Willow Creek Farm
At Willow Creek Farm, we breed purebred, registered Bluefaced Leicester (BFL) sheep and BFL crosses with a focus on fiber qualities. We aim for high-quality, breed specific, clean wool that has a longer staple length while being next-to-skin soft. We also focus on keeping the BFL standard of good conformation, hardiness, and good mothering qualities in our registered sheep. We keep a smaller flock and our sheep are friendly and handled often.
Why We Love BFL Sheep
1 – Their fleece are amazing
We love the long, soft, curls of the BFL fleece, along with the shiny luster. Their fleece are so useable, both for items against the skin, as well as outer garments and rugs.
2 – They are multi-purpose
Not only do BFLs have amazing, very useable fleece, but they are also larger sheep and thus good for meat production. This is especially true when they are crossed to make Mule Sheep. Learn more about Mule Sheep at mulesheep.com and nemsa.co.uk.
BFL ewes are also very “milky,” sometimes tripleting and making plenty of milk to feed them all. We enjoy using our BFLs for milk production. Fleece, meat, and milk – making them an excellent triple-purpose sheep.
3 – Their unique look
Roman noses, long lustrous locks of fiber, upright alert ears … we love the look of these sheep, as well as their personalities.
4 – They are wonderful as purebreds, but they also cross well
BFL sheep are known for being an excellent improver breed. When crossed over other breeds the lambs have hybrid vigor and a great improvement in the fleece and meat characteristics of the breed crossed over by the BFL.
yarn, roving, batts
Custom Fiber Processing
We enjoy the beauty of natural, custom-processed yarn, roving, and batts; and
everything that can be made with them – from sweaters to quilts. That is
one of the many reasons that we love helping you make your raw fleece into
materials for your next project or retail space.
What are Bluefaced Leicester (BFL) sheep?
Bluefaced Leicester sheep are a unique breed known for their exceptional wool quality, characterized by a long staple length and fine, soft curls. They are known as a great “improver” breed as they improve fleece qualities and meat qualities when crossed over other breeds. To learn more about the BFL breed, go to the registry page at bflsheep.com.
What is the difference between a longwool & a finewool?
The longwool breeds have fleece that grow longer in one year’s growth. Their fleece tend to have more curl than crimp, often locks, and are generally not as soft. Finewool breeds grow less length in a year, have more crimp, and are finer and softer.
Is the BFL a longwool or finewool breed?
The BFL breed is known to be the finest of the longwool breeds – softer, but still long fiber.
Why do we breed both purebred, registered BFL sheep and BFL crosses?
Our purebred BFL sheep have such amazing qualities in their fleece, and their meat and milk production, why would we want to cross them? The answer is, because we really enjoy different fleece and crossing our BFLs over finewool breeds give us sheep that have fleece with fun and unique textures, colors, and lengths. Generally, we get very soft fleece that grow longer than a finewool breed typically does. This makes them easier to process at our fiber mill and makes fun yarn for us to use.