4-4 IAN Lambing and Shearing

Spring is wool harvest time for wool growers of Idaho. I went to Solon livestock near Letha, Idaho where the Solons were shearing 7000 head of woolly sheep as they prepare flocks for spring grazing turnout. In his own words Harry Solon explains the process. “The very end of February when we have to leave the federal range that we run on, we trail the sheep back from south of Kuna out in the Snake River birds of prey, we come through Caldwell, Black Canyon and end up here at Letha. Normally about 7 March we start shearing and that can last anywhere around 10 days, weather depending, after we get done shearing, we make up the spring bands, we vaccinate they ewes, ear tag a few ewes and then we try and get turned out of here towards the end of March and we start trailing towards the lambing range. These ewes will start lambing 5 April so we have to get up on the lambing range ahead of them. Are the shearers specialty craftsman who come in and do the work for you? Run us through the shearing process. The shearing boss that runs this operation is Cliff Hoopes and he is out of Wyoming. He has been sharing with us for about 15 to 17 years. One of the problems here in the US, there just is not as many shearers around as there used to be.”