OREGON
     Some might call it "agri-entertainment. Ray and Alice Antoniewicz call it "agri-education."  By opening their A-Z Farm to the public, they are educating people–young an old–about agriculture.

     This weekend, Feb. 15-16, the Antoniewiczes are hosting Sheep Shearing for Spectators, an opportunity for the public to visit their 37-acre farm to learn about sheep, shearing and agriculture.  A-Z Farm is located at 1820 Schuster Road, just north of Oregon.  Hours are 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., and there is $2 admission fee; children age 4 and under, admitted free.

     "A lot of people nowadays just do not have the opportunity to go to a farm," Ray notes.  "They don't have a grandfather on the farm, so we feel as if we're filling a void...Agriculture has a lot of work to do to tell people about where our food comes from."

     Ray and Alice have worked in education all their lives.  Ray served as the University of Wisconsin-Madison Extension state equine specialist, retired five years ago.  Alice worked as a nurse and continues to work part time as a nursing supervisor at St. Mary's Hospital in Madison.  Now, however, their educational work take place on their own farm and with sheep as the centerpiece.

     While the Antoniewiczes hope people visiting their farm have a good time, they place a premium on their learning something while they're there.

     "We're trying to make it educational," Ray says of their on-farm events.  "Sure, they get to touch the wool and the baby animals, but we try to give them information along with that, rather than strictly the pleasure of doing those things."

     Having consumers that understand at least some aspects of production agriculture can go a long way in their acceptance of products' price and value in the grocery store, he adds.

     A their second annual Sheep Shearing for spectators, which takes place largely inside their 117x53 foot barn, visitors will watch Jerry Ace of Stoughton as he shears sheep.  Mary Wallace, a well-known wool judge and a Cambridge sheep producer, will skirt the wool, explaining what makes good wool, how different qualities of wool make up a complete fleece and the various use of different qualities of wool.

     Spinners will be on hand to show how wool is spun into yarn.  Displays, posters and flyers will show what sheep eat and how a wool blanket is made.  Visitors can purchase one of the Antoniewiczes' fleeces and, with information provided, send it to a mill to be made into a wool blanket–a memento of their day on the farm.

     Several vendors also will be on hand to sell sheep-related and wool products.

     The Antoniewiczes' agri-educational efforts don't end when the weekend draws to a close, however.

     On three Sundays in March, they open their doors for Lambing time on the Farm, an even they started three years ago. On March 16, 23 and 30, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., visitors can see the Antoniewiczes' new born lambs and, with luck, witness the birth of a lamb.  There will be chicks, baby ducks, bunnies and, perhaps, other animals to see and touch, plus farm-related displays.  Children will be able to collect eggs from nests.  Admission is $3; free for children 4 and under.

     "We're not a petting zoo, but we want people to know they can touch them, too," Ray says of the animals.

     They estimate 2,000 people visited their farm for weekend events in 2002.

     "We decided to offer something for people to do with their kids," Alice says of their weekend events.  "They can come out and so something, learn something."

     A-Z Farm also offers Time in the Country.  By appointment, groups can visit the Antoniewicz farm, with talks, displays and experiences tailored to the age group.  In early spring, visits are held indoors, and from late April on, visits take place primarily outdoors and include a hayride so visitors can see the sheep on pasture.

     Ray and Alice started offering "Time in the Country" four years ago, and although most of the groups visiting are students, they also have welcomed home-school groups and mothers' groups. Like their other events, there is a small admission fee.  Last year, between 40 and 50 different groups visited the farm for tours, and Ray believes farm tours like theirs is an untapped market.

     "We don't know how big we want to go," Ray says of expanding the number of farm tours they offer.  "We're supposed to be retired, and we'd like to travel a little bit, but there are umpteen things we could get into."

     For example, the Oregon Chamber of Commerce held its Halloween spooky barn at A-Z Farm in 2002.  The Oregon Emergency Medical Service (EMS) has held social gatherings at the farm, as has a local church group   One family, whose mother loves sheep, booked an afternoon at the farm for a birthday party and hayride.

     The Antoniewiczes started raising purebred Hampshire and Suffolk sheep 35 years ago.  Within 10 years they had moved to crossbreeding and concentrated on building a commercial flock.  Their flock started out with Dorset breeding on the maternal side, and they've added other lines – including East Fresian, Targhee, Texel and Hampshire – to capture each breed's beneficial characteristics. Their flock consists of 100 eyes, and they typically attain a 200 percent lamb crop.  Their ewes lamb in the barn, mostly in March.  Most of their lambs are sold via private treaty as feeder lambs, plus University of Wisconsin-Madison has bought some feeder lambs for the last couple of years.

     The Antoniewiczes adopted managed intensive grazing about seven years ago.  They have four fenced pastures, ranging in size from three to 11 acres and, within them, create smaller paddocks in which their sheep graze.  With portable fencing, they create paddocks less than an acre in size.  The size of the paddocks and the frequency with which sheep are moved to a new space depend on the time of year, forage growth, and the number and age of the sheep grazing.  Ray has found managed intensive grazing has increased the efficient use of their farm's pastureland.

     "They do a better job of grazing close to everything," he says of the sheep when in small paddocks.  "If they go into a big lot, they selectively graze, and a lot goes to waste."

     Better use of their available pastureland has enabled Ray and Alice to double the size of their flock since they started with managed intensive grazing.

     Three years ago, the Antoniewiczs started working with Olds Seed Company to test different pasture seeding mixtures and management practices like frost seeding and interseeding.  They have a six acre lot devoted to the test plot.

     They recently started working with Dave Thomas and Cody Hiemke, UW-Madison Extension sheep specialist and animal science graduate student, respectively, on a lamb-quality study.  The study, called Improvement of Quality and Pricing of Wisconsin Lambs, will look at heritability factors and develop recommendations for the production of quality lambs, plus develop a lamb-pricing grid based on fat thickness and muscling.

     On June 28, the Antoniewiczes will host the Wisconsin Sheep Breeders Cooperative's Production Field Day.   In addition to a tour of the farm and discussion of its practices, several speakers will present sessions on topics of interest to sheep producers.

     While the WSBC field day is targeted to sheep producers and prospective sheep producers, the Antoniewiczes are clearly focused on providing family agri-education.  It is an effort that also involves their four grown children: Todd of Madison; Troy and his wife, Phyllis, of Oregon; Tony and his wife, Jodi, also of Oregon; and Sara Anders and her husband, John, of Brooklyn.  Even the Anders' four daughters – Amber, 8; Mikala, 5; Brienna, 3 and Emily, 1 –get into the act.

     "It's family oriented," Alice says of their agri-education efforts, "but it also involves our family. It's a double bonus for us...I think it's nice that people can see their farming is a family thing."