At Desert Weyr we breed high performance Black Welsh Mountain sheep for the farm flock owner who wants easy care sheep that perform well on forages alone.
Our superior mutton is for the local food aficionado ready for a rich flavorful meat that is out of the ordinary.
Rich, deep black wool provides a neutral background for the fiber artist whether you are a spinner, knitter, weaver or crocheter.
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PHILOSOPHY
Our small family farm produces animal products in a humane and environmentally friendly way. We provide our food and fiber animals with a healthy life and a quick humane death. We manage our pastures in a sustainable fashion designed to improve soil fertility and the farm environment.
Black Welsh Mountain Sheep are an old British breed noted for both meat and wool production. They are small and easy to handle. In the UK Welsh Mountain sheep are noted for providing the best tasting mutton. We cannot ship meat but it is available at our farm store and in Paonia at Lizzy’s Market. Try some tasty Black Welsh Mutton at your next special event.
The fleece is a dark black or reddish black called cuchddu. Check out our shop for raw fleeces, washed and carded roving, spun yarn and sturdy hiking socks.
Sheep manure is a wonderful fertilizer and we offer it for sale to local gardeners by reservation. We also save and prepare the horns from the rams for crooks, buttons and knife handles.
It is our responsibility to use as much of the animal as we can and we take our responsibility seriously.
Come visit and see our wonderful sheep.
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BLOG
Learn how we manage our small farm on a daily basis and get to know our flock!
2019 Lambing Done!
Lambing for 2019 has finished. We bred 36 ewes and every single ewe got pregnant. This is a first for us. Usually at least 1 ewe fails to conceive. Sadly we lost 2 ewes. One to an accident and one to pregnancy toxemia. Our lambing percentages were decent, 57...
AI Class Results
We've finished our first round of lambing and the AI Class results are in. Total ewes bred via AI was 34. Total ewes lambing to AI was 9 giving a 26% lambing. However, as everyone knows we had some straw failures and other issues where the ewe did not...
Scone Recipe and AI Class Completed
We hosted a class in sheep artificial insemination the first week of December. 10 students from all over the US and even one from Canada came to learn about non-surgical procedure that Dr. Purdy has developed. Students got to practice thawing straws of frozen semen...
How I got 15 meals from a 9 pound Heritage Turkey
Thanksgiving is over. For the last several years we haven’t had turkey on Thanksgiving because I was not able to get a locally raised heritage bird. I like the flavor and I want to support rare breeds so if I can’t get a bird raised like I want it we’ll choose...
Freezer Management
One of the hardest things to manage when you use chest freezers for storing meat for sale is how to handle the depths of the freezer and not lose track of what you have. I’ve discovered a few tricks over the years that are applicable to anyone with a chest freezer. My...