Self-Intro of ShaDo Farms - Arlington, WA

[Guest guest]

ShaDo Farms

Doug & Sharon Sharp

email address: dougsharp@...

Snohomish County, WA

We live on 5 acres and hope to eventually be a self-sustainable farm.

We both hold full-time jobs with long commutes, so this will be a long

endeavor. We have a a small herd of Icelandic sheep from which we

harvest wool with the future intention of harvesting milk for making

cheese. We also have Ancona ducks from which we harvest eggs, and

registered Maremma LGDs. Our animals are raised free-range on pasture

and not given any hormones or antibiotics.

Our Maremmas just had a litter of pups on the 26th of February so

they'll be ready for new homes the end of April. They are not known

for having large litters, but they had a dozen pups. Our Maremmas

have a great lineage - Max comes from Rattle Creek Farms' Nero & Elma

in West Virginia, and Maddie is locally from On the Lamb Farms' Luca

Brasi and Carmela.

We welcome any suggestions on how to get started milking Icelandic

sheep as they are not really the domesticated type, though they do

love horse treats =o)

St. 's Creamery in Everett, WA is a goat dairy that sells raw

milk. Raw milk is also available locally via CSAs and recently I

noticed a fruit stand carrying it.

Anyway, we hope to glean a lot of information from this group.

God bless,

Doug & Sharon Sharp

ShaDo Farms - Italian Maremma LGDs, Icelandic Sheep, Ancona Ducks

Arlington, WA