How Sheep Wool Becomes Yarn at Old Long Farm in Callicoon

Alex Gardner spends a good deal of time tending to his 32 Shetland sheep. Gardner, owner and farmer of Old Long Farm in Callicoon, chatted with Radio Catskill about the joys of turning sheep wool into yarn.

Responses have been lightly edited for clarity and length.

Tell me how you started Old Long Farm.

“I grew up in Vermont and worked with sheep when I was in high school with a lady down the road from me. When we moved to Callicoon, we moved into an old dairy farm. Most people know it as the Old John Long Farm. It was the barn we’re standing in.

Since I love sheep, I thought, ‘We have a barn and fields.’ We got seven sheep in the midst of the pandemic from a lady upstate. They’re all pure Shetlands… and so now, we have 32 sheep.”

What are the sheep’s personalities like?

“Shetlands are very curious, relaxed, and a little wary. Some of them will let me come right up to them and pet them. They’ll eat out of my hand if I give them grain.

They don’t like to be startled. You know, they’re prey. They’re also herd animals. If one gets spooked, they all run away with them. One needs to be very slow, quiet, and gentle when managing sheep because they’re very gentle animals.

When they like to be petted, they’re like dogs. They just want to be scratched on their butts, behind their ears, and on their necks and noses. They’re very sweet. They meet each other by sniffing each other’s noses.”

Walk me through the process of turning sheep wool into yarn.

“Most sheep get sheared once or twice a year. The first couple of years we had them, we only got sheared once a year, but now we do twice a year because their fleeces grow so fast, and it’s just softer, better quality. There’s a lot less waste.

We have a guy, Jim Powers, who comes down and shears twice a year in the early spring and in the early fall. He gets them up on their back, and he shears them for about five minutes each sheep. It’s really quite amazing to watch. It’s a beautiful art.

Then I do what’s called skirting. I lay out the fleece and pick out the bits of hay. After two or three shearings, I put it in bags and bring it up to Battenkill Fiber Mill.

It takes about a year and a bit to process. They turn it into yarn for me and send it back. I knit with it, give it away, or sell it in New York.”

I didn’t realize it takes more than a year to process the fleece. What goes into that?

“It’s a pretty involved process. First, you have to wash it. Then they do what’s called carding. It’s essentially getting all of the fibers in the same direction. You can do that by hand, but it is incredibly labor-intensive.

It then goes into a spinner. If you’re hand spinning, you just take a little piece, and it goes into a hand spinner. With a big, huge machine, it’s all going in one direction, and they spin it into the yarn.”

Your favorite part about raising and tending to sheep?

“Lambing is really, I think, the high point of the year. Lambs are so joyful. They literally bounce across the room when they’re excited. When they’re nursing, their tails go fluttering back and forth. It’s really adorable.

Lambs are perfectly happy to be picked up and held. They like to play. That’s really the most joyful part.”

Image: A sheep sniffs a camera at Old Long Farm in Callicoon, N.Y. (Photo Credit: Kimberly Izar)