My poor babies! The shearing......

I've been really reluctant to post about the shearing day of our sheep and alpacas, but I figure that if you can't laugh at yourself (or your animals!) then you're taking yourself too seriously. When you look at the pictures you will see what I mean!
My friends, it was it was a bittersweet event. I am glad that they don't have those big fluffy coats on anymore and I can tell that they are completely relieved to be all lightened up and cool on the super hot days. BUT.....*sigh*......they look, well......silly. There I said it! Ok well to be fair, Cowboy and Kenzie (the sheep) look fine but Furio and Cortez, not so good. First, let me remind you of what our majestic friends looked like at their fluffiest. See this post here.
The shearers started with Furio and he was pretty compliant and mellow with just a couple moments of jerking and kicking.

You can see Cortez looking on nervously in the background behind the gate.
But they got through it and he was fine. No nicks or anything (THANKFULLY!) but he does look rather silly. Next was Kenzie and she was surprisingly calm! Though she did jab the shearer in the boob with her horn. She (the shearer) was none too happy about that! Kenzie did get a little nick on the neck that I was worried about but here it is a couple days later and it's healing quickly and she is doing great.
Next was Cortez and that's when things started going downhill. Cortez is the sensitive, skittish one of the bunch. He would not stay still, he was jumping, kicking and getting himself very very exhausted and since it was such a hot day, this was particularly dangerous. He had to be restrained and they pretty much had to rush through it because he was getting himself so stressed, exhausted and overheated. They didn't really finish his legs (you can imagine that it is pretty difficult to shear kicking legs!) and his new 'do really needs to be "cleaned up", which we plan on doing when they are gelded later this month or early next month (they will be sedated during the gelding and when that is over with, Todd and I will quickly clean up his scruffy 'do. That's the plan at least, lets see how it all works out!). He has gained a few new nicknames since the shearing including: Shambles, Disgrace, and Patches. All of which are said in a very endearing way and Cortez has a great sense of humor about it. Love you, Patches!!
Cowboy was also quite a pain. He was extremely squirmy and just not having it. He got a couple nicks also but, like Kenzie, they have pretty much all but healed. He feels great I'm sure. His coat was probably the thickest and hottest of them all, him being black and all.
So without further ado, here are my hideous beasts (don't laugh!.....Ok laugh but be gentle!) Here is Furio galloping, light as a feather!


and here is the rest of our ragged gang:

Furio is hiding behind Cortez and you can really see just how silly Cortez looks. Kenzie is the one who looks the best out of the bunch. Needless to say that our animals are the laughing stock of the neighborhood at the moment.

So there are a couple of things for which I am thankful regarding this shearing.
1. No one was hurt. I was really scared that Cortez was going to get himself some gashes by flailing around as much as he was, but thankfully he is just fine. Kenzie and Cowboy got a couple nicks but they are all but healed a couple days later.
2. Furio has all of a sudden decided that I am his new best friend! He has always been a little reluctant to cuddle in any way (same goes for all of the fluffy bunch) but now that he doesn't have all that extra fluff, I think he really appreciates me rubbing his neck and back. He used to only let me pet him for a split second while feeding him a cup of grain but now I don't even need the grain, I can just walk up to him and give him some love. This makes me so happy, you can't even imagine! He even let me pet him while he was laying down yesterday!! That is a huge step in the right direction. He's finally warming up to me!! Now Cortez and Kenzie are a totally different story. We'll work on that I guess!
3. The alpacas don't intimidate me as much as they once did. I think I thought that the animals were a lot larger than they actually are because they were under all that fluff. It's hard to be intimidated by a face like this:

4. Their fur will grow back very quickly. Within about a month, they will start to fill back in and all the patchiness will start to fade away. But hopefully by then, we will have a chance to "spot clean" the alpacas so they will look slightly better.
5. This experience has motivated me to learn more about shearing and eventually learn how to do it myself. The animals are a heck of a lot calmer around my husband and me and since the act of getting sheared is already stressful to an animal, I think it would ease their minds if it were my husband and me doing it rather than a stranger.

So our first shearing experience was somewhat of a flop but also a great learning experience. I learned a lot of things I should NOT do next time!
Oh, almost forgot to show you the huge pile of fleece!


No, that's not a garbage bag, that is an 8' by 10' tarp! Here's a closer look at Cortez' fleece:


I have already spun up a bobbin of it on my spinning wheel! It spins like a dream! I look forward to making some hats and mittens out of the yarn!

Hope you enjoyed!