Where Are You Spring?

Well, winter was long. And cold. And snowy. And still here. This photo was taken this morning.

We had more snow at Easter than we did at Christmas. But in all fairness, we did have a nice mild break in March. But it was just a teaser. Made us yearn for green grass and gravel driveways. But alas, April provided us with a famous late winter blast. Hopefully this will be the end. Warmer weather is bound to be just around the corner. Oh please, let warmer weather just be around the corner! My heating bills just can't tolerate it any longer. I want to spend hundreds of dollars on livestock, not oil! Or wood. We heated the house over winter mainly on wood but did have to fill the oil tank twice and are waiting on another fill as I type. When temps got below -20C, and I wasn't home to feed the fire, than I had no other choice but to buy oil. Which really spoiled me. Blessed warm heat with no labour involved!! I can officially say I'm sick of stacking wood. 

Speaking of livestock. We sold the pigs. Yay! We never ended up butchering them for ourselves. We had every intention, but both finances and means really didn't necessitate the cost. There would have been far too much meat left over that would never had gotten eaten and when you balance the cost of slaughtering and smoking and cutting, it just didn't pan out for us. So we sold them instead and chalked them up to experience.

One of our ewes had twins that were born stillborn just before Christmas. That was very upsetting. Both me and Farm Girl were at work and missed the birth. Not that I can guarantee we could have done anything to help, but it was another lesson we learned. Putting time aside for our livestock. But, in the new year, another ewe gave birth to a big healthy girl. That lived! Yay! First lamb born on the farm and to me since my separation.

But one lamb wasn't enough. I wanted more. Farm Girl kept texting me photos of lambs born at work and I was jealous. Especially when she texted me a photo of a set of quadruplets. I texted back and joked she buy a female off them. Having those genetics would be an awesome addition to our flock. Of course she laughed and said there would be no way, but lo and behold, I found an add for 3 bottle lambs that came from a set of quintuplets! I texted immediately and was successful in purchasing them (she had a LOT of interest).

Two ewes and one ram which we plan to raise for breeding. We love them and enjoy bottle feeding them so much that Farm Boy declared he wanted some bottle goat kids of his own to raise. So guess what? We now have two adorable little newborn bucks in the barn.  Man, I love babies!

Farm Boy then decided he wanted to raise goats so I bought him his first nanny.  She is part nubian and will make a good breeding doe but also a good milking doe. She's super friendly and easy to handle. Perfect for a 12 year old's first goat.

The little buck next to her is not hers but came from the same farm. We took him to finish him off and send him to market. Goats did very well at the auction over easter so we have our fingers crossed its a good year for goats all around.

So that's it in the barn that's new. In the equine department, we still have Chase, Farm Girl's horse, Pixie and Blossom. We sold Fantasia as I just didn't feel the connection with her. Our love for Pixie and Blossom is pretty tight that I think I just want to keep their babies and not bring in any others. I did buy a little project for us over the winter which I never got at.

However, in the spring for sure I'm going to hook Pixie up and teach her how to drive. I can't wait.

Meanwhile, we have gone to view some sheep and are hoping to bring them home within the next week or two. I'll try to remember to post some photos. That's it for now. I'll leave you with one of my favourite photos of our recent puppy litter. She reminds me so much of Quinn who we had to rehome after my husband cut me off support payments (will update later on that in a future post) without notice and we were forced to sell a bunch of items to help with finances until I got a job. And poor Quinn was one of our sacrifices.

We are not keeping this little cutie but she is going home to her grandpa's family. Sadly, he died back in November and they want to continue the line so bought one of Jewel's pups from us. Jewel is his daughter. Instead, we plan on keeping a pup from our other breeding dog, Jewel's mom, Emma who is at Oldest place getting bred to her stud who not only has a matching personality as Em, but is super gorgeous. We can't wait for their line.

Updates

Haven't posted in a while, so thought I'd write a blog with updates. First the pigs. I learned that I hate pigs. This is my one and only time I will ever raise them. That said, I've gotten more used to them than I did at the beginning.

Pigs are filthy, disgusting...well, pigs. I can't keep up with their pen. I took these photos right after I cleaned and laid a new layer of straw in their pen. If I didn't, I wouldn't get the chance to get a good clean photo again until I mucked out their pen once again.

My truck. I love my truck.

Cosmetically, he isn't the most handsome beast on the road, but man oh man, he's got power. I can feel his strength beneath me when I drive him and that makes me feel very happy. And safe.

Chase. Who is Chase you ask? Chase is my Farm Girl's horse. She had sold him to a family friend, then bought him back, then sold him again when we realized the previous farm was not an appropriate property to raise animals. She sold him to the same family friend so basically the horse has been handed back and forth over the past two years. Well now that we are on a great farm, Farm Girl bought him back once again.

She loves having the arena and working him almost nightly. She's been practicing her riding saddleless at a lope and both saddleless and bridleless at a walk.

Just this morning, Emma gave birth to a litter of eight puppies.

The three little lambs have merged nicely with the other sheep.

While the ram is being stalled permanently after he rammed Farm Girl pretty good in the pasture.

Summer Heat

We've been having one hot day after the next in the past week and I think today was the hottest yet. When you can see the humidity in the air, you know its too dang hot to go outside. But I needed to check on the animals water and see how they were all handling the heat---with camera in tow.

The horses rarely leave their shelter in the heat. Which I don't blame them.

Whereas the miniatures are braver and rarely go indoors.

But when they do, it's a team decision.

The sheep also were keeping cool inside the cool barn.

Along with the breeding dogs.

Well, except for Emma who took comfort from a stoned pillow.

The horse's eventually did come out briefly, long enough to get a snack then hunkered back under the shade of their shelter once again.

Which was pretty much when I too decided I had enough of the heat and rushed back to the comfort of my cool home.

Boarding

There's a horse in my pasture once again.

It will be a couple years before we can fully grow the sheep flock so we decided to make use of the property and make some money by boarding horses.

This guy arrived late last night and woke me early this morning when something spooked him and he started running like mad in the small pasture. I hate running horses. I fear they may take it to the next level and jump the fences in their panic attack to get away.

Jumper?

As it turns out not only is Farm Girl's horse, Chase, very extremely herd bound but also a remarkable jumper.  We moved our miniature horses into a new pasture this morning but out of sight of Chase.  Chase is kept in his own "pasture".  I quote this because he grazes in temporary fencing and though we had that one bad experience, generally he is very safe in there and doesn't attempt to leave.  We chalked that event up to being new to the farm and feeling very unsettled.  He spends his day grazing contently within his small pasture with it's lush and plentiful grass.  But every now and then, he is struck with a bad case of herd bound(ness).  Not sure why.  It is inconsistent and sporadic.  But at any given moment he decides he needs to find the other horses.  They, of course, can live quite fine without him, thank you very much, so will ignore his attempts at calling out.  If I'm outside, I'll go into the goat shed and shew them outside to appease him or lure them out from behind a bush if that is where they have disappeared.

Today I was mowing and heard The Boy calling to me over the engine, pointing an excited finger to Chase's pasture.  He was at it again.  Running around crazy-like, calling out for Pixie and Blossom.  Farm Girl was off from work today, so I told The Boy to fetch her as I was busy.  She came out and went down to this pasture and attempted to calm him.  When he did not, she put him into the holding pen in order for him to calm down.  Once he did, he was allowed out of the pen and back into his pasture once again.  As I mentioned, the miniatures moved to another pasture with the goats which at one corner can have them disappear around the side of the house.  It was this flaw that excited Chase so much.  And no amount of cooling down in the holding pen was helping.  We watched him running around in there but weren't really worried.  After all, the holding pen is made up of 4 to 5 feet fencing with t-posts separated every four feet in some spots.  This was thanks to the sheep who continually found ways of escaping.

But I digress.  Being the owner of horses, I have seen them run top speed toward a fence and at the last second, pull on the breaks or turn swiftly.  As Chase turned toward the far end of the holding pen and started running at top speed for the opposite side, I whole-heartedly expected to see him coming to a halt.  After all, the only the place to go was through.  Then as he got closer and closer within mere feet, I knew he wasn't stopping.  I had horrible visions of him getting badly mangled as he barged through the fence.  But to our shock, he jumped.  Went sailing right over that 4 to 5 feet fence.  This fence.

He did catch his hoof on the top rail and took out a staple, but otherwise made it safely over.  It took some consoling and soothing to calm him and finally catch him, but at last we did.  And put up his portable pasture closer to Pixie and Blossom's new pasture.

Starting Over

The pastures stand quietly abandoned, the sheep's favourite tree looks lonely without the flock sleeping contently beneath it's shade.

The holding pen is still and empty while the shelter sits incomplete.

It was a hard decision to make selling the sheep, but I know when I have been beat and way over my head.  The lack of a perimeter fence and barn was far too much of a challenge to contain 80 something sheep. When they left the property and started heading up the road on their last escape, I knew I was done.  The liability risk of them running into traffic or onto other farmer's properties was too high.  I called a sheep buyer and he came and bought them from me.  In the end, it was probably a good thing as he informed me that the breed of sheep I was raising had little value in this area.  They were considered more as goats then sheep.  So I guess I saved myself years of raising a huge flock of the wrong breed.  It is our intention to make money off this business and the most dollar we can.  I had lost $75 per head on the lambs simply because they were Katahdin.  It was very disappointing.  I loved my sheep.  I took pride in the breed I raised.  It was a huge set back but one that I should be grateful could have been worse.  I could have been deeper invested.

But we are not giving up and will rebuild our flock.  Before then however, we will ensure the perimeter fence is in place.  If I took anything from this harsh lesson was that no matter how wonderful electric fencing may work, it does go out and you need something permanent in place to keep them from escaping further.  Meanwhile, Chase has returned to the farm and has an overnight enclosure in the sheep's holding pen preventing him from having any crazy ideas about visiting the horse farm down the road again.

And the miniatures are still here along with the billy goats.

And of course the pygmy goats whom Delilah has been reassigned to guard.

I am saddened that the sheep are gone considering they were our main reason for coming here, but I tell myself it again was in God's plans for me.  If they had never escaped, if I had never realized my limits, if I had not called in the buyer I would never had known I was on the wrong track.  So until the flock return, I guess I will enjoy being a goat farmer.

Gone

"Cause nothing is worse than a missing animal."  Those words from my previous post couldn't ring more true.  There truly is nothing more frightening then waking up and finding one of your livestock animals gone.  Vanished nowhere to be seen.  The other morning this scenario happened exactly to me.  Farm Girl had just brought her horse, Chase, back home and was enjoying riding him out in the open pasture but at the end of the day we didn't have a stall or pen to lock him up in.  Heck, the horse's pasture hasn't even been fenced yet.

But Farm Girl assured me that Chase was so fully trained to the electrical wire that he refused to cross any rope resembling it including twine.  And she's right.  I've seen it and used it to my advantage before  Even if the rope or line were lying on the ground, Chase would refuse to cross it.

But that day, something didn't feel right.  You know when your gut is trying to tell you something is wrong or impending?  That was how I felt. Chase was new to the farm and surroundings and seemed awfully interested in the horses he could hear down the road at a neighbour's farm. I even noticed he was eating grass directly beneath the rope line, touching it several times.  I told Farm Girl she should turn it on and give him a couple good shocks to refresh his memory just in case he had any crazy ideas of escaping.

She brushed me off declaring, "Mom, it's Chase!!  He isn't going anywhere."  And he didn't for the first two days that she kept him contained in the rope enclosure.  Reason enough for Oldest to back up her sister and say, "When I got home late the other night, he was content and just grazing.  You are being paranoid."  Oh I am known to be overly cautious according to my kids.  I worry too much they say.  I say I have reason to be.

The girls left me that night with Chase in his rope enclosure to stay at their father's place for the weekend with reassurance everything would be fine.  At 3:30 in the morning I woke to the sound of the Samson and Delilah barking their heads off frantically.  I headed out in the dark only to find Delilah outside the sheep holding pen.  That was unusual as she is not a jumper.  Samson is however but I keep him tied to a tire to prevent him from doing so.  Not sure how she escaped, I brought her into the house for the rest of the night to prevent any more escapes.  I did not check on Chase.  Or so much as glance in his direction.  I completely forgot about his presence.

An hour later at 4:30 I was woken once again by Samson barking wildly.  Wildlife is plentiful around here so I waited a bit to see if he scared whatever it was away, however when he failed to stop barking I got up and looked out my window.  Dawn was just lighting the evening sky and I could see Sam barkng out toward the road, not the woods.  That was when I glanced toward Chase's "pen" and noticed not only was it missing (the rope) but Chase as well.

Cussing profusely I grabbed a sweatshirt and coat and ran outside.  It was light enough to see about a yard ahead of me but not in the distance.  I squinted against the darkness nevertheless scanning the horizon and property.  Chase is a dark horse and chances of spotting in the early dawn was next to impossible. I prayed I'd find him hanging out near the sheep pen where the miniature horses are kept but he wasn't there.  He was nowhere to be seen.  Gone. Vanished.

The downside to having such a large property is that he could be anywhere.  I wondered if he could have headed into the woods or perhaps simply grazing along the property line.  It was fenced along the western and eastern line of the property while the south side was semi-fenced.  If he had gone in that direction, there was a very good chance he could have gotten cut up or injured in the fence.  I stopped my train of thoughts and froze.  The horse farm.  He was so focused on it the night before.  The grass in the pasture was tall as I plowed my way through it soaking the front of my pajama pants.  I searched for the missing rope enclosure hoping it would lead a path to where he had gone.  I didn't find any.  I reached the far end of the pasture with no sign of Chase or the pen and hit the pavement and road and started walking toward the direction of the horse farm.

In the silence of the night, I heard calling.  And then crying.  The Boy had woken and found me missing as well as the horse and feared something horrible had happened. I knew I had to respond to him but had to reach the horse farm first to find my missing horse.  It was still too dark but I reached the corner of their pasture and first quickly glanced to see if any fences were taken down.  Then God there were not.  I could make out some horses in the distance on the horizon but certainly couldn't identify whether one was my missing horse.  Stupidly I did the only thing I could with a child screaming frantically in the distance, I called out Chase's name hoping he would come trotting up to me like an obedient dog.

Of course that produced no results so with the fear of my crying child waking the neighbours, I headed back home. When I was within earshot I called back to him, assuring him I was fine.  He begged me to come back home and since there really wasn't anything more I could do until the sun fully rose, I obliged and headed for my laneway.  That was when I saw the rope lying in the driveway, stretched out like a pointing finger toward the entranceway. At least I now knew he had not gone through any fences and made it safely off the property.  Where to was still a mystery.

It was time to call FarmGirl.  Just as I was waiting to leave her a message, a vehicle pulled into my farm.  I knew why he was there.  As he stepped outside his vehicle, I asked, "Did you inherit an extra horse this morning."  He laughed (thanfully) and said, "Was wondering if he came from here. He's been hanging around my stallions pen. I worried one of my own horse's got loose."  Yes, I knew exactly how he felt.  He drove me and the Boy over to his farm to collect my horse.  As I clipped his lead to his halter I automatically mumbled, "You naughty boy, Chase."  The farmer and his wife who was also woken both laughed and said, "How appropriate is that name!"

I walked Chase home without incident and locked him up in the sheep's holding pen where he stayed all day long until Farm Girl arrived later that night with trailer to bring him back to her father's farm where a barn with plenty of empty horse stalls waited.  Lesson learned:  (1) Don't bring horse home until his pasture is ready.  (2)  Make sure all perimeter fencing is in place.  (3) Add a laneway gate to prevent any more escapes.

Farm Photos

Took a little time out of my day and my camera and snapped some photos from around the farm.

Guess who is back with us?  Farm Girl had the opportunity to buy back her horse, Chase, so jumped on it.  She missed him more than she realized she would.

Spring Day

What I did on this beautiful spring day.  Built a temporary shelter for one of my rams, Dodge, as the new ewes are getting closer to lambing and we'll need the extra leg space so the boys are moving out of the barn.

We built another temporary shelter in the wood shed/chicken coop.

It will be the temporary stop for new animals on the farm, sick animals, and for now, Durango's temporary digs.

It was such a beautiful spring day, we hated that none of the goats or sheep could come out to enjoy it.  So we brought some of the baby goat kids out to play instead.

Of course it didn't take long for us to realize neither mom or babe were comfortable with that scenario, so Farm Girl went back and retrieved a mom.

That worked.  All were happy bouncing little goats.

Who loved discovering their "goatness".

After they finished playing and returned to the barn and their pen, we tackled another project.  I wanted to refurbish an old hay feeder for the horses outside. With the mud season upon us, and having destroyed the feeder I had placed in the pasture prior to winter, I needed something that would get the hay off the ground.  Looking around at what I had on the property, I came across the old feeder.  The sheep had pulled off 80% of the badly welded bars on the feeder.

So I used some left over fencing and wrapped it around the remaining bars on the feeder.

It's sitting in the old chewed up feeder the horses destroyed over winter until we can get it staked to the ground.

It has been so nice lately that I have my fingers crossed for an early spring.  Maybe, just maybe we'll get the animals out to pasture before May.