Latest Posts
Boosting Your Pasture Nutrition Through Frost Seeding
Frost seeding provides an easy, no-drill method to boost your pasture nutrition and extend your grazing season. With frost seeding, you can add various herbs and legumes to your existing pasture. Seeding is done in the early spring when the night time temperatures fall below freezing and day time temperatures are above freezing. In Vermont, this coincides with sugaring season. The … Read More
Shepherds and the Fiber of Our Being
Not long ago, I became a member of the Northeast Felt Maker’s Guild. They recently put out a “call to artist” for their upcoming collaborative exhibition. This year, the exhibition is titled, The Fiber of Our Being. …As felters we work the wool with every fiber of our being. There is a direct connection from our fingertips to our medium … Read More
Readying for Lambing Season
With udders filling, and bellies rounding, my thoughts go to readying for lambing season. If I have learned anything at all from my many years of lambings, it is that with each year, I will push myself to my limit, I will see and do things that will bring me to my knees in awe and wonder, as well as … Read More
Ask the Shepherd-Scrapie Disease and Testing for Susceptibility
Scrapie is a fatal, degenerative disease affecting the central nervous system of sheep and goats. There is no cure and there is no treatment for scrapie, though scientists around the world are searching hard for one. Scrapie is classified as a transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE). Both scrapie and bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE; a.k.a. “Mad Cow” disease) are TSEs, as is … Read More
Felting With Gotland Gray Curls
Joining Nicole at Frontier Dreams for Keep Calm Craft On, to share my latest felting project. I spent the past few days, felting with Gotland gray curls. I set out to make a felted jacket, but had to abandon the sleeves when I realized that I would not have enough wool for both sleeves. So instead, I made a … Read More