I never thought that I would be a sheep shearer when I was growing up. My first shearing job was when I was 14
years old, I made $5 ahead, so it came down to a grand total of $35. And it took us half the day.
My name is Katie McRose, I'm 26 years old, and I'm a sheep, llama, and alpaca shearer from Seguin, Texas.
And this year, we're projected to bring in between $80,000 and $120,000.
If we didn't shear these sheep, they would be extremely hot in the summer. They've got to carry around the
weight, they've got to carry around the heat. And in order to not make them suffer like that, we shear it
off.
I can't imagine living this life without my wife, because she literally like holds everything together.
The only class that I failed and had to retake in college was actually sheep and goat production, which
is super ironic.
I did come out debt free, which was really nice. I didn't ever have to ask anybody to borrow any money or
to help me out with rent, which was nice. The most I maybe made in college was around $30,000 working
part-time.
time.
We knew that we like shearing and that it allowed us to travel and we made decent money at it. So we decided to
give that just a go full-time.
The first year we did like 350 jobs, the year after that we did 475, 575. And this year, we're gonna knock
that out of the park again.
How pricing works for shearing animals is by the head. For one sheep, it's $20 for me to shear it and $20 for
me to show up. We call that a setup fee. If you have two sheep, it's still $20 a piece. But we have a $40
setup fee and that $40 setup fee is across the board. When we get to 100 sheep, depending on the breed,
you're looking at $5 a head.
One or two llamas it's $45 a head plus a setup fee. Same thing for alpacas, $30 a head for 10 of them plus
the setup fee.
So in four months already this year, we've brought in over last year's amount of $80,000, that's servicing
about 480 farms. I have every intentions of reaching 600 or so farms this year trying to break that $100,000
to $120,000 goal.
So during shearing season, we work seven days a week, and it's typically 14 to 18 hours a day, depending on
how hard we run. We leave the hotel around 7 a.m. At our first job, probably about an hour away, get there
around 8 a.m. And we could have anywhere from one job which would be a large job with like a hundreds of
animals, or we'll have multiple small jobs. Our average being five to eight jobs a day, but we do as many as 14
in a day and that's traveling from place to place.
So shearing looks really easy when you watch somebody do it, somebody that's skilled, you look at it and
you're like, wow, I mean, that stuff just falls off like butter. And it's there's a lot of technical skill
that goes into that.
On an easy, normal sheep, I'm shearing it between a minute and a half and three minutes. And then on the
more difficult ones, it'll take me about five to seven minutes.
Those shears are incredibly sharp. It goes really fast with high RPMs, it does not bog down, which means that
it could cut through meat, it can cut through flesh, it can cut through bone, tendons, without skipping a beat.
So it is very dangerous. And then I am holding an animal that has a mind of its own.
Just this year, cut my pinky in half, I broke my toe. I've been electrocuted over an extended amount of time,
and I hooked my leg and put 22 stitches in it.
A lot of people want to know how I can just run like the Energizer Bunny. And the thing is, is the Energizer
Bunny does stop beating the drum eventually. You know, when you go that hard, it's really hard on your body.
Physical exhaustion is one thing I can pretty much power through that. But the mental part is really hard.
Sheep shearing is mostly a mental game, doesn't really matter about how strong you are. It's about can you
hack it for that many hours.
I love shearing. I love shearing sheep. I love shearing alpacas. I love shearing llamas. I hate shearing goats,
but that's besides the point.
When you take a passion and you turn it into work, it is that, it is work. I love what I do, and I honestly
don't want to do anything else. It's just honestly being a business owner is not what it's all chalked up
to be. It's hard, because nobody else takes that responsibility if you don't show up.
I would say that being a sheep shear is a minority in the United States. And then being a woman is definitely
its own subcategory. And then to be a gay woman, I don't think I know another gay woman sheep shearer
besides my wife.
I didn't want people to judge me before I ever got out there. Like I didn't want being lesbian to be a
defining part of me. As I've matured, I've realized that it doesn't have to be a defining part of me, but
it is an excellent quality that I have.
I was worried that it would affect my business. And it hasn't, because turns out people don't care if I'm gay.
What they care about is if I come in and do a good job on their sheep.