Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Justina

Hannah's solid black daughter, Justina, is the only ewe lamb of the season by S'more Courante.  For that reason alone I am interested in her development.  Thankfully, Justina also happens to be a fine lamb with promising conformation.  Here she is with Hannah and her twin brother, Trans Am. 
While Trans Am has the super crimpy lamb fleece I've come to expect from Courante's offspring, Justina is a complete mystery.  She has the most uniform, un-wool-like, dog hair coat I have ever seen.  In fact, she looks like a glossy black lab retriever.  Both her parents have lovely fleeces, so I'm not worried about hers.  But I am curious about it and how it will develop.
I'm happy to announce that I made friends with little Justina this past week.  She shyly crowded in with Tucker, Jane, and Francesca one day and I surreptitiously rubbed her chest without her seeing my hand.  Even after the other lambs drifted away she was still dreamily receiving pets and accepted the fact that shepherd = bliss.  I love it when that happens! 
Justina is the lamb I suspected of being modified because of the lighter skin color around her eyes.  So far I don't see any evidence of modified in her fleece.  That's ok.  Even if she is only plain black I am still glad of her.  She's a little sweetheart.

3 comments:

Michelle said...

Does Justina feel soft? My little dog-coat lamb has never felt especially soft, so I'm not hopeful about her fleece. Someone is coming to look at her this morning; watch her turn into something stunning!

Sabrina Wille Erickson said...

She is not especially soft. Penelope is just like her, and she is out of my softest ewe, Lana, and Ash. Weird. Considering the genetics of these two dog hair lambs I would expect them to turn out stunning. Since I wasn't planning on selling them, it will be very interesting to watch them grow. Quite an education! But one I certainly didn't expect to acquire

Michelle said...

Well, I just took a deposit on my dog-coat ewe lamb (and Blackberry - yay!), so I will stay in touch with her new owner to see how she turns out, and would like to hear your results as well.