The Auza sheep are being sheared this week and it will continue into the next few days. Over the weekend, I traveled to Casa Grande to catch up with the Auza family and the crew who would be shearing for them. I also needed my “fix” on seeing sheep as it had been since last May that I had been able to spend any time with the sheep, the herders and the Auza family. I will be posting the activities of Saturday over the next few days as there are lots of pictures and a few videos that capture the activity that occurs during the sheep shearing. I read on a Facebook page that sheep shearing is actually “spa day” for the sheep! In a way, I guess that is true as they get to shed their long wool coat for the hotter temperatures of the next few months before they are moved to greener pastures and cooler temperatures in the northern part of the state. By then they will have grown some of the wool back on.
The first two videos are as the sheep being brought to the shearing station which for a few days is located where a majority of the ewes having been grazing and caring for their young.
After the ewes and their babies are corralled, the workers begin to corral them into a tighter funnel.
The video tells you everything. The babies want their mommas!
Tomorrow I will post a video on the shearing from a man who has been in the business some twenty years.
ArizonaSheepHistory.wordpress.com 