Round 'Em Up!!!

Today was "Vaccinate & Worm the Sheep, Goats & Llamas Day." It didn't start off well. I thought I had everything in one place, but turns out I was missing a vital piece of equipment needed to make wethers out of the two little boy goats. This needs done while they are small, and who knows when we’ll have good weather on a Saturday again. I needed to find the band castrator tool TODAY.

While I searched The Farmer tried to come up with alternatives, like using a pair of needle-nosed pliers to stretch open the bands. He decided to test it out, and the first band he stretched open popped off the pliers and flew off into unknown regions. Some day when I'm running the sweeper I'll probably find a little green rubber ring where I least expect it.

It was obvious from the test trials that pliers just weren't going to do the job. The bands need to be stretched completely open, not just from two sides. I searched and searched some more, and finally found the missing bander. (Maybe those ornery little boy goats snuck in the house and hid it, hoping to avoid their eunuch-thized fate!)

I finally had all the necessary paraphernalia gathered up so we went outside to round ‘em up! We did the sheep first. They haven't been sheared yet and are easy to get hold of. They got their vaccinations and Ivomec sheep drench, and were good to go.

Miss Keira kept poking her nose over the fence, so we slipped a halter on her, clipped on a lead, and said, "Okay, you can be next!" She's not overly fond of shots, and always kushs down.

Well! That brought on an unexpected complication. Samson was in the same pen, and wanted to make amorous advances, figuring he at last had her where he wanted her! ARGH! Not NOW! The Farmer stood on one side of Keira fending off her suitor, while I got on the other side and gave her a vaccination and shot of wormer. She was off like a jet plane the minute we let her loose. (Sorry Samson, another day!)

Since Samson hasn't been handled much, we figured he was likely to be a handful and decided to save him for last. We rounded up the goats, gave them all their meds, then picked up each twin and did the dastardly deed of slipping a band on to switch them from buck to wether, and poking a baby aspirin down their throat. They screamed and complained more about the aspirin than the band, and were off playing the minute we let them go, so it obviously doesn't bother them much.

That left our new big boy, Samson. I tried to entice him with some feed, but he knew we were up to something and wasn't having any. The Farmer decided he was going to have to rope him. Oh fun!

I said, "If you're going to play cowboy, let me go get my camera first."

As The Farmer first approached, Samson went running off to the other side of the pen.

The first couple of throws were unsuccessful, but The Farmer was determined!

I was surprised when after a few tries, Samson just seemed to accept the inevitable and stood still while The Farmer walked up to him and put the rope around his neck.

Not only did he allow me to put a measuring tape around his middle to check his weight, he let me give him both shots without fuss. He didn't kush, and he didn't give any indication he wanted to spit at us either. I was much impressed!!!

Our handsome boy is turning out to be quite a gentleman!

So it ended up he wasn't much trouble at all, and we were done with our round-up in record time!