Bluefaced Leicester yearling ewe. This photo won 5th place at 2008 Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival

Our first fiber animals were three Bluefaced Leicester ewes. They carry both UK Barlaes Titus and Bayshore bloodlines.  We picked this breed because we were mainly interested in wool, but we wanted to start with a dual purpose breed. Our farm goal is to  breed toward producing the highest quality fleece available. Their wool is tightly purled, fine, dense, semi-lustrous and opens cleanly to the skin. And it is very nice to spin with!  Bluefaced Leicesters are considered a large breed, with the rams weighing in around 250 pounds and the average ewe around 175 pounds, but very manageable.

 

 Here are a few interesting facts about Bluefaced Leicesters:

 

* The Bluefaced Leicester is one of the three Leicester breeds, Bluefaced, Border, and Leicester Longwool. All three types originated in the early 1900s in northern England. The name refers to the dark skin under the fine white hairs covering their faces.  The breed is the largest of the native British longwool breeds and the most prolific. The fleece is predominately white wool, but this breed does carry a recessive black gene and natural colored lambs do appear.

 

* We have bred all of our ewes to our registered BFLram Blue. He carries both domestic and UK bloodlines of Carry House V2, Gwestydd Jamie and Beeston Titan in his pedigree. He was 2007 Howard County Fair Reserve Champion Other Meat Breeds Ram, 2008 Reserve Champion Ram at the Montgomery County Fair, and also the highest placing BFL at the 2008 Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival. We are eagerly looking forward to seeing his offspring. Breeding stock will be available in 2009.

 

All of our BFLs taking a cud chewing break.  The fence damage was done by our two rams  - stronger fencing will be coming soon!

Our Bluefaced Leicester ewe, Cissy loves to stick her nose in the snow. 

* It is considered a longwool. It has a staple length of 3"-6" with a fleece weight of 2 1/2 to 4 1/2 pounds. We sell our raw fleeces, heavily skirted, at $16.00 per pound.

Two three week old ewe lambs.

We are proud members of the following organizations which contain a wealth of information concerning our favorite breed of sheep and sheep related activities:

 

Bluefaced Leicester Union of North America

 

Frederick County Sheep Breeders Association

 

Maryland Sheep Breeders Association

 

 

Three week old ram lamb.

 

 

Ewe lamb at one month old.