Shearing stuff

Had a day's work at The Farm Park - mainly to do the commentary for the shearing demonstrations. Everything seemed to go well both demos were packed and the shearing went really well.

The footwear in the blip are shearer's moccasins - they are made from felted wool and give the shearer grip on the floor made greasy by the lanolin in the sheep's fleece.

As I said yesterday the were a group of spinners trying to beat there own best time on a 'back to back' competition. It's a worldwide competition where up to 7 ladies spin a fleece just taken from a sheep and knit it into a jumper - the pattern, the ply of the wool and the size of the needles are set as a standard - their time last year was 10 hours+ but when I left they were well on their way to be 9hours+ - the Australian's do it in 4 hours - must pop over to check they're not cheating!

Back at the Farm Park tomorrow - there's a food festival celebrating local produce.