Here’s a fun fact for ya: at one point, Idaho had more sheep than people.
If you have a hard time imagining that many sheep, you can get a visual next month, when over 1,200 sheep hoof it down Main Street in Ketchum during the 30th annual Trailing of the Sheep Festival. This is not something that happens because of the Festival. Rather, the Festival happens because sheep have been trailing through the Wood River Valley for well over 150 years.
The Trailing of the Sheep Festival returns to the Wood River Valley October 7-11 to celebrate the region’s sheep ranching history, and it is absolutely worth the road trip from Boise.
The history
The history of the Festival and the history of Idaho’s sheep industry are one and the same.
It is said that John Hailey brought the first sheep into the Wood River Valley in the late 1860s. At that time, Idaho recorded a breeding sheep population of 14,000. As mining declined, sheep became an increasingly important part of the local economy. By 1890, there were a reported 614,000 sheep in Idaho. By 1918, the sheep population reached 2.65 million, about six times the number of people in the state. Sheep didn’t stop outnumbering Idahoans until 1970.
Scottish immigrants were among the first to make a real go of the sheep business here. Basque immigrants weren’t far behind, arriving in the U.S. from northern Spain starting in the mid-1850s, most of them drawn West by the gold rush before pivoting to sheepherding instead. They earned a reputation for being tireless and dependable, the kind of herders that ranchers trusted to take flocks alone into remote mountain pastures for months at a time. Many eventually started their own sheep operations.
Today, the sheep industry is still going strong in Idaho, carried on by many of those same Basque and Scottish ranching families, along with immigrant herders.
In the late 1990s, the Wood River Valley was experiencing tremendous growth. Farms, ranches, and open land were disappearing fast to development, and families who had worked that land for generations were getting priced or pushed out.
On the Festival’s website, Mary Austin Crofts, former Executive Director of the Trailing of the Sheep Festival, described how this tension turned into an opportunity:
“I was working on the Wood River Trail System, a paved Class I trail system, to connect all the communities in the Wood River Valley,” said Crofts. “When we needed some missing pieces of right of way to connect the Trail, I went to the local sheep ranchers to ask if they would agree to allow use of some of the sheep driveway that was dedicated in the early 1900s, so sheep could move from southern Idaho through the Valley to summer grazing in the mountains. They graciously agreed.”
“But, after those sections of the trail were paved and the sheep came trailing through as they had done for 150 years, if you’ll pardon the expression, all hell broke loose,” she said. “It was then that local sheep ranchers, Diane and John Peavey, decided it was time to tell the growing community of newcomers in the Wood River Valley about the place they had moved.”
In the fall of 1996, the Peaveys invited people to meet for coffee at a local café and then help walk with the sheep through the Valley to learn about this historic tradition of trailing the sheep. They did so in an effort to minimize conflicts between users of the bike path and the sheep. Along the way, they shared stories of the rich history, heritage, and cultures of the Wood River Valley. It was casual and educational. People absolutely loved it.
In 1997, the Peaveys met with the local Sun Valley/Ketchum Chamber & Visitor Bureau (CVB) to talk about turning the annual sheep trailing into an actual event. The CVB saw the potential to turn a conflict into a celebration of cultural heritage, and jumped on board with staff, ideas, and funding. That’s how the Trailing of the Sheep Festival was born. The first Festival featured the Big Sheep Parade down Main Street, the Sheep Folklife Fair, Sheep Tales Gathering, and a Lamb Dine-Around, all elements that are still part of the Festival today. The CVB and the Peaveys ran the event with a committee of volunteers until 2003, when the nonprofit Trailing of the Sheep Cultural Heritage Center, Inc., took over.
Sadly, John Peavey, local rancher, former Idaho State Senator, and Festival founder, died in June 2024. The Peavey family is still heavily involved in the Festival today.
The Festival
Thirty years in, the Festival has grown a lot from those first casual walks along the sheep trail. But the mission hasn’t changed: preserve the stories of Idaho’s sheep ranchers and herders, celebrate the cultures that built this industry, and give kids and adults alike a real look at where local food and fiber actually come from.
In 2025, the Festival’s combined five-day attendance topped 25,000 people from 46 states and several countries, and pumped just over $7.5 million into the valley’s economy.
Here’s what’s happening for the 2026 Festival:
Big Sheep Parade
- Sunday, October 11 at noon
- Free
- Main Street in Ketchum
- No dogs allowed
This is the big one. Around 1,200 sheep move down Main Street with the ranching families and herders who have made this trip for generations, trailing south toward winter pastures. Historic sheep wagons roll through and Folklife Fair participants join in, each identified by a sign-bearing dancer. This year, The Very Reverend M. Jonah Kendall of St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Ketchum will bless the flock.
Once the parade is complete, you are welcome to walk with the families as they herd the sheep to their resting spot south of town.
The sheep for this year’s parade come from the Schwandt family’s Jaz Ranch, which has grown from about 300 ewes in Lamoille, Nevada, into a six-band operation spanning Bliss, Gooding, and Carey, Idaho. This is their first year bringing sheep to the Big Sheep Parade.
The Festival also honors anyone from the sheep ranching community who has passed away since the last event with a riderless horse in the parade. This year, that is in memory of Colby Castle.
Sheepdog Trials
- October 9 and 10, 9am-5pm
- October 11, 9am-2pm – FINALS
- 2400 Buttercup Road, Hailey
- $10-$25
If you have never seen sheep dogs at work, you are in for a treat. They do not mess around. The National Point Qualifying Sheepdog Trials, sanctioned by the United States Border Collie Handlers Association, bring around 80 of the country’s top border collies (and other herding dogs) and their handlers to Hailey to compete. This year, teams are traveling in from as far as Connecticut, Alberta, and Saskatchewan.
You can grab food from the Gooding Basque Association, browse more than 30 vendors, and pick up Festival merch. Bring your own lawn chair since there’s no seating provided, and be ready for a short walk from parking to the field. Leashed dogs are welcome at the Trials, just not at the Big Sheep Parade.
Folklife Fair
- Saturday, October 10, 10am-4pm
- Roberta McKercher Park, Hailey
- Free
This is the cultural heart of the Festival. Expect sheep shearing demonstrations every half hour, spinning and weaving demos, sheep wagon displays, and live music and dance from Basque, Scottish, Polish and Peruvian performers rotating through the stage all day. More than 80 vendors sell handmade, sheep and wool related goods, and there are hands-on craft activities for kids at the Kids’ Fluff booths. You can also visit authentic sheep camps, check out booths from the Idaho Rangeland Resources Commission and Idaho Wool Growers.
Wool Fest
- Thursday, October 8 – Saturday, October 10
- Multiple locations
- Tickets required, prices vary
More than 20 hands-on classes happen for Wool Fest. If you want to try felting, spinning, or dyeing wool yourself, this is your chance! These sell out fast, so register asap. Registration closes at noon on October 4, and pre-registration is required. After October 4, call Jan Bittenbender at 208-315-0566 to check availability, or ask about a walk-in spot (a $10 cash-only walk-in fee applies, at the instructor’s discretion). Just know the refund deadline is firmly set at September 25, since instructors travel from out of town and course materials are ordered ahead of time.
See the full class list at trailingofthesheep.org/wool-fest
Culinary events
- Wednesday, October 7 – Sunday, October 11
- Multiple locations
- Ticket prices vary
The week is full of ways to eat your way through the Festival: Cooking with Lamb classes, Farm to Table dinners, and the For the Love of Lamb dine-around at restaurants around the Valley.
Lamb Fest happens alongside the Folklife Fair on Saturday, October 10, from 11am-4pm at Roberta McKercher Park. Local chefs and restaurants serve up lamb dishes ranging from traditional to creative.
Cooking classes are happening Wednesday, October 7 through Friday, October 9. Learn to cook with lamb, make cheese, and so much more.
Farm to Table dinners are happening Tuesday, October 6 through Thursday, October 8. There is one dinner each night, and these sell out fast, so don’t wait too long if you want a seat. Each night features a four-course dinner with local lamb and menu items. The lamb ranchers attend the dinners to tell you more about sheep ranching in Idaho and answer questions.
For the Love of Lamb is happening on Friday, October 9 at 4:30-5:30pm throughout downtown Ketchum. You’ll visit different downtown restaurants for a bite-sized taste of their best lamb dish. This year’s lineup includes Fiamma’s lamb ragu cavatelli, a lamb bao bun from Ketchum Grill, lamb curry at Limelight Hotel Lounge, an Idaho potato and lamb soup from Rasberrys, an Asian jalapeño lamb popper at Salted Sprig, lamb dumplings from Scout, a lamb burek from Sun Valley Culinary Institute, lamb arrosticini at The Observatory, a lamb rigatoni from The Sawtooth Club, lamb koftas at The Village Market, and a Basque-inspired lamb tostada from Whiskey’s on Main. Ticket sales end Tuesday, October 6 at 5pm.
Happy Trails Closing Party is on Sunday, October 11 from 10am-3pm at Ketchum Town Square. There’s live music, vendors to shop, and food by La Parrilla.
Sheep Tales Gathering
- Friday, October 9 at 7pm
- The Argyros Performing Arts Center (120 South Main Street, Ketchum)
- $25.00
This year’s Sheep Tales Gathering, the Festival’s storytelling and culinary night, is built around Boise’s own Basque food story.
Boise chef Dan Ansotegui, a James Beard Award nominee behind Bar Gernika and Ansots Basque Chorizos & Catering, and founder of The Basque Market, takes the stage at the Argyros Performing Arts Center on Friday, October 9 at 7pm. He’s joined by John Ysura, a historian who specializes in the Basque diaspora of the American West, and Patty Miller, Basque Community History Project Director at the Basque Museum and Cultural Center in Boise.
Together, they’re presenting “Basque Food In The West: There to Here and Then to Now,” tracing how Basque cooking changed from small farmhouses (baserris) in Spain, to the boarding houses that fed Basque sheepherders across Idaho and Nevada, to the Basque restaurants we know today, including the ones on our own Basque Block.
Hear stories about how peppers, potatoes, beans, and corn, all originally from the Americas, ended up shaping traditional Basque cooking back in Spain, and about the boarding houses that once dotted the Hailey and Ketchum area in the early 1900s, feeding herders far from home.
Tickets are $25. Online sales close Thursday, October 8 at noon, but remaining tickets may be available at the door. More info here!
The details
When: October 7-11, 2026
Where: Ketchum, Hailey, and Sun Valley (about a 2-hour drive from Boise)
Cost: Many events are free, including the Big Sheep Parade. Ticketed events include dinners, classes, Sheep Tales Gathering, and the Sheepdog Trials – although you can also pay for the Trials at the entrance to the parking lot.
More info: trailingofthesheep.org
Thanks for reading!
With love from Boise,
Marissa
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