Getting There

I decided I needed more room in the barn for the sheep so decided to use the only last space available---second last actually as there is still the corner where we store the hay.  The space I'm referring to is the clutter corner.  The corner where we put everything, and I mean everything.

We removed all the clutter first.

And then found new homes for the deep freezers and cabinets until at last it was empty.

All that needs to be done now is install the boards and lay some straw.  I'm not sure what to think about the electrical outlets.  Are sheep inclined to chew on the plastic covering them?  Or worse, lick the outlet boxes?!  If it were the goats I know that wouldn't be safe, but I've never had my sheep get into anything.  But I'd hate for this to be the first so am thinking of getting an electrician out to move the outlet boxes.

Visitor

We found a visitor in the greenhouse this morning.

See him?

And we have the first sign of spring on the first day of spring.  Granted, it was found indoors but it gives me hope.

Feeders

Guess what I did today?

Made new arrangements in the barn again of course.

It seems I'm always unsatisfied with the setup in the barn.  The problem I was presently having was that I was wasting a whole lot of expensive hay.  Without a hay feeder in the pen, the ewes trampled a good portion of hay and made it into bedding.  So I had to fix that.

I searched the internet and Pinterest for a setup that would work for me and the small space I had to work with.  The sheep pens in my barn are not very wide.  They are only 10 feet deep so no room for a feeder in the middle  I knew I had to work with the space outside of the pens.

We installed bottom boards along the base and left about 11" for sheep to slip their heads out comfortably for feeding.  There are individual slots that we separated by 12" but are adjusting that to about 8" as it is really too wide and not only can two ewes slip their heads into one slot but a ewe has already got a leg and head stuck in one. Besides by making the slots smaller will provide more individual feeding slots to accommodate all the sheep.

Next project, smaller and lighter grain feeders.

Screw Winter

We're planting for spring!

Rain Rot

I have learned that owning horses is not as easy as one may think.  It seems every year I learn something new.  Horses are far more sensitive then other livestock including miniature horses. They pick up diseases easier, have more sound issues and weight problems.  This winter we discovered a new disease in horses.  It is called rain rot.  Sierra has gotten badly infected.

But as nasty as it looks, this is not a life-threatening disease and is a common issue with horses so I've been told.  Even my Farm Girl's coach has it on some of his horses. It's mostly caused by the warm humid climate when the hair particles are killed and then you have an onslaught of cold weather and the thick winter coat grows in on top of those dead cells.  We didn't notice it until late fall when we discovered a bunch of bumps under Sierra's coat and a baseball size patch of hair came off in my hand. Initially we thought she had mites and treated her for that however it never went away and the bumps continued while hair particles fell off.  A call to the vet diagnosed rain rot over the phone which her coach confirmed when he came to take a look at her.  When the vet came out to take a look at Blossom, he noticed Sierra and thought she might have mites or lice so did a thorough search through her coat and found as we already new that she did not have any.  He prescribed an antibiotic for her and advised us to give her a bath with an iodine based shampoo.  Meanwhile, we are to remove all the dead hair and expose the skin in order for it to heal.

She is on antibiotics for a couple more days but then she will be sent outside to let the sun heal the rest.  The sun is the best medicine in this case and the rain is the worse.  We cannot allow rain or snow to touch the rain rot or it we will be back where we started from and Sierra will never heal.

No Kidding!

My little pygmy goat, Holly is expecting!  No kidding!

After 3 years of waiting, it has finally happened.  Daddy is not Thunder as I would have liked.

But after all Caesar's. The sneaky little bugger.

After months of ignoring the girls, or at least we thought he was, Caesar is proving his stud worth.

Blossom's Fate

The vet came out to look at Blossom and after looking her over gave me both good and bad news.  The good news is that she does not have founder, nor is she lame in any manner.  Yet.  Unfortunately, the bad news is that the tendons in her legs never developed properly and the situation is irreversible. Blossom was born with loose tendons in all four legs.  

The front legs corrected themselves but the back legs never really did.  Though I do believe she was standing on them as correctly as she could for a long time now but for whatever reason, in the past month the tendon in the back legs began to stretch again until she was walking on her heels rather than her hooves.

I took these photos outside but they don't really give a good view of how bad they are.  I think she is standing on a hill and it is pushing her feet forward because as bad as it looks, they are actually worse than this.

Another angle.

What made this diagnose so heartwrenching is that there is nothing the vet can do for her.  It is not treatable.  She is not in any pain so the only thing we can do for her is to wait until the time comes when walking on her heels will break the skin and infection sets in.  The humane thing to do at that time will be to euthanize her.  When those words passed the vet's lips, I admit I cried.  I love this little miniature and can't bare to think of her fate.