Art Fredrickson grew up on a farm near Hayden, Colorado. The
land and animals have formed his character. Art was a rodeo cowboy for 25 years.
" My wife Linda and I had the opportunity to purchase 130 acres in North East
Texas (Franklin County). After much research we decided to raise sheep.
We were told that there were too many coyotes here to raise sheep,
but with the 5 wire electric fences and Llamas for guard animals we have
never lost a lamb to coyotes. Through our research we decided to raise
Dorpers."
A relatively new breed in the U.S., the Dorper is a hair sheep
developed in Africa. Dorpers raise lambs of good quality on poor forage
where other sheep can barely exist. Since Dorpers breed year round you can get a
lamb crop every seven to eight months.
Dorpers are prolific and a 180% lamb crop is not
uncommon with 200% possible under good forage conditions. The Dorper ewe is
fond of her lambs and gives plenty of milk for twins or triplets. The lambs grow
rapidly and have a high weaning weight. We have a ewe that raised triplets that
weighed a combined 210 pounds at 90 days of age. Dorpers are very calm and since
they do not require shearing and are disease resistant they require much less
labor than wool sheep