Fall was wonderful, warm and open.  The good weather gave us lots of opportunity to finish off summer projects and start on some that we thought would have to wait for spring.  Everyone had to adjust to "winter quarters", the boys and I back in Calgary, the sheep and horses back to Crossfield.  Bergen still had some fall pasture but Crossfield suffered more from the summer drought so it was back to hay almost right away.

Fibre Works Alpacas:  We were very busy with Canadian Camelid Fibre Co-op work.  The first fibre collection went ahead in October with the professional grading being done at Wool Growers in Lethbridge.  Over 2500 pounds of alpaca fibre was collected and graded.  A great start to a long (we hope) and beneficial business venture.  Moonshine, Diamante, Shelly, Zoe and Raya are settled in at Brewsters for the winter.  Moonshine and Diamante are for sale:  Alpacas for Sale .  Gaucho and Amigo are at Crossfield with the rest of the wethers.

Fibre Works Shetlands:  We moved all of the ewes and lambs to Crossfield for winter pasture at the end of August.  The combined flock totals over 50 now.  We tried fall shearing the ram lambs and the longer staple mature ewes at the end of September.  The fleeces were in the 4" range and very clean.  We also coated some of the mature ewes and ewe lambs to see how that method works to achieve cleaner fleeces.  Some people have had trouble with Shetland fleeces matting under the coats.  Maybe with our dry Alberta weather, we will avoid that problem. It will be an interesting spring shearing to see how the various approaches compare.  In early October, we decided to swap Sabre for Prairie Zoe and purchase Dailley Patty from Roberta and James Murray as part of their flock dispersal sale.  Zoe is a friendly light fawn yearling, very dense and a low status sheep.  Patty is a semi-single coated black, fairly dominant mature ewe.   They adjusted well and went in with the breeding groups. We started flushing with good quality hay at the end of September, breeding groups went together in mid-October.  We are using Avens, Sebastian, Henry, Bayberry and Auric.  They stayed together until early December.   Brendan was wethered due to horn problems.  Bjorn was also wethered due to his small size and semi-invalid status.  He seems very perky and gets along quite well.   We did not breed Brigitte this year so Bjorn stayed with her to keep her company until the breeding groups were disbanded.  We still have some 2000 ram lambs for sale:  Shetlands for Sale . 

Fibre, Yarn and the Fibre Works Gallery:  We have some new yarns and some new fleeces to put on the shelves but still haven't had the time.  We also started on a wonderful scarf project using handspun white alpaca and silk hand painted warp.  Amazing colours, beautiful hand and drape!  Pictures in the camera soon to be at the Gallery.

Bergen Norwegian Buhunds:   Treva and Tjalfi still do not think that the barn cats "belong".    We are working on it.  They have had to adjust back to the city with the no barking at the squirrels rule.  That is always a tough one!  We are planning for our next litter, likely in the fall of 2001 or the spring of 2002.  No decisions for sure until after the annual eye checks in May.  The puppies from the Jera litter are all great and placed with wonderful owners.