Unloading Hay on our Anniversary

We didn't bale it, we bought it.  And unloaded it, 350 bales worth, over a couple of 90+ degree days.

I can see the end of these farm days down the road a few years.  I wanted documentation.

Before and After

On Saturday, we had a shearer come out to finish up a few sheep who didn't get sheared on March 30.  Kora, a pied (spotted) black and white Finn ewe, was still too short-fleeced to shear back then, having been sheared in Fall 2009-- and there are people who really want that Finn fleece for spinning.

So we waited , and now before it gets really hot, we asked Jake Sirek to give her a haircut. Driving 40 miles to shear one ewe seemed ludicrous, so we asked Jake to clean up a few more ewes who couldn't be sheared well earlier, being "in the rise".  You non-Shetland folks, I can't explain that, because I don't get it myself.  I just know the shearer can't get under the lowest inch of wool, then, which turns into big mats of wool, later. 

Here, Kora and her twin lambies wait their turn for lamb vaccinations and Kora's haircut.  They licked clean the bin where alfalfa hay is stored.

After shearing, Kora actually looked a little thin.  But very, very comfortable.

This is a family picture of Finn ewe, Lassi, her ewe lamb Leila, and her ram lamb Lukas.  I still don't know about Finn colors;  whether this is what the Finn breeders would call plain "brown", or "fawn"-- being brown with an Ag "graying" gene, or what I would call a modified brown.  The finn breeders are rather new at colors, and therefore, at describing them.

Here, we see Mari the white Finn ewe and her white ewe lamb;  my old Little Red Oak Yarrow hiding in the corner, freshly shorn;  front and center is Leila again, and front right, Kora's ewe lamb, Heidi, is scooting past-- the lamb who had selenium deficiency last month.  She'd just gotten a pink ear tag and her Cdt shot.

Terri Drimel will take Leila home in a few weeks.  Her experience, this month, with losing another little brown Finn ewe made me want to bump up vaccinating the lambs against "overeating disease"-- clostridium?  So we took advantage of the cool, indoor lambing barn and ear tagged half (ran out of tags) and vaccinated and wormed all the lambs.  It felt good to get ahead of schedule this summer.  Now, we'll only have half as many to tag when our Scrapie Program vet tech comes out on July 9th, when we will give booster shots-- and know the lambies are protected.

I laughed until I cried

Okay, it was late, and the hilarious tremens often set in after midnight, right?

But I caught a link on another's blog and clicked, and read... and laughed until tears rolled down my cheeks.
So give it a try:
http://www.cakewrecks.com/

I'm going to add the link to my blog roll at right, for future guffaws.  It helps to offset the fierce seriousness with which some sheep breeders are taking our favorite critters, lately.  The arguments are sounding like those fought over religion or politics, here in North American Shetland land.  Not about animals, not sheep.  Maybe about being right.
I hope you find a smile in the Cake Wrecks, instead, as I did.

Soon I will post photos of lambies available for out-placement to good homes.  I took a quick dash through the list of ewes and babes this weekend and managed to, mentally, sell, HALF the sheep.  But that means 24 of 48.  Not enough.  Will keep working on this.
Still, plenty of brown and other lambies for everyone.  Take two!

Two polled ram lambs this year, both musket.  You can have ONE.  I will keep the other.

More to follow.
Laugh yourself silly.

Bluebell and her twinners

My old friend, Highland Hollows Bluebell is what, 6 this year?  We just counted up the 5 sets of twins she's had for us at Little Red Oak Farm, so, yes. . .
and for the first time, she stopped leading her babies away from us.  She came over to my bench in the shade some days ago and asked to be petted.  Her little POLLED musket boy, Forrest, wants the same-- but we don't pet ram lambs, here--
and her little white ewe lamb, Forsythia, hangs back shyly.  They plopped down to rest awhile.

(As always, double click on photos to biggify.)


Next, I pulled together a photo of one of Yarrow's ram twins;  he has good head splashes--and will throw spots, I'm quite certain.  His horns are strong, so I'd rather he move to another farm.  The only picture I had also happened to have Emily with the ever-friendly Kimi and her babies in it.

Kimi's spotted Finn Ewe lamb-- and more Finns.

For Terri to see! I see the photo's a little fuzzy, but so is she!
Here is proud Mama Lassi's (finn) with her brown ewe and ram lambs.  The first of 3 lambs didn't make it.  The little spotty ram may go to live in New York.

And another of Kimi's two ewe lambs:

Spring lambs, of course!

We'll back up to Mother's Day;  a cold day when we took our roving and fleeces to Shepherd's Harvest in Lake Elmo and offered roving at prices to sell-- and it surely did.  15 or so pounds of it, gone from my house. Yay!  Dear Daughter (DD) and Dear Husband (DH) knew exactly how to celebrate Mother's Day:  they volunteered to come with me to set up and sell wool.  For the first time, I had a Shetland/Finn blend that was especially popular, although all colors sold well.

It rained so much that week that Mari the Finn Ewe's lambie was soaked through and very dirty:

Later, Mari cried and cried to find her babies, and suddenly stopped when she peeked inside the portable calf hut.  I figured there was a special sight inside, and I was right.  Look at that little brown ewe's pink triangle of a nose!  Poor wet babies.

Little brown shetland ram lamb, still tiny:

It's 2 weeks later and things have warmed up considerably.  The lambs are loving the compost pile of last years' bedding. It's made for playing King of the Mountain!  Here, Em has the formerly stiff-necked lamb sucking a finger.  She's all better-- BoSe did the trick within hours.  Selenium deficiency !  Amazing.

Also pestering Emily are a very, very friendly Shetland ewe lamb, lower right, and a naughty little brown Finn ram;  behind her is a black Finn ewe lamb who's also fond of suckling fingers.  Further up, a little brown and white Shetland who will be musket (oatmeal colored). I am so behind on naming and learning the lambs this year that I don't recall if it's a ram or ewe lamb! 

Finally a good shot of DD visiting with Kimi, her solid black lamb under Em's arm, and in front, the little formerly sickly lamb belonging to Kora.  We just had to show you that she made such a nice recovery.  Pack of racing lambs seen behind-- 

Enjoy this nice, new, warm weather.  We're finally getting the garden in.

Little lambs, Finn and Shetland

Stiff necked lamb-- help!

The little stiff necked girl is in front;  her brother, behind.  He's not as bad, and is likely just grazing.  She could/did lift her head level, often, but this posture was easiest:

Any ideas?  A finn twin (the other is smaller but seemed fine) cried, hunched, didn't lift her head, within the first 24 hours.  I started supplementing with milk replacer, reading "hypothermia due to malnutrition".  I figured she or Mom didn't "get" nursing well,  yet.  She got much stronger and started nursing.  She's 5 days old, but still runs around rather stiffly, with her head straight out, doesn't lift it often.  But can.

White muscle disease?  Any ideas?  I do believe she may do just fine, after a bad start, but if anyone has any ideas, I'd love to hear 'em.

We went to Shepherd's Harvest Sheep and Wool festival in Lake Elmo, MN today.  Lovely event with all the usual wooly fun--
we were lucky and sold about 15 lbs of roving-- the best part of that is, do you know how much space 15 pounds of roving takes up in my basement?  Plus, we sent almost all fleeces off to Carol Wagner's Hidden Valley Woolen Mill for processing.  Nice to get the room back downstairs.

End of Lambing, Photos follow

In another rush to the finish, lambing season has, I think, wrapped up for 2010.  30 lambs out of 18 ewes, 21 ewe lambs, 9 ram lambs.  We like odds like that.  Many ewes were yearling, first time moms this year, and as many of you know, first-timers frequently have single babies.  But they knew just what to do!

Nine Finn lambs (2 boys), 21 Shetland lambs (you do the math)!  We lost one Finn lamb--darn, a brown spotted girl--but we have lambs aplenty. 
I have not had time to enjoy them as they came, though I see that the lamb races have begun-- and this year, we have a new lamb playground attraction--the enormous compost heap of bedding dug out of their barn last fall.  So many paths and peaks, so much fun!

Photos later, and I will start to decide who will stay, and who will be sold.
I think next year I would like to have only 10 ewes over winter, which means I have to sell about 30 ewes and lambs!

Some MORE lamb photos. ..

For economy of time and writing-- I am adding more of yesterday's photos here. 
The first babies born are now 11 days old.  Bluebell's white ewe and musket ram. . . might he be polled?  Drumroll...

Pal, my old friend, with the first ewe lamb she's had at Little Red Oak Farm!

Pal had a little ram, too.  Both sweet babies, easygoing, like their mom.

This little ram is Little Red Oak Belle's.  She's mioget, I think.  He looks fawn-- his little nose surely isn't the standard moorit...

And again, this funny picture of Lassi the Finn ewe checking me out-- while her little one-day-old boy lays next to her.  Her solid brown daughter is a blur behind her.

The lambs are Comin'

The first LittleRedOak Shetland lambs arrived on Thursday.  Highland Hollows Bluebell led off the season with twins, a musket (oatmeal/brown) ram and a white ewe lamb.  Timed nicely for late morning arrival.  Emily called it; saw Bluebell acting funny at 7 am, put her in a jug, let the other ewes out to pasture and went off to school.  Lambs arrived 3 hours later.

Twin Brooks Palisade delivered a brown ram and black ewe lamb at 4 am last night;  Not tonight, I hope,  I'd rather sleep!   Here, Bluebell's boy greets Pal's through the lambing jug panels. Healthy babies, all, and moms are doing fine. The dad to these four lambs is Kimberwood Leonardo, my smooth-polled (hornless) moorit ram.  No evidence of horns on these newborns, but it's too early to guess about that, yet.

Into Spring

Tax season is pulling in to a close, so of course, who's not got all their tax data compiled yet?   The seasonal tax preparer, of course.

Today.

So I won't write long.  These are new spring photos that DH took on Sunday. 

The ewes are expectant, shall we say, but no one appears ready to burst--

My Finns surprised me last year, though, by appearing lithe and un-ready and then suddenly lambing while I was away, so we'll see.

My elder friend that I watch out for, Paul, is now in a forever-home with nice nurse-aides about 13 miles from me.  I'll make fewer 45 mile drives to Minneapolis now.  That was the big deal of my winter-into-spring, and it's working it's way out now, as are the lambs, the taxes, the irises...

Rams with no- or tiny scur-horns.  LROak March, Finnsheep Osmo,
Kimberwood Leonardo, White Pine Parker.  Nice boys.

Shearing Day was Great!

Great weather, in the fifties, blue sky, lots of friends, good food, good help.
Here's a picture of several women skirting a fleece in the great outdoors:

One of me trimming hooves, while big Dave holds the ewe captive (look at the pregnant finn ewe belly!  3 weeks yet!)  Dave Little holds a sheep who's next for shearing;  Mike Anderson's bent over another ewe.

Candy T., with her back to the camera, bagged fleeces as they came off the sheep, labelling the bags with the sheep's name. 

My daughter, Emily, played vet tech this year, and gave the CD&T vaccines and ivermectin wormer.  I was fiercely proud of my girl, and very grateful for all the fine helpers.  Afterward, we ate pretty well in the house, and collapsed.

Fleeces off the sheep, half sold, and now some will go to Zeilinger's woolen mill this week.

Happy Spring!

Aaagghhh! A skunk lives in my chicken barn!

Or visits it daily.  He likes the cat's food, for which he must somehow get from floor to table about 2 feet off the floor.  Then he washes his food (Like a raccoon?) and leaves debris in the cat's water bowl.  We haven't been getting many duck eggs this week, either-- they lay their eggs in nest boxes on the floor, you know. . .
There's a live trap in front of the chicken barn-- we are hoping he'll wander in.  So far tonight only one or our cats got caught in it, and when I put her up to her cat entrance she did a quick reverse to come back outside. . . and that's when I Knew.  I went inside and saw Mr. Skunk up on the table, washing down a little cat food dinner with the cat's water.
I don't know yet how we'll get rid of this freeloader, but we will, and we will have one more great little farm tale to tell forever.

Shearing Day March 21, 2010

March 21st, Sunday, 10 am.  Mike Anderson from WI will be here for the third year to shear the little flock of little sheep.  "How many ya got?"  "Twenty-four."  "Okay, Sunday at 10 will be fine."

It'll be a two-hour flurry of hoof trimming, vax and wormer shots, fleeces gathered up, skirted and bagged, and we'll eat a little at lunchtime. 

If you can come and plan to eat, you might bring a little something so we have enough!
Just wanted to get the word out. . .

And oh, my friend Lori in New Prague had her first shetland lamb yesterday, March 2nd.  She bought two ewes from me and a ram--
but this baby came from the natural breeding that agreed prior to that on my neighbors' farm.  Remember I  bought some sheep back from a neighbor last Oct/Nov and sought homes?  Lori'd bought a bred ewe at a bargain!  CUTE baby, she said. 
Happy Spring

Clearing out a lifetime of stuff...

For my friend, Paul, whose duplex apartment has been the same since he was 2 years old.  However, it's on the second floor, and he won't be taking steps like he used to, since his stroke.
He's mending.  Not whole, but mending slowly.  I'll move him to a facility out near me so I can check in on him a lot.  He's never been a farm type-- more a cosmopolitan hipster who's appalled to be wearing knit running pants and seen in a wheelchair.
It's easy for me to say that we have to take what life throws at us.

At Little Red Oak Farm, the sun is shining high and warm, and I've been outside a few times today.  I think I'll prune the little oaks (really! some are Little Red Oaks!) and fruit trees.  It should be done while dormant, no flies about to spread disease. 

And find you some pictures of sheep.

The sheep are pretty shaggy!  That's Maple looking us over, while the rams are behind all the ewes and "next door";  it had just snowed before this picture.

Maple and Poppy, two musket colored favorite "pets".  Beaucoup wool, Bluebell's breeding.

There's a new MN shetland (and soon Finn?) shepherd who's been emailing me all winter, keeping my enthusiasm for the sheep high, to match his. He just started a blog, new in my blog list-- Fletcher three oaks? I think he calls it. In the blog list at right. Give it a visit.

There's another new shepherd up in Glenwood, near Jerry Fletcher, I think-- named Aaron, wife Nicole-- who just got their acreage to hold the shetlands they bought from me last November. Nice couple, also enthusiastic. Maybe you'll meet them all one day. They're calling their farm Able Acres, at last discussion.

Time for me to mail those sheep transfers in to NASSA for them, now that they have a new farm address.

The snowy view from the bedroom window after the last (we hope) blizzard!
I'm working on a shearing date, now.  I should have done this a month ago (but I was a little busy).

Happy Spring, soon!

I told you I was busy. . .

I look back at that last post from January 5th-- in it, I said that elders in my life were needing some help--
and a few days later, one of them had a stroke.
I have been juggling two or three or four lives ever since.  The elder, here, is not a family member, so it is not rip-your-heart-out sadness I feel for him, but he has long been a friend.  And he had recently asked me to be responsible for him "if anything ever happened"-- formally, in documents.  So I work through the regular-strength sadness to keep his affairs in order and talk to his medical team.

So---pshewww---that's what I am doing lately.  That and tax prep at my usual wintertime job.  Not too many hours yet, there. And uh-oh, someone has forced me to sign up at Facebook.  I've only peeked, really!

The pleasure of this week is that since DH had a minor knee surgery, I am also back to being chief animal feeder and tender, so I do get to scratch a few sheep chins and monitor mama hen's progress on a clutch of chicken eggs.  It's a soothing balm for the sore work I am doing for my old friend, Paul.

Too busy to post. . .

Hmm, it was holidays, snowstorms, elders who needed help. . . now tomorrow, I'll begin work in the '09-'10 tax season.  I don't know how many hours I'll work each week until April 15.  Then lambs will start to come.

Adventures since Christmas:
After blazing paths (with a shovel) to all the barns on this farm site-- which are all at least 75 ft. apart--
the sheep are all re-combined into one-gender groups after breaking up breeding groups.  20 ewes, 4 rams, total.  Two rams here, two there.  I'd put them together, too, but all the stars are not in alignment yet. . . electronet, port-a-huts, never mind--we are getting there. 
I decided to take Shawn the aberrant-horned ram in to the butcher-- he was sort of a bully with EVERYONE, ewes or rams (though, not people) and I just didn't want him to damage sheep, buildings, or gates with his thick horns.  A buyer who wanted him could not drive the two hours to get here, and I could not hold him 'till spring.  Let's hope he left me some beautifully-fleeced lambs.

He was the first ram that we pulled out of a breeding group.  It was beginning to blizzard, on Dec. 23rd, and we knew he wouldn't let his ewes get into the shelter (PIG!).  So we ambushed him in the portahut, stuffed him into a BIG dog crate, and lifted his 125-150 lb. crateload onto a sled-- on which we sailed him across the barnyard with the greatest of ease!  Great system--we'll use that again! 

Without rams, the twenty ewes are happy in the big, shabby lean-to that they spend winter, pregnancy, and lambing days in.   It's about 15x20 feet.  Big enough for 20 ewes, I guess.  Now that the rams are out, I can visit with them more comfortably-- there are Christmas lights and a horse-sized heated water pail in there, with a nice straw floor. It's been below-zero cold for a week, but the youngest ewes have been leaping and hopping lately when  I visit, a very funny sight. 

There are a few frail elders in my life who have needed lots and lots of help, lately, so that's taken up my extra time--
but my own little family is doing fine and we had nice holidays together.  We saw the movie "Avatar" on Sunday, what fun that was!

Now, tomorrow it's back to an office--
while the ewes in the barn grow rounder until spring--
and I spend time spinning and knitting with ladies who love those activities.  It's a nice time of year.

Other People's Farm Blogs Amaze me

I could just sit and read all night.  I go to another Shetland breeders' blog, probably the most recent post that's popped up on my list to the right, here--
and they have, on their blog, a list of their favorite blogs, so I click on some of theirs--
and it goes on and on.  I am charmed, I am invigorated by other people's ideas and adventures.

Here's an extremely nice piece of writing on living on the rural side:
We're Not From Around Here

Hooray!  I figured out how to make hyperlinks.  It's a new world from now on.

Here's a nice Romney sheep blog:
Romney Ridge Farm

Oh, that's fun.  Happy Reading.

I'm inside this week, weaving, knitting, putting away Hanukkah decorations.  That family party is over.  Christmas with the other side of the family is next week, but I am not the host of that one.  Psheww. 
It's 0 degrees F and less, here in MN, and the sheep got double feed today.  They drink a lot of water from their electric, heated buckets.  I think it's like warm tea.  Wouldn't you?
The cats, hens and ducks now all have heated pet bowls, too.  Chickens', up high on a platform so the ducks can't mess it up and a bucket on the floor for the messy ducks.  What a great idea.  It took us 5 years to figure that one out.

Imagine it All White

I won't have to post a photo, then, as I haven't taken any for a while.  The snow of winter has begun, and next, the cold, so just imagine I took a photo, and it was all white.

We heard it was coming from the fearful meteorologists--so we took inventory-- milk, coffee, food in the freezer, we're okay-- hay, chicken feed, heated water pails all round, heat tape on the water hydrant-- tractor accessible to plow--we're ready.

Dear Daughter had a concert band performance on Tuesday night, projected to be the worst travel weather.  We were prepared to take a hotel room in the city in order to make the concert, but didn't have to.  The snow was blowing, by its end, but nothing extraordinary for Minnesota natives to cope with.

I tucked a flake or two of hay inside every sheep shelter-- there are 5 breeding groups of 4-7 sheep right now-- filled waters and salt boxes, got the fowl inside their barn, with cats adjacent, and waited it out.

Emily's school was cancelled today.  Yay, we made gingerbread boys, girls, sheep, dreidels and stars.  Tomorrow we'll decorate them.  Maybe I'll photo those!

Tonight we went out and put newly-purchased Rocky coats on two finnsheep girls-- they'd been shorn by the farm I bought them from, having been destined for the butcher.  They were spared that fate, but now they looked too vulnerable to me in their half-inch of wool covering, so we put coats on them.  As I recall, any layer will help keep a body warmer, even if it's just heavy nylon.  They are also in the most sheltering of my barns, so . . . it's as good as it gets on this little farm.  Oh, for the record, the 6 month finn ewes, who are as tall as any full grown Shetland, wore sizes D and E loosely, having no wool.  But the length along the spine, front to back, was good.   My big puffball Shetland, Bluebell, has on a G size, and it looks tight all over. 
I have an H as well;  I'm thinkin': Osmo the Finn ram;  maybe Bluebell in a few weeks.
These coats may be a nice thing, but it's true that the sheep had better be quiet and good-natured to put up with being grabbed and outfitted while enjoying a bit of hay.

Finally, arrangements were made today for Shawn the Shetland ram with aberrant horns, who has the most amazing fleece I have seen on a Shetland.  Oh, I have a picture of that!

He's also seen in the last post, looking through the fence.  Half-horn guy.  Because he is now the only guy with thick, substantial horns here, I was afraid of what he'd do to other hornless rams when rams are recombined in a few weeks, after breeding.  I had a butcher date ready for him.
I called a woman who had said, "before you butcher him, call me", so I did.  Shawn can go live with her, soon, and I am always happy when an animal with great traits gets to live on . . .
Happy Wednesday, everyone.