On Saturday there were at least three thousand visitors and on Sunday afternoon it also seemed to be heading in that direction. With these serious numbers, the sheep shearing festival in Blaricum, in honor of the 90th anniversary of the Goois Nature Reserve, can be called a great success.
Sheep shearing anniversary party Blaricum a great success – NH Nieuws
Several hundred sheep are sheared every year at the sheepfold. This year it didn’t stop with shaving. Visitors could stroll through the market, workshops were given and there were demonstrations of sheep herding. “It is our present to the residents of North Holland to celebrate our 90th anniversary,” says Ines van Hees of the Goois Nature Reserve.
To shave
For example, this year’s anniversary became a kind of festival, with the classic shearing of the three hundred sheep as the main attraction. A whole team of shearers works their way through the herd in two days. In a traditional way the sheep are lovingly embraced and cut with a ‘shear’, a kind of primitive scissors. Although it begins as a struggle, after a while the animals seem content and relieved to be released from their wool load.
“If they are removed from the herd, they are restless, they don’t like that. But once you put them on their ass, they literally don’t have a leg to stand on and they surrender,” says shearer Erik Bijlsma.
“Once you put them on their ass, they literally don’t have a leg to stand on and they surrender”
One of the interested parties, an elderly Gooi lady, looks at the hard work with admiration. “I think it’s so clever how they follow the anatomy of the animals while cutting,” she says.
Watch every year
She lives in the Gooi and has been coming every year to see the shaving. “Now I have not been able to see it for two years due to the pandemic, but luckily it is possible again,” she says. As a tip she gives to have a look at the studbook rams, “they are very worthwhile.”
Next year the shaving party will again be of a more modest size, the Goois Nature Reserve can be satisfied with the celebration of the anniversary.
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