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Scaling Down for Winter

We have been focusing lately on gearing down for the winter. Last winter was so hard and stressful, that we’ve been making some tough decisions about animals for this year. Right now our livestock list goeas something like this:

3 horses: Shine, Marlene and Winter
3 cows: Maude, Pearl and Maeby
3 pigs: Bill, Dixie and Beowulf
12 sheep: 9 ewes and 3 wethers
4 geese
4 dogs: Split, Ben, Joon, and Ralfy the Ancient Beagle
Chickens: 7 laying hens, and a rooster (in a chicken tractor) and 3 bantams running free
4 cats

So the plan is to reduce the number of big hay-eaters, and anybody else who might be a source of stress this winter.

Maude is going to live with our friends in Damascus, Va, where she will be a pampered only cow. Shine is going to live with her former owner in Boone, NC, where she will be giving rides to disadvantaged kids, which is perfect for her. Bill the pig and the 3 wethers are all going in the freezer, along with the chickens in the chicken tractor, who have frustratingly been eating their eggs.

This is sounding much more do-able!

And Then a Miracle Occurred

The last week or two has been somewhat frustrating. The critters have been rampaging, and even when they are relatively well behaved they are still taking all of our time and energy. Dixie the pig is particularly awful, getting out of wherever I try to keep her, and being aggressive with me, too.

Yesterday we got chores done and took a drive to Hickory to pick up our puppy (you might note the singular form of that noun) and Split. We’ve been just a little apprehensive about Split, who Michelle has described as having ADD, and indeed she was pretty wide open, especially compared to Gel, who is Mister Perfection Himself (and the pup’s dad).

We had a lovely visit with Michelle and Wally, and got inspired by their farm and all their beautiful and healthy animals, and then we lolled about on the lawn under a shade tree with the puppies, at which point—in spite of our whole family actually practicing saying “No, just one puppy please!” in the car on the way down—Michelle very easily convinced us to take two. Bernard fell in love with Big Mike, a big, mellow male ( who I believe has been renamed Benny), and ED really liked the darkest female, whom she has named Joon. So we actually came home with three dogs!

Our plan with Split has been to get to know her without trying to do any real work quite yet. We have no idea what we’re doing, and want to take things slowly, and develop a relationship with Split. So yesterday we took her all over the farm on a leash, and during evening chores she accompanied ED and me in the pasture while we moved fences and animals.

The first clue we had that she could be pretty helpful around here was when the three of us were walking through the pasture to the barn and Dixie came up barking and grunting and being a little bit threatening. Split assessed the situation, experimented with a few nips, and then bit Dixie’s hind leg hard enough to make Dixie decide that the other side of the pasture was plenty close enough. Dixie didn’t offer much fight, though we grabbed a big stick to make sure we could back her off if we needed to.

So that was good, and we were finding our walk through the pasture a lot more pleasant with Dixie on the other end of it. We finished all our fence moving chores and I got ED to hold on to Split while I moved the sheep from the barn (where they spend the day, out of the heat and bugs) out to their fresh grazing paddock. Usually this operation goes fairly smoothly—me, with a handful of corn, running in front of the eager flock—but this time three of them didn’t make it in. I tried to lure them with more corn, and then chased them around and around the pen and just could not get them through the opening. I asked ED to stand with Split halfway around the pen to stop them going in circles around it.

and then a miracle occurred

Split, who was pretty excited by this whole inefficient operation, pulled the leash out of ED’s hand, went and got the three renegade sheep, put them in the pen, and came and lay down at my feet. ED and I stood there with our mouths hanging open.

I think this may work out just fine.

Grazing Update

These days our biggest chore is moving animals around. We are rotationally grazing cows, horses, chickens, and sheep. The cows and horses are grazing a neighbor’s field, and they’re pretty easy, requiring only a single strand of electric wire to contain them. They only graze at night, however, because the heat and bugs are too bad during the day. So they snooze in the cool barn all day, and go out on pasture in the evenings.

The cows’ milk is beautiful, bright yellow and very creamy. We are feeding them so little grain—just a 3 or 4 pound scoop of a mix of chicken scratch and dairy pellets per day. I think we’ll stop that by the end of the week, at least for Pearl, who thrives on forage. Their production has gone down a bit (I think we’re getting 4 or 5 gallons a day from Pearl) but both cows are gaining weight and looking beautiful, and who cares if there’s a little less milk when the input is almost nothing? And, really, the milk is just gorgeous.

The chickens are in a chicken tractor in the garden, and they have done an astonishing job of clearing the rampant weeds. I really enjoy their company while I work out there digging beds and planting and mulching—whenever I turn up a worm I throw it to them, so they’re a very attentive audience! They’re very busy and content, and they’re laying well.

The sheep are getting rotated around our pasture in their new electro-net pen. They are also putting on weight, even the ewes with lambs. The rams and wethers look great—time to butcher those wethers soon! I don’t quite have my technique down for moving them—I fall down a lot—but I’m getting better! And the pasture is so dramatically improved this year—already!

I am the most boring person on earth right now. All I want to talk about is grass. I sure have a lot of tolerant friends!

Talia’s Lamb

Talia and her new lamb, Tulip

All Done Lambing

Yesterday Hannah and Talia lambed, and this morning Maisie had hers. Talia is our gorgeous moorit Icelandic ewe and she had a jet black little ewe lamb.

Hannah’s lamb was a weak and tiny ram lamb, who looks like he’s not going to make it. Hannah is a ewe we should’ve culled a long time ago—she has lovely wool and good conformation, but she’s the result of an accidental linebreeding, and has never given us a nice lamb. She’s also our only ewe with worm problems, so she’s very hard to keep weight on. I guess she’s going to have to go in the freezer, especially since all our other lambs this year have been such sturdy bouncy little things with this Icelandic cross.

Maisie is a lovely gray Cotswold/Lincoln cross and her lamb—at least in the dim light of the barn this morning—seems to be chocolate brown. I’ll try to get a picture of her later today.

So—all singles this year, four ewes and a ram. Our new naming system goes like this: All lambs have the same first initial as their mother, and we have a different theme each year. This year’s theme is plants. So Callie’s lamb is Clover, Hallie’s is Hibiscus (already nicknamed Hibby), Talia’s baby is Tulip, and Maisie’s is Moss.

Hallie’s New Lamb

Hallie had a single ewe lamb Thursday, smaller than the lamb her sister Callie had a couple of weeks ago, but healthy and vigorous. I really like these Icelandic/Cotswold crosses. The lambs are so much more active right from the beginning, and, strangely, they’re also much friendlier than the Cotswold lambs. They both have short tails (I love that—no awful tail-docking chores), and are both stocky and not nearly so leggy or gangly as the purebred Cotswolds. This new lamb is not going to have wool on her forehead, but the older one is going to have a Cotswold-style topknot. The older one, by the way, has grown so fast—I’ll try to get a picture of her.

Another Shamelessly Adorable Lamb Picture

Cute Lamb

Look at that sweet face

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Scaling Down for Winter

And Then a Miracle Occurred

Grazing Update

Talia’s Lamb

All Done Lambing

Hallie’s New Lamb

Another Shamelessly Adorable Lamb Picture

Cute Lamb

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