Sachsenkam: The festival of woolly animals shows that rearing is more than a hobby

Created: 09/22/2022, 13:05

When awarding the prize, judge Werner Schauer also pays attention to the fineness of the wool.

Here he examines the white mountain sheep "Princess" by Barbara Krinner from Gaißach.

© Patrick Star

Sachsenkam – The Bad Tölz-Wolfratshausen Sheep Keepers Association recently invited to a sheep festival with awards at Reutberg Monastery.

In order for the hoofed animals to land on the winner's podium, a few things have to be considered.

Barbara Krinner from Gaißach is the proud owner of twelve sheep, to which she has a very special connection: "Sheep are like an addiction," says the 58-year-old with a smile.

With her flagship animal, the “princess”, she recently took third place in the sheep awards at Reutberg Abbey.

In addition, the "Prinzessin" became the third wool winner." Her granddaughter reached second place among the young breeders with her "Gerti".

Krinner has always been fascinated by sheep, she says about herself. When she married into a farm with five cows, she bought two more sheep.

Then it became more and more.

After 25 years, the woman from Gaißach can no longer imagine life without sheep.

She has experienced many beautiful moments with her animals, for example when lambs were born.

Raising sheep is more than a hobby

The hobby is not financially worthwhile.

At best, you could earn money with the meat that only her husband is interested in – Barbara Krinner is a vegetarian, her husband a butcher.

The wool, on the other hand, is virtually worthless, and the proceeds are at best enough to finance the sheep shearers.

There may be movement in the market, since organic wooden pellets with sheep's wool for the garden are becoming increasingly fashionable.

This is confirmed by the Otterfingen sheep breeder Ludwig Bauer: "You don't earn anything from the sheep, you'd rather pay for it." Many people wouldn't understand why he keeps these animals, says the trained mechanical engineer: "They were just a nice balance when I was in annoyed me at work.” Even as a pensioner, he doesn't want to do without the animals.

The purchase of his first sheep was just a joke: "There was a meadow next to the soccer field.

And then I said to my soccer friend that we could buy sheep.” No sooner said than done.

40 years later, Bauer still owns the rare white mountain sheep, which he was particularly fond of.

"As long as I can do it, I'll do it," says the 70-year-old.

What counts in a sheep award are: Fineness of the wool, muscles and appearance of the animals

Barbara Krinner doesn't think about quitting.

Rather, she hopes that she can pass on her enthusiasm for animals to her grandchildren, "because it's a wonderful hobby".

She doesn't find it difficult to forego vacation trips: "We live in such a beautiful area that I don't want to move away.

The most I like is going up a mountain – where there are sheep.”

Werner Schauer can well understand this enthusiasm.

He has been a state-certified judge for sheep for 25 years and travels throughout Bavaria in this capacity.

On October 2nd he is in Tegernsee and a week later in Allgäu.

"You don't have anything else to do," says Bad Kohlgruber with a smile.

"You talk about sheep all day long - idealism is part of it."

At a sheep competition, he paid close attention to the fineness of the wool, the muscles and the outward appearance of the animals.

The back should be as level as possible, the nose should be curved and no brown pigment should be visible on the eyelids.

21 points are necessary to reach class one.

The number of animals on the Reutberg was "not that big", says Schauer: "But the quality was very good."