Our ewes live on our smallholding in Essex. The welfare of our animals is our main priority. We run a small flock so that we can provide the best possible care for each and every animal.
We have an incredibly close working relationship with our ewes, all of whom have names and very individual characters including Beatie who is the boss, Tilly who will do anything for a sprout! and Alice who thinks she is a dog and wags her tail when you scratch her head!... By getting to know each and every one of them, we can spot any changes in behaviour and provide a high level of care and attention. We work hard to ensure a happy, stress free life for both them and their lambs.
Our initial flock started 16 years ago with 3mth old; Molly, Beatie, Tilly, Lilly and Milly. The flock now includes Tilly, Molly and their Daughters, Grand Daughters,...
Great Grand Daughters, all the way to Great Great Great Great Great Grand Daughters. It's very much a family team....
Molly is a fantastic Mum, she always has twin girls and several of her daughters are in her flock, she's so attentive and protective x
Tilly is now 19, she must be one of the oldest sheep in Essex!? She's a bit blind so she now goes to bed in her stable in the barn each night with a warm straw bed, mineral lick, water and she has breakfast and dinner.
Read More...She also wears her coat (calf jacket) when its wet / cold through winter. She's the sweetest ewe and has been from the minute she arrived with her 4 sisters when they were 3 mths old. While the ram is here she resides in our Retirement Village along with Storm, her first niece, in a safely fenced off paddock alongside the normal grazing field with a new shelter, restaurant, grazing and hay racks. They receive a special seniors diet too. .
Jess is the daughter of Alice - one of my favourite, if a little greedy.. ewes. Fab Mum, real character and definitely passed that instinct and hunger to her little girl
Read More...Jess had 3 lambs before getting mastitis, which despite immediate treatment, sadly damaged one side of her udder so she could no longer suckle her lambs. She eagerly accepted the role of Auntie 3 years ago, which means she stays with the lambs when the lambs are weaned and all the Mums come home from summer grazing for their summer holiday.
Jess is the most fantastic Auntie! x
Last year, within 2 days, just 2 days!, she had the whole flock connected to her. When you call them now, the lambs all instinctively flock to Jess first and she brings them down, very proudly with a touch of strutting in her step, and into the pen for their meals. This also allows us to catch and treat any lamb quickly and without stress, whenever they need attention.
I'm Andi and I dreamed of being a shepherdess from the age of 5 when my addiction started during a wonderful holiday at a farm B&B in Cornwall.
Read More...We stayed on a Farm B&B in Cornwall when I was five and I would be up at dawn, wearing wellies and a nightdress and sneak out to the yard where the farmer would give me warm milk bottles and set me to feeding all the lambs. I was hooked.... and dreamed of it for many years. Kept dreaming about it throughout my 12 years in the rat race in a very high pressure job. Then an opportunity came our way so we lept! We both changed our jobs. We sold our house and bought a smallholding. Completed all the fencing and shelters and then bought our first 5 Hebridean ewe lambs, aged 6 months old. Beatie, Tilly, Milly Molly and Lilly. Their daughters run the current flock. I work from home as a web designer and my office window overlooks the main lambing shelter, so I can be designing a web page one second and delivering a lamb the next. I'm fully aware, every day, of how lucky I am but its taken a mountain of work and years of battling with planning departments to get here but I am very lucky. My girls are my passion, they are spoilt rotten and they are fantastic mums!
Read our story in Smallholders Magazine.
Hebridean sheep produce a uniquely soft but hard wearing fleece, which is lovely to spin and produces wonderful yarn with a gorgeous mix of browns, black, grey and even cream colours. Our fleeces have travelled to spinners and crafts people across the world inc; Canada, Hawaii, New Zealand, Australia, USA, Switzerland, Finland and Guernsey to name but a few. Postage can be arranged throughout Europe and the rest of the world (although fleeces going to USA and Australian must be washed first to meet customs laws). We already have a list of pre-orders for next years fleece so please get in touch if you would like to reserve some! Click here for details.
Millfields Rare Breeds Hebridean Sheep and Boreray rare breed Sheep, wool, yarn, wool products, fleece,
Gifts, Clothing and Footwear, Farm Equestrian and Country clothing.
