes were killed.
Some just had their throats slashed
and were left to die. In one 10 -day
period they lost 14 animals. Over 100
head of sheep and cattle were killed
in a five -mile radius.
The Shelleys bought a guard
donkey to pasture with the herd and
the deaths stopped briefly but the
wolves soon found a way to get
around the donkey and the toll
mounted again.
They discovered that the coyotes
didn't bother ewes that had bells on
so they bought 75 bells for the necks
of the ewes. They also bought a
Tibetan Mastiff guard dog. The big
dog just lies around most of the time,
Judy says, but a couple of times a
day it disappears and takes a jaunt
around the perimeter of the pastures.
The combination of the three
measures seems to have worked. In
1997 they lost just three sheep and
last year didn't have any losses.
But the cost of the
1996 losses was heavy.
Though there is
compensation for loses, it
was not high enough for
breeding stock. As well,
the damage went further
than the killings. The
decision on the part of the provincial
government to withdraw a clause that
would have given southern Ontario
farmers permission to use trained
snare -setters to protect their animals.
People who are against snaring don't
see the damage wolves do, she says.
Critics of the snaring proposal
worried that family pets might get
caught in the snares. Steve points out
those worried about
Bells, dogs and
donkeys helped
reduce coyote
threat
breeding cycles for the rest of the
flock were disrupted with some ewes
lambing late, others not at all.
"We're just getting back on our
feet this year," says Judy who
estimates the Toss from the coyote
problems at S20,000.
Some of the credit for the
decrease in losses might go to coyote
hunters who have come in to help
farmers in the area, Steve says. In a
15 -mile radius they have killed 14
animals.
Judy fumes at the mysterious
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14 THE RURAL VOICE
dogs don't realize
snares would only be
set where the dogs
shouldn't be anyway.
Despite the
setbacks of the past,
this year has been
phenomenal, Judy says. Now they
have about 125 ewes.
The three legs of their business
are the shearing service, selling
breeding stock and marketing lambs.
One third of the lamb crop goes to
the Christmas market while the other
two-thirds go to the pre -Easter
market which brings a higher price
than the Easter market. Their
breeding stock is sold in the fall and
they always have more orders than
they can fill.
The whole family is involved in the
business. When Nicole turned one
they started a policy of giving her a
birthday present of a female lamb
born closest to her birthday. Now she
has a flock of eight sheep of her own.
Growing up around sheep Nicole
isn't afraid to go into the pen with
sheep that are bigger than she is. It's
one of the attractions of sheep, says
Judy who finds them something she
can easily handle. Nicole bottle feeds
surplus lambs and joined the rest of
the family when they showed sheep
at the Royal last fall, showing a
Suffolk Iamb in the show ring.
The Shelleys are leaders of the 4-
H sheep club that shows its sheep at
the Hanover fall fair. They even loan
Iambs to members who don't have
sheep of their own.
They're tireless promoters of the
sheep industry. When they take their
own lambs to market at Cookstown
or Keady, they sometimes take along
lambs from other small producers to
help them out. In April, Judy will
teach a sheep management course at
night school in Mount Forest.
While the sheep industry has seen
tremendous expansion in recent
years, too often people think it's