Our small "nearly fifteen" acre farm in eastern Iowa became home to its first flock of Romney and Romney-cross sheep in the spring of 2000 when we were looking for a way to manage the vegetation.  We were doing a lot of mowing!  Our first flock consisted of a Romney/Border Leicester cross ram, a purebred Romney ewe, and a Romney/Finn/Rambouillet cross ewe.  In 2004, we began to add strong purebred Romney genetics to our line from both the east and west coasts, emphasizing soft, lustrous fleeces and strong, correct conformations.  Our Romney flock has grown to about thirty breeding ewes who consistently produce award-winning fleeces and beautiful, well-built lambs.

 

In spring of 2007, our desire to help in protecting the genetic diversity of sheep culminated in the purchase of a small starter flock of Romeldale/CVMs.  With three ewes and a ram lamb from Yellow Creek Cottage in OH, we look forward to adding a line of finer fleeces as well as incresing the numbers of this beautiful but endangered breed.  Other than at breeding time, the two flocks live together and exist as one - at least for the time being!

The sheep at Peeper Hollow Farm have free access to pasture year-round, and are supplemented during the snowy months with grass and alfalfa hay, and a corn/oat blend for lactation.  The breeding flock is shorn in late winter, just before lambing, to avoid tender areas or breaks in their fleeces due to lambing stresses. All animals destined for the sale barn in late fall, including lambs and culled breeders, are sheared in October, giving us some beautiful fleeces that would otherwise be lost.  All sheep are covered with coats immediately after shearing to keep their fleeces clean.  Even the lambs wear covers/coats beginning within minutes after birth.  The coats keep the fleeces clean of the vegetable matter (VM) or foreign fibers and dirt that normally find their way into uncovered sheep fleeces.  Each sheep's coat is changed out at least twice over the course of the year as the wool (or the sheep's own physical growth, especially in the case of lambs!) requires.  After all, most of these sheep will be eight to sixteen inches wider at the end of one year's growth of wool than right after shearing!