Welcome to The Chronicles. I hope you will enjoy my posts about the joys of raising the oldest breed of sheep in the world -- the always intriguing, easy-to-raise Soay sheep. With few exceptions, posts contain what I hope is useful information interspersed with a bit of whimsy. Feel free to comment on anything you find here. If you want to send me a private message, that's okay, too. Send your note to the address on the "contact us" page of our main website (***saltmarshranch-dot-com). Meanwhile, enjoy The Soay Sheep Chronicles! Priscilla
With both the World Series and the election almost over, it’s time to start thinking about that special Soay shepherd on your Christmas list. The last time I made gift suggestions here was several years ago, so I guess an update is overdue. Disclaimer: everything on this list is a personal favorite of mine. I […]
As I have said before on these pages (I think), when it comes to deciding which rams to breed, Soay owners engaged in conservation breeding face a dilemma: whether to breed rams with tight horns, including horns that have been cut. If we do not breed these rams, either because we do not like their […]
So you’ve decided you want to start a small flock of Soay sheep and you have, or can put together, the infrastructure to support your new flock: pastures or a barnful of hay, secure fencing, water and shelter, and predator control appropriate to your location. But what about the starter flock itself? How many sheep […]
Nothing we do to keep our sheep healthy is as basic and simple as putting iodine on every newborn Soay lamb’s navel. Just when the poor newborn is staggering around trying to figure out where on earth that udder and nipple are that it so urgently needs to find, the lamb’s moist umbilical is dragging […]
No sooner had we managed to jam all seven of our adult rams into the five-foot square Shaul panel enclosure intended to allow Sidley and Upton (our two breeders this fall) to safely rejoin their brethren than it was time to spring the rams from isolation and let them fend for themselves. The Soay scrum, […]
One of the few genuine dangers in raising sheep, heritage or commercial, is the non-breeding rams’ aggression towards the (lucky) breeding rams when breeding is over and the breeders return to the full ram group. It’s a pretty simple phenomenon: the breeders smell like ewes and the non-breeders are overwhelmed by hormonal jealousy. The solution […]