I just want to buy a Katahdin for a pet or “lawnmower”- do you have any for sale?

Sure! Katahdins make great pasture maintenance animals, they tame easily and love to come running for a grain bucket! I find that most people who want sheep for pets find that shearing wool sheep is burdensome. It’s expensive to pay a shearer to come out to do a small number of animals, it’s hard to get the sheep dry enough in our climate; and for most pet owners, doesn’t result in salvageable or saleable wool. Hair sheep are much easier to keep as pets since they shed naturally, like wild sheep do.

You can certainly choose to buy registered breeding stock for pets. Sometimes we have adult “cull ewes” for sale which have had a problem with lambing and should not be bred again, but can make fine and gentle pets. Or, you can buy a castrated “wether” lamb that’s destined for the slaughter channel. We usually have lots of fun colors to choose from. Wethers are usually the regular $200 butcher lamb price ,regardless of size. However, sometimes we have a few slow-to-start lambs which, for various reasons, are going to take a long time to hit butcher weight. Since we know we have to put a lot of feed into them to get them to gain, we may sell them at a discount while they are still small.

We do have a minimum “floor” price for pets; and this is to ensure that the buyer can comfortably afford to take on one or more sheep as companions. On a small acreage, it can cost a few hundred dollars a year in feed and supplies to maintain an adult sheep. So, buyers who are uncomfortable with a purchase price in that range may find they are also uncomfortable with the costs to maintain the sheep later on. Thus, we don’t normally give away sheep for free, or entertain bargaining. This is a working farm, and all sheep have a value in the slaughter channel, so their value as pets is determined accordingly.