Gaeil Farrar
Staff Writer
Amely Wolf of the Springhouse 4-H Club brought an unusual market lamb to the 59th annual Williams Lake and District 4-H Show and Sale this year, but it is a breed she hopes will catch on in the Cariboo Chilcotin.
He is a Katahden/Dorper Cross and the only sheep of his kind in the show.
He was born the day before Valentine’s Day, hence his name Valentine. But adding to the reason for his name, Valentine also has a somewhat elongated light brown heart shape on his white back.
“He was evacuated to Prince George because of the fires so I only had four days to train him when we got him back,” Amely says.
She won a best groomed ribbon in her class, but says there wasn’t any other sheep to judge him against for achievement so she only received a participation ribbon for that category.
Valentine weighs 82 pounds and will be good eating, Amely says.
“They have really good meat with not as much fat as other sheep and they are parasite resistant,” Amely adds. “They are also really friendly.”
But the best advantage of raising Katahden/Dorper Cross sheep for meat is that their coat is made up of short hair. They only grow wool over the winter to keep warm but the wool falls off in the spring, which means they don’t require sheering, says Amely’s mom Sue. They also don’t need to have their tails docked as wool producing sheep do for cleanliness.
Sue says they have a small farm and were looking for a breed of market sheep which didn’t require a lot of maintenance and produced good meat.
Unless people are raising sheep to sell or use their wool as well, she says they have found the Katahden/Dorper Cross is an ideal meat sheep.
Valentine was for sale at the Williams Lake and District 4-H sale which took place Monday evening, Aug. 28 starting with the parade of champions at 5:30 p.m.
In addition to farm animals such as pigs, turkeys, steers, lambs and others to bid on, 4-H members sold other projects such as framed photographs and garden displays.
Many of the 4-H members in the district, like Amely, have had a difficult time raising their animals this year because of the wildfires and evacuation orders which resulted in the show and sale being rescheduled to take place at the Williams Lake Stockyards Aug. 23 to 29.
Many 4-H members impacted by the fires were not able to participate in the show and sale.