Neil drove truck as an owner-operator driving long-haul into the U.S.A. He sold the truck and trailer in Jan. 2005 to be home with the family. He worked part-time for a relative on a hog/cash crop farm and rented a small hog finishing barn nearby for almost a year. We felt that profit margins in hog farming were too tight and overhead costs were too high for our comfort. Heidi had a backyard flock of 10-15 ewes for about 2 years previous to this. They were enjoyable to keep and paid for themselves, so we decided to research further into raising sheep. We discovered the OLIBS group through a farm profile in The Ontario Sheep News. They were very willing to provide advice on start-up and sheep management. We were very impressed with the health status and productivity of the OLIBS flocks. We sold our existing sheep. Over the fall of 2005 and spring of 2006 we purchased 400 OLIBS ewes, 5 Texel rams and 1 Suffolk ram. The rams all came from OLIBS flocks to preserve the health status of the ewes. The sheep were kept in rented barns at Troy Ont. In July 2006 we moved to our own farm east of Brantford. and bought 60 more OLIBS ewes and 2 more Texel rams. We marketed our lambs on the OSMA Forward Contact Program while it was still in operation, and were told by OSMA staff that at the time we had some of the best carcass index numbers in the program. We accepted an offer to become OLIBS replicating Breeders in the spring of 2007. The Texel rams were sold and replaced with OLIBS rams from John & Eadie Steele and from Darryl and Rachel Stoltz. Our 1'st crop of OLIBS replacement lambs were born in the fall of 2007.

On our farm we pasture the sheep as much as possible using intensive rotational grazing on a combination of perennial pastures and annual crops of wheat, rye, sorghum/sudangrass, oats, barley and turnips. These annuals are used to fill in gaps in the growing season when perennial pastures can't keep up with demand and to expand the spring and fall grazing season. We also pasture a lot of rough land on our own and neighboring farms that is unsuitable or impossible to use as cropland. We also winter graze crop residues on neighboring farms. Often this is viewed by the neighbors as a favour in helping to keep their farms neat and clean. With these combinations of feeds we've been able to keep about half the flock (dry ewes) grazing with very little supplemental feed until into January.

We lamb the ewes indoors in greenhouse style buildings on a 3 times in 2 years accelerated lambing schedule. Our market lambs and replacement ewe lambs are raised in the greenhouses or in a converted tie stall dairy barn. Ewe lambs are pastured as conditions permit. Market lambs are finished on a corn, grain ration for quick weight gain and mild meat flavour. We work carefully with our nutritionist to formulate and balance these rations for optimum health of the lambs as well as the ewe flock.

On our farm we have also worked extensively with the Environmental Farm Plan and the Grand River Conservation Authority to cost-share our fencing and pasture watering system. Partial funding was supplied for fencing the sheep away from the creek that flows through the farm as well as the pond that is used as our water supply. Treed shelter belts are also planned for planting in 2008.

We have gone to several seminars and farm tours put on by the Large Flock Operators group. These tours have been an excellent networking opportunity to work with other farmers and OMAFRA staff.

In the fall of 2007 Neil was nominated for and joined the executive committee for OSMA District 4.