Shearing preps

Two weeks out from shearing is almost as busy a time as shearing day. We get all the animals in and:

• body score them (rate them between 1 and 5 for weight by feeling along their backs).

• get their jabs up to date (I'll go into our jabbing programme another time!).

• clip any toe nails that need clipping (this takes two of us - one to clip, one to hold the animal).

• take samples of fleece that we want to get micron tested to see how the breeding programme is progressing. These get sent off to a lab.

Basically we try and get everything out of the way before shearing day, as it is hectic enough! Most of the herd are fine with it, just the pregnant ladies who tend to be rather grumpy.