Life on a Diversified Family Farm

Despite the unprecedented cool weather and abundant rain, spring has sprung at WoodsEdge! Flowers, crias (baby alpaca and llamas) and yak calves are each welcomed with delight. The herds run and romp through the lush green pastures. Our grass fed beef are content and although our honey production is somewhat hampered by the rain, our hives are healthy and the bees enjoying the increased bee friendly plantings we have done.

  

Our alpaca and llama fleece harvest was done in late March and early April this year so we could get the fleece into manufacturing channels sooner, with some exquisite hand-spinning fleeces pulled aside for our upcoming annual Summer Stitch, Spin ‘n Sip on June 23. The yak soft down is still being harvested, but visitors to our Farm Store will be totally enthralled with the yak fiber, rovings and yarns we already have processed and ready to sell.

 

We welcome your visit to our Farm Store filled with the bounty our 90 acre diversified family farm produces. Please visit soon! We are open from 10 a.m. till 4 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays.

 

Fashion Forward - Spring 2013

New York is abuzz as Fashion Week rolls into town! These runway shows symbolize the beginning of the spring! 

 

The Spring 2013 colors and styles are already well defined and are just now beginning to hit retail stores across the country. We thought perhaps a report on the fashion colors for Spring 2013 would help you – whether you are buying new clothes for yourself, products for a farm store or dyeing yarns and spring accessory items like we are.

It’s a good year to use those natural alpaca colors – particularly the beiges and light fawns, as well as silvers. You know, of course, that you can “create” your own silver by adding 10% black fibers to 90% white fibers. It is a perfect way to use what the alpaca industry has called “contaminated” grey or black fibers. Here at WoodsEdge we have been “creating” grey yarns since the late 70’s in sheep’s wool, as there were few light silver grey fleeces!

I particularly like to add my own signature to the beige or light fawn products by over dyeing with a pale pink Linen or soft Nectarine. I feel these over-dyed colors are more feminine, more saleable, and look better on more skin tones.

Handspun handknit shawl made from medium silver grey alpaca overdyed with a hint of blue.
Vintage WoodsEdge circa 1990's.

It is also definitely the season to over dye light silver grey. We are excited to have four new grey alpaca yarns to add to our repertoire this spring and look forward to over dyeing the pale silver grey as well as the variegated silver grey and soft brown tweed as soon as this arctic air mass dissipates. This is the perfect natural color to over dye to achieve the dusky blues, Grayed Jades and muted lavenders such as African Violet. In fact, many of the blues shown this season could be over dyed on pale silver. With blues being one of the easiest colors to wear by many different skin tones, it is sure to be the color you will want to stock up on if you are in retail.

The new bright colors on the scene are Emerald and Tender Shoots (aka chartreuse), which look fabulous with Monaco Blue or Dusk Blue. Poppy Red paired with white, navy or black continues to be a quintessential All American favorite.

News to Yak About

Brent, our head yak master here at WoodsEdge, just returned from the International Yak Show and Conference, held annually at the National Western Stock Show in Denver, Colorado. He had a great time, made lots of friends and bought the Reserve Champion bull along with a few other cows. Photos should be forthcoming on our new Tibetan Yak Foundation Female and Signature Sire pages, on our web site. It is not live yet, but keep checking - it will be soon!

Stock Yards at the 2013 National Western Stock Show, Denver, CO

Coincidentally, on Brent’s first day back at the farm, a new yak heifer calf born! It was a typical winter thaw January day in New Jersey with temperatures climbing out of the deep freeze to start snowing, then sleeting and gradually warming up enough to rain. After growing up in Iowa, New Jersey weather never ceases to amaze me after 40 years of living here!  

Fortunately, this mama yak was no ordinary cow. She is one of the infamous elite McRobert/Puckett yaks, who we affectionately call Boss Mama. She has earned her title respectfully as a stellar wooly Imperial who is a no nonsense mama and herd protector. A little funky New Jersey weather was not about to get in her way of birthing another outstanding wooly Imperial yak! Ollie, our resident yak whisperer, and caretaker of yak has done a marvelous job with taming this wild and wooly group from Nebraska! Hence it was no surprise to Ollie that Boss Mama chose the dry bedding in the barn to have her new calf. I am sure Jerry McRoberts (God rest his soul) never imagined one of his cantankerous cows choosing a barn to birth in, but then that is why we have always said the animals who are lucky enough to be chosen as WoodsEdge bloodstock come to the WoodsEdge Spa and Resort.

Boss Mama with her 2 day old calf.

We are happy to report that Boss Mama and her lively heifer calf that is up and running, are both doing fine! This calf takes its place as one of the elite few who earned the name as McRoberts’ BEST, out of his two best bulls that he sold to Tad Puckett along with this elite group of cows right before he died. Having known Jerry and his brother Wayne, and their wives Barb and Cathy (who was one of our first alpaca garment models) since the mid 1980’s, I am sure Jerry would be pleased his elite yak who were the love of his life (other than his wife and daughter Brooke) are in a breeding program that is determined to take Tibetan Yak to the next level.

Thanks Jerry! With every calf out of your breeding program, your name and reputation as the foremost breeder of Tibetan Yak in North America remains talked about! Brent and I are so grateful we have these genetic treasures in our herd.

Yakfully yours,

Linda Berry Walker & Brent Walker

Breeding Award Winning Fibers since 1976             

Life on the Farm in Autumn

 Ahhhhh….fall is finally here and now our busy season begins!

Our last blog was about what the Fashionista’s would do this year at the Garden State Sheep and Fiber Festival. Despite the sticky weather on Saturday, the Festival was a huge success! Amy & Illumina won the Shepherd’s Lead class wearing an ensemble inspired by the fall colors. If you love the scarf that Amy is wearing, come visit the Farm Store as we hand dyed a few in the same color palate.  



All of the farmers markets are in full swing, until they sing their sweet swan song at the end of October or the weekend before Thanksgiving, depending on the market. We are at full tilt at the markets, as the weather has turned chilly and everyone is looking for our alpaca socks and blankets! Stop by a farmers market near you and see our selection of alpaca and llama wears.

As we have still not yet had a killing frost, my great gardener friend Leisa and I have been strategizing what we can save and what we have to put to bed until next spring. Amazingly we still have a fair amount of color in the gardens and Leisa’s addition this year of grasses has been spectacular. My favorite is graciella with her graceful plumes – sounds like a great name for an alpaca cria too! In our efforts to save as much as we could, Leisa decided to take Madame Gardenia home to her eastern sunlight breakfast nook. This year Madame performed better than any other gardenia that I have ever raised with prolific blooms all summer. Too our dismay, we learned gardenia’s are poisonous to cats and dogs, thus not a good choice for anyone with indoor pets. If anyone reading this has a greenhouse, or home without pets and a great eastern sunny exposure, let us know right away. We would love to give Madame Gardenia a new home.

Crias and little yak calves are being born. What a thrill!

We invite you to the farm to share the wonders of the fall season!

What will the Fashionistas do this year?

Around our farm, Amy is known as one of the two legged fashionistas, but there are quite a few four legged fashionistas as well.  Meet WoodsEdge Bright Ilumina, one of our best dressed suri llamas!

Last year Amy and WoodsEdge Causin’ A Commotion placed second in the largest adult Shepherd's Lead class to date. This year Amy and WoodsEdge Bright Illumina will be back to strut their stuff! With the help of fellow fiber aficionado, Ginger Clark, and WoodsEdge’s in-house fiber aficionados, this year's garments will surely impress the judges! Come cheer on these fashionisitas this Sunday around 1pm at the Garden State Sheep and Fiber Festival. The Shepherd's Lead is a crowd pleasing class you won't want to miss. 

Click here to learn more about the Shepherd's Lead class.

Yakkity Yak - All About Yak Fiber

Our three Imperial Tibetan Yak cows pictured here, although true black to look at; actually produce a warm milk chocolate brown fleece. The yak fiber is short stapled, and ultra-fine like cashmere, but often compared to quiviut. They shed this precious downy fiber annually, with the shed complete usually by fall.

It spins into a fine soft yarn; making a lovely lace weight yarn. Depending on your preference you can spin yak on a light weight top whorl spindle or a supported spindle, or a high ratio spinning wheel.

Yak blends very nicely with other fibers. If you are going to blend by hand, use a similar staple length fiber like cotton, cashmere or camel down. Commercially combed tops are also a great way to try yak for the first time, and spin quite easily. My personal favorite is a 50/50 blend with Merino or Cormo, which changes the color to a lovely pearlescent grey with a rich patina. Perhaps the most surprising quality of yak fiber is the soft luster.

This coming weekend at the Garden State Sheep and Fiber Festival, held at the Hunterdon County Fairgrounds on Rt 179 in Ringoes (directions -http://www.co.hunterdon.nj.us/depts/rutgers/2011-4HFair/directionsandmap.pdf) you will get an opportunity to purchase both the Imperial Yak down and white Royal Yak down, as well as the pewter colored yak/merino top. We are in Barn 3 – just look for the 10 ft Yak banner! Perhaps best of all, you will see Ginger spinning lace weight yak yarn on her top whorl spindle, and hear yak stories from Linda. For you knitters, we will have the first few skeins of yak/alpaca yarns for sale.

Come see us at the Festival and yakkity yak with us!

Just Hanging Out for the Holiday?

Whew, can you believe summer is almost over. Marked by a gorgeous full moon tonight, we were out rounding up alpacas. Always fun on a full moon!
 

But if you are just hanging out this weekend like our friendly farm kitten has taken to do – mouse hunting seems to have been cancelled for the weekend according to him.

We invite you to stop in Saturday or Sunday from 10 till 4. We have a bumper crop of crias in the store paddock who love to show off their racing skills. The yak that have been busily photographed all week, which means cookies galore, have enjoyed the attention, so hopefully if it is not too hot, you can see them grazing in the bird sanctuary. Perhaps you can spot Mop Top – our curly headed 4 month old calf. His mama, Boss Mama, has finally let him venture out from under her long black yak skirt.

The farm store is open on Saturday and Sunday, but not Monday. Even avid farmers need a day off! Hope to see you over the weekend. If not, thanks for your continued support!