Blossom's Fate Revised, Goat Attack, and Flock Escape (Again)

Yesterday I was going to blog about Blossom's feet.  For a recap, read this post about her fate here.  I knew it was overdue but me and Farm Girl finally got around to brushing down the minis and trimming their hooves.  Blossom still has her baby coat on but we did the best we could to remove most of it so the heat wouldn't be so insufferable.

But it was her hooves that had us totally stunned.  She was standing on them rather than her heels.  It appears her lax tendon is healing.

Her right hoof actually looks completely healed.

While her left was in worse shape it is also starting to gain strength.  The hoof has been so deformed because of the lax tendon however I hope with proper trimming in addition to her standing correctly on it will benefit both her leg structure and the shape of the hoof.

I am feeling good about Blossom's legs and praying for a miracle because the idea of euthanization is unbearable.

The reason I wasn't able to do this post yesterday as we had another flock escape.  This time they found a way out of their holding pen but this time around I had help.  Both Farm Girl and my hubs were here to help round them up.  They are being held up in the electronet until the holding pen is secured again which hopefully isn't too long as it is pouring rain outside with the chance of thunderstorms.  

Sheep huddled under the tree during the downpour.

Hate to loose power and chasing sheep once again.  Though we did pick up a solar energizer yesterday but it will take a few days to fully charge.

The other big deal that happened yesterday was that we had to say goodbye to Samson, one of the livestock guardian dogs we recently brought to the farm to guard over the sheep.

Though Sam was a very sweet dog, he was also excessively timid, was far too sheep obsessed and showed signs of aggression at meal times.  That aggression finally resulted in blood drawn.  We are not sure how or why, but we knew he did not like our milking goat, Beatrice.  We had noticed him lunge for her a couple times and left small bite marks on her ears but we had hoped they were simply warning signs.  However, yesterday morning I glanced out the window and noticed him viciously attacking her.  We ran out to the pen and called him off which he did promptly, however the gashes he left in Beatrice were big.  He bit off one of her horns and tore a huge gash in the side of her gut.

Those huge orange stains are iodine which it makes it look worse even though it was certainly severe enough though Beatrice is fine today and walking around and grazing as per usual.  We had thought his dislike was toward Beatrice solely and began building the pygmy goat pen we had planned in the future as we needed to separate Beatrice from Samson.  However, at the end of the day after we had chased everyone back into the electronet, we discovered that Olaf, one of the kid dairy goats and Torch, one of the pygmy kid goats also had blood on them and had been attacked.  The decision to remove Samson from the farm was swift.  The hubs took him back to his farm where there is no livestock and where we will rehome him.  We are not certain if his aggression is towards goats only or not, however we are not taking the chance.  Attacking three goats in one day and causing so much blood loss will only lead to a certain kill in the future.

It really was too bad because he is an awfully sweet dog who craves human attention yet fears it at the same time.  Hopefully we can find him a home with a gentle, kind, patient and understanding owner who can see Samson for his good qualities.  Sadly, however, he has no place on my farm and had to leave.  That leaves the job of guarding the sheep entirely up to Delilah.  We are having some health issues with her right now, mainly her drastic weight loss and lack of desire to eat.  Not sure but perhaps Samson might have had something to do with that as well since he was so food aggressive.  Besides I had seen him attack her for no reason once or twice.   However, the loving personality of our pet dogs, have done Delilah a world of good and see her coming around slowly.  Now that Sam is gone, perhaps her full potential will be realized.