I farm: “140 Blackface ewes in Barnaribbon, Drumcliffe, Co Sligo. I’ve 190 sheep in total. I keep Blackfaces because they’re a smaller, hardier sheep and good mothers.”

Going solo: “Since starting out on my own in 2019, I’ve been trying to build up numbers on my land. Then I also help my dad with his sheep on the home farm, as well as doing some contract sheep shearing. This time of the year, there’s just some winter shearing and store lambs to shear, so I only spend about one day a week shearing.”

On the farm: “January is among the quieter months. The plan is to get as much fencing and maintenance done as possible this month and also put out feed buckets for the sheep on the mountains, as we don’t feed any nuts during the spring. We use mineral buckets to keep the ewes in good condition until lambing.”

Lambing: “On the home farm, we’ve a small bunch of Blackface cross ewes lambing in mid-March. The main bunch, which are all Blackface, will be lambing from the first of April onwards. Jobs on the farm before that will include scanning in February and putting out more feed buckets after that.”

Shearing: “Dad was a shearer, so I got into it at a young age. I did my first season with him when I was eight. I started shearing at 16, and I’ve been shearing ever since. I started doing competitions and found I enjoyed the competitive aspect of it.”

Karol Devaney from Sligo at the 2019 national sheep sheering championships in Cashel, Co Tipperary. \ Philip Doyle

I studied: “I finished school and went to New Zealand to play rugby and do some shearing to figure out what I wanted to do. Then I went back to the books when I was 21 to study Food and Agribusiness Management in UCD, because I have always had an interest in business and marketing and the mix of agriculture and business suited me perfectly.”

Social media: “I also have a clothing brand for farmers called Eweknit, and I do a range of promo for that on social media on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram. I also have a podcast called The Eweknit Farming Podcast.”

Quotable quote: “If you’re not afraid to work and you’re not afraid to put yourself out there, there’ll not be much else to stop you succeeding.”