Ann Rudsby's Organic Sheep Farm

August 17, 2017
Hölje, Sweden

When visiting Ann Rudsby's farm, Lisa comes across a rare grey sheep whose wool is purchased for the first A New Sweden Edition.

Ann Rudsby runs an organic farm with Jämtlands sheep that have very fine fleece quality. Ann has about 90 ewes, and they give about 2,5kg wool each.

As we drive up to her farm, Ann Rudsby is just walking up from a barn. She greets us and directly shows us a few of her ewes. She is wearing a black tshirt with the logo of her farm and has her hair up in a ponytail.

Two women stand in the forecourt of a farm with farm buildings in the background. They are standing in front of a feeding lot, where some sheep are enclosed and are happily eating hay
Ann Rudsby explains how she takes care of her sheep. She runs the organic farm Rudsby Jord & Skog.

This is one of my grey ewes, she says, and points to a big sheep. Most people don't keep they grey or black lamb, but I just love the color of wool we get from her, Ann says. She goes up to the ewe and separates the thick fleece so we can see the beautiful grey color.

Ann Rudsby holds in her strong arms a beautiful grey sheep. The sheep looks placid, and the colour of its fleece can be seen
Ann Rudsby shows me her rare grey sheep.

Up by her house she later shows us the yarn made of the wool of that grey ewe. I immediately decide to book all grey wool from next sheering so I don't need to color the yarn. Coloring is difficult to do without chemicals, and I want my clothes to be as natural as possible.

A hand stretches out the fleece on the back of a grey sheep, revealing the rich colour underneath. In the background, two curious sheep look on from their pen
When Ann separates the wool we can see the beautiful grey color.

Ann takes us for a drive a couple of kilometers away where the young ewes are grazing. They are now four months old and looks curiously at us as we step out of the car. It's a big green field that they have, Ann explains that she changes the grazing land every summer.

As we leave Ann's farm, I have booked all lambswool and all grey ewe wool from the next sheering coming up in September.

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