Don on why Treleven decided to focus on lamb

“But at the time, when we got into the picture, it was clear to us that the crop of primary value would be lamb. And we, both by choosing the breeds that we chose to start the flock and then by aggressive selection, we created a flock that could produce a 200% lamb crop per year. So the average ewe would have twins. And if a 130 pound ewe has two lambs weighing eight pounds at birth, and can raise them to 65 pounds on milk by eating grass, which is what we were doing, then she’s, she’s producing her weight in lamb each year. And now that we have a refrigerated cold chain so that you can, and for that matter, you can put lambs on a pickup truck and drive them to an auction market in Massachusetts and get a good price for them. It just seemed to overwhelm the economics of raising sheep for wool. So wool became, I’m not gonna say a byproduct but a secondary to what we were doing.”

Hilary on lessons learned through butchering

“Yeah, I worked as, at a slaughterhouse in Ferrisburgh for a while, and did butchering there and I did all processes from the kill floor all the way through packaging, really enjoyed that I liked that work a lot, it was really satisfying. Because I’m also interested in the genetic or no, the anatomy piece of animals, I’ve always liked that side of it too. So being able to see what we created, because I did send my lambs there while I was working there. So I got to see what the carcass looked like, which is something that not many farmers or shepherds get to see. So that it’s I think, I think it’s really valuable because you can see the result of what you’ve been feeding them all summer. And with a sheep it’s particularly hard because they have so much fluff on the outside, right? They’ve got all the wool or the hair or whatever, that can disguise a lot of it and you can try to feel it and manipulate it and get to know it that way. But when you can add in that piece of seeing the carcass from the inside it really, you know, is enlightening as to your practices and you can compare it to other people and you’re like, Oh, my carcass looks different from that one. And I’ve noticed that they graze or feed their sheep this way or so it’s really I love that comparison and analysis piece. So I was able to do that butchering as well as getting to know how the carcass break down really well on a sheep. It’s very simple, of course, but being able to describe to my customers, oh I think you should probably grind that shoulder if you’re looking for, you know, a large amount of ground lamb. Or if you really wanted more stew, you should probably put in that leg, you know, that kind of stuff, which is so valuable to maintain a customer base. Because you need, these people are paying like what, like $400 to get back this lamb, and you don’t want them to be disappointed, and you want them to have what they were hoping to have from it. So it was enjoyable, because I liked the work. But it was extremely helpful for the success of our farm for me understanding the breakdown, I mean, also of the beef, but we’re talking about sheep. So the breakdown of a sheep carcass. Seeing it from the inside.” 

Hilary on educating consumers about the whole meat process

“So certainly, when I was piece, like selling my lamb by the piece, at farmer’s market, there was a lot of people who were like, oh we just want, you know, the lamb chops for our dinner tonight. And those are the people who I loved sort of talking to about farming. And they were extremely enlightened by what farming was like, and like how lambing has a season and how slaughtering, there’s a season and not everything’s available all the time, year round. And like all that kind of stuff was really clicking for people and that felt really cool and fun. But the customers that we have now are people who have like, they totally get it. And this was a weird year for us, slaughter wise and all of our customers were so supportive and understanding that the prices went up that it looks a little different than normal, all that kind of stuff. So it feels really good to have finally gotten to the point where people understand, because it definitely can fight, that can fight against you when you’re out in a marketplace trying to sell things. And it’s hard, sometimes it’s frustrating that people don’t understand. I had a lot of comments at market, almost every week, someone would come up and make a comment on how expensive a piece of meat was. And it’s just really frustrating to me, you know, like people think that I am making, like that $15 a pound chop is like pure profit for me. It’s like, I don’t think you understand. I’m not getting rich off of my lamb chops by charging $15 a pound. It’s like that’s what it takes to pay for like this whole process. You know, I’m not jacking up the price.”

Hilary on selling lamb skins

“Right now we don’t have a great way to preserve, keep the wool really clean on our sheep. Because we shear once a year, it is pretty much like a matted mess by the time it comes up, with burdock that they got over the summer that’s sort of grown into the wool. So shearing it and trying to turn it into a nice wool product is like, it wouldn’t work at all. So we’ve decided instead that for the lambs when we slaughter them, it just makes sense for us to keep the wool on the lamb. And then when they get slaughtered, we take the skin and send it down to get tanned in Pennsylvania. And it’s a really popular and easy to sell product locally. And we have a reputation for having them so people call us asking for them. So they take, takes no effort to sell it. Where the wool side of things you know, the sheep get shorn every year, and it’s just the decision because of the poor quality wool to not have it sent out. But it’s also at the beginning, when Ben and I started our farm, it would take so much money to invest in having our wool processed, and then having to work pretty hard to sell it. It just didn’t make sense for us. So we had a couple things fighting against us. But I think in the future, we’ll work towards having better quality wool, because it is hard to see all the wool not get used for something every year. It’s a little like, oh that’s too bad. But it was kind of like the sheep’s shell for the year, and they utilized it to keep them warm to keep them cool, keep their bodies protected from bugs and all that stuff. So it was essential, and it is essential that they get it taken off every year. So it doesn’t feel like a complete waste, but it is still sad knowing that we could probably do it a little better.”