Breeding sheep

The Workers of the Countryside

The 30 tame, beautiful, wise and colourful ewes amble the summers away in environmental care locations on forested fields and pastures. They are very versatile workers of the countryside, transforming bushland into fields. They take care of the vegetation staying open and welcoming to various plant species on fields and forest pastures, helping preserve the traditional, grassy landscape of the countryside. Grazing and hay-eating animals help with binding carbon, which keeps the earth in a state of active growth. The sheep also fertilise their own pastures! The manure attracts pollinating insects to pollinate flowers and serve as bird food.

Finnsheep and Kainuu Greys

The majority of our sheep are the most common domestic breed, the Finnish Landrace, Finnsheep. The Finnsheep provide a full range of color in their wool, even featuring some multicoloured individuals. The farm also has smaller and most extinct of the three Finnish sheep breeds: Kainuu greys, with a black (or rarely brown) head and feet, their wool ranging from white to black across a palette of greys. The lambs of the grey are usually born pitch-black, with a very soft and curly coat of wool that makes them look like poodles. It’s exciting to follow their growth and see what colour the wool will eventually be!

Both breeds are hardy, dexterous and versatile. Their wool features many different qualities and degrees of finesse from excellent craft wool to fur pelts. The meat is mild, tasty, soft and fine-textured. Our domestic breeds are an international specialty for their characteristics, such as being able to fall pregnant throughout the year. Most other breeds are only able to do so in late summer to autumn. The most unusual characteristic, however, is the high fertility: the number of lambs per ewe is on average three, whereas other breeds would produce one or two. It’s normal for an ewe to deliver 2-4 lambs, but sometimes it might even give 5-6. In these cases it’s clear that the mother won’t have enough milk for all and some of them are born very small. This causes extra work, for the lambs need to be bottle-fed for 6-8 weeks.
The children visiting the farm are of course very excited about this. The Finnish sheep breeds are used to increase the fertility of other breeds and feature heavily in mixed breeding.

Breeding Our Sheep

At the moment the farm practice is having about 20 ewes lamb in March-April, bringing forth about 60 lambs. Ten ewes are so-called idlers, retired dames or young ladies still growing up. Even they aren’t completely idle, since they get to participate in the shepherd dog trainings. Our farm is thus very small on the scale of sheep farms, the flock being calibrated for the size of our fields and buildings. Despite the small scale we strive to do everything in the best way possible: we follow the growth and wellbeing of the lambs, choose only the best dams and rams for breeding, and study in order to find the best ways to operate to ensure the ideal condition of the sheep and pastures.
From the sheep we get ecological and comfortable, warming and breathing wool products, beautiful pelts, and nutritious grass-fed meat, which is rich in Omega-3 fatty acids.

Sheep Therapy

The Finnish sheep are excellently suited for therapy animals. They bring lots of joy and refreshment of the mind to us. They’re beautiful, well-sized, safe, warm, soft, gregarious, friendly, and very affectionate. Their life is also nice and interesting to follow. And what could be more endearing than holding a small lamb in your lap and feeding it? The bottle crowd becomes very tame and lambs love frolicking across the yard after their caretakers.

Rantakorpi farm

On the Rantakorpi farm, Finnish sheep and Eastern Finnish cattle are raised on a small scale. The farm offers horseback riding trips, experiences with farm animals and sheep products.

Contact info

johanna.koivuluoma@gmail.com

Rantakorpi farm
Rantakorventie 82
41490 Niemisjärvi
Finland

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