Picking up Pastured Poultry & Delivering a Single Sheep

It’s been a busy weekend, and it’s not even over yet since we’ve still got Memorial Day!

Friday afternoon I went out the back roads through places I’ve never been, and ended up at Mountain Fork Farm to pick up my order of pastured broilers.

Yes, I know we have chickens here on our farm. And yes, I thought about raising some for the freezer. There’s just one catch, but it’s a BIG catch. If I raise them, I have to process them, which is a nice way of saying I have to chop their heads off, scald, pluck and gut each chicken. I’ve done it in my time, but at this stage I don’t have the stamina for such a big project, so I decided to support some other farmer who does.

It was a nice drive, and what I saw of the farm was gorgeous. They had a canopy set up a little ways down their driveway, right before you go through the gate to their property, with chickens in coolers ready for pickup. I wish I’d thought to ask how many acres they have. It has to be pretty good sized, because I couldn’t even see their house from where I was.

The first thing you see is a big greenhouse in a field to the right of the driveway. They also sell a wide variety of vegetables that are grown using sustainable agriculture methods, so no doubt get a lot of use from the greenhouse.

They have a shed not far from the greenhouse with big coolers for the chickens and such.

There was a big field to the left, and the road winds on back through the trees. I could hear chickens way off, and I know from their website they raise turkeys, Berkshire hogs, Dexter cattle and horses. I was disappointed not to see any of that, but maybe I’ll be able to go back again another time.

Saturday I spent catching up on work in the house, with laundry and cleaning and baking a couple of Cherry-Orange coffee cakes, several pizza crusts, bread for us, and “Birdie bread” – made with whole grains and veggies, cut up in cubes, and fed to my picky parrot.

Today we delivered a ewe to a friend’s farm way out back of beyond. You even have to drive through a creek to get to the farm. I reckon they don’t go anywhere during hard rains! They were supposed to be home by mid-morning, having gone to a Fiber Festival earlier this weekend. We got there mid-afternoon, but nobody greeted us but the dogs.

Of course, that’s a pretty big greeting, considering they are HUGE Great Pyrenees, and there were about ten of them prancing around us. They will not, however, win any awards for vicious watchdogs, as they were far more interested in seeing if we would pet them. Of course, we’ve been there before, but even the young pups we’d not seen before were eager for their share of attention.

We wandered around the yard for a while. The dogs were all barking and the one inside was going nuts. I knocked at the door. No answer. What to do???

Fortunately, they have several pens, and there was one unoccupied behind the house, complete with shade tree, so we put the ewe in there, got her a bucket of water, left a note in the screen door, and went back home.

The funny thing is, a couple hours after we got home Kim called me. I figured she was going to comment on the new sheep and tell me where she’d been. Wrong! I said, “Did you find the present we left for you?”

Turns out she hadn’t, and she’d been home the whole time. I’m not sure where she was working, but her mother was in the house and never realized we were out there, or unloading sheep in the pen right by the house. I figured there was no way they could NOT know we were there considering how the dogs were carrying on, including the one in the house. We’d left a note in the screen door and left a sheep, so there’s no denying we were there!

At any rate, the sheep got delivered, and I got to check out a bunch of the ewes and lambs she had running around.

We’ll do the check and registration thing to each other through the mail, so … all’s well that ends well?

We tried a different route home, and I couldn't resist snapping a picture of this lovely red barn we passed. Oh… and Robin… you won’t believe how many wild turkeys we saw on the way to and from their farm! They never stood still long enough for a picture, but I promise, we really did see LOTS of them!

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!

Typical Scene on the Farm

It's a blustery day here on the farm. There's moisture in the air, sometimes just a light mist, other times it's wee little balls of stinging sleet. This is not my favorite time to be out and about, but the animals need hay even more on days they don't go out and graze.

The guineas don't seem to mind a little rain, running around looking for grain or perched on the fence.
I almost chickened out of my morning walk through the woods, but I figured if the guineas could hack the foul weather, so could I.

The wind was making quite a racket as it roared through the trees, and of course the creek was up a little from the bit of rain we had.

On nice days, when I let all the animals out together, it's not unusual to see all kinds of combinations of critters, with the chickens, guineas, dogs, sheep and llama.
This isn't the first time I've seen poultry perching on sheep. I think that nice thick wool must keep their feet warm, or maybe they just like being on top of things.

It's a typical scene on the farm.

Baa, baa, black sheep, have you any wool?

The weather remains changeable here. Yesterday it was up in the 70's, last night it rained, this morning it was in the 40's. At least the sun was shining brightly when I went out to do the morning chores.

The sheep were still resting in the main pasture, in a nice, neat row near the orchard:
That's the matriarch on the left, Coconut, then Rowan, Domori, Payapa and Valrhona. They're retired now from producing lambs, though of course, they still produce wool! In fact, each one produces a different color. Being Shetland sheep, some of those colors have special names. From left to right, their colors are: white, gray, moorit, shaela and musket.

So to the question, "Baa, baa, black sheep, have you any wool?"
The answer is yes! And so do all the other different colored sheep!

Friday on the farm...

It was beautiful out there when I went to do chores this morning. The weather has warmed up again, and I wore a light jacket instead of my heavy winter coat. Even at that, I pulled off the jacket before I was half way finished with the chores. Though the sun was shining, it’s pretty dreary. What colored leaves we had have either turned brown, fallen to the ground, or both. Still, there’s a little color peeking through here and there, like this lovely little violet.Toby was in rare form this morning, galloping all over the place, carrying around a big piece of lumber he found somewhere. He’s got to have a piece of wood in his mouth, whether it’s so tiny you can barely see the end of it sticking out of his mouth, or so large it’s twice his size and he’s dragging it along behind him.

He’s the farm jester, always finding ways to make me laugh, no matter how grumpy I might be. He loves to play in the water. In the original game, he jumped up and bit the water, but later it evolved to him wanting sprayed while he ran around with his lumber stogie in his mouth.

The other animals generally ignore his lunacy, unless he gets too close. Then they’ll scoot out of his way while casting a wary eye in his direction.

Eventually, they’ll go back to munching their hay or grass or whatever they were doing.

It’s another beautiful Friday on the farm.

Another Frosty Morning

For our part of the world, it was downright cold this morning. It was 27 degrees F (-3C), which doesn't sound so cold if you're in Maine or Canada perhaps, but it's all relative, and for us.... brrrrrrr....

We had another hard frost, and the sheep were sporting icy wool this morning. It's easiest to see the frosty fleece on a dark colored sheep like Papaya.
I don't like HOT weather, but I'm not too keen on this really COLD stuff either. The wind is wicked sharp out there today. The rocks and fallen leaves were covered with ice crystals.

Dare I say it? I wish this frigid weather would *leaf* us alone!

The End of an Era

I just got off the phone from talking with our state vet. She’s a wonderful lady, and has been out here once a year for a long time now to check out our sheep flock and goat herd for Scrapie.

But not this year.

I was in the voluntary program, as I felt it made it easier to sell registered stock. However, I disliked all the paperwork. Worse, there wasn’t any way to correct any mistakes you might have made once the paperwork was in. And then there was the problem we had when someone gave The Farmer an OLD goat. She was too old to have kids any more, so NOT breeding stock. Didn’t matter, getting that goat set our years in the program back to Day 1.

Since we’ve downsized and are mostly a retirement home for a few old goats and sheep, there just isn’t much point to keeping up with something that creates a lot of work and no return for your trouble. So I told her I was opting out of the program. I won’t have any lambs or kids this year, and won’t be selling any more goats or sheep, so why keep it up?

It’s the end of an era.

The Frost is on the Pumpkin

Okay, I lied. The frost is NOT on the pumpkin. However, we did finally get a hard frost last night, and as I was headed out the door to take pictures this morning, I was just sure I'd be able to use that title. Wouldn't you know the few little pumpkins I bought were in sheltered locations and didn't get frosted!?!

You can see it on the windshield of Youngest Son's car:

You can see frost on the sheep's wool and where they were sleeping:

The last of the roses got frosted:

And of course, the grass and fallen leaves are frosty:
The sun hitting the newly frosted leaves is causing a shower of leaves to fall this morning:


Right now the oak trees, like the one shown here at the end of our driveway, still have most of their leaves:But the leaves are falling faster and faster:


So I figure it won't be long until all the trees look as naked as the walnuts do:
(... that picture is for you Robin! See, you're not the only one with leafless trees!)

And last, though you can't see the frost on the trees in this picture, I decided to include it because I like it, even if I do have it upside down here:
It may not LOOK upside down, but it's not really a picture of the trees, but a picture of their REFLECTION in our pond.

So, even though the frost wasn't on the pumpkin...
It was on most everything else this morning!

Morning on the farm...

When I went out this morning to do chores, the little guineas were running around. These are the smallest and youngest of our many guineas.

They ran from the main pasture to the "back yard pasture"... mixing with the sheep and goats.

Everyone's after the same corn I threw out!

Southern Heat

I don’t know about global warming, but I know it’s plenty warm here in the south. I’m not too thrilled when you pass a bank thermometer and it has THREE digits!

Even though it’s in the shade, our thermometer has been reading 98 degrees F. for the last three days. (For those of you using the Celsius scale, that would be almost 37C.) That’s just TOO hot.

Everything here on the farm is trying to cope with the hot weather, from “A” to “Z”. (Okay, so the closest I have to the front of the alphabet is cat, with sheep at the tail end.) All the critters look for shade, but have different habitats and various ways of beating the heat.

Spot, the Cat, likes to lounge around in the shade under our truck, and keep his thirst quenched with Birdie Broth, otherwise known as water out of the bird bath – just a “faint flavor of birdie essence”. I'm not sure if I put fresh water in there for the birds or the cat.


A dust bath is the method of choice for a quick cool down for the Chickens... … while the Dogs like to hang out under the back porch or in the shade of the big walnut trees in the back yard.

Neffie takes a rest (above), while Toby enjoys chewing on a hunk of wood while lazing in the shade (below).

Even our Garden needs help with the heat, especially considering we are also under drought conditions. I’ve had to water the peppers and tomato plants almost every day. (Thank goodness for well water!)

Of course the Goats like to hang out under the shade trees in the back yard with Neffie.

Keira the Llama often joins them, but she also cools down by “burying” herself in a sea of green plants in the bog area of the bottom pasture, though it’s not much of a bog right now!

In the aviary, the Peafowl go for a combination of bathing in the dust or pool.


Last, but not least, the Sheep also opt for spots under the shade trees. Our flock matron has a special spot under a pile of lumber and gets double shade from that and the overhanging tree branches.
One way or another, everyone is looking for shade and the coolest spot possible. I’m thrilled to be able to enjoy the air conditioning inside the house. Yep, I admit it, when it comes to extreme heat, I’m a Wuss.

Beating the heat from "C" to "W" -
Just keep that air conditioning on for the "W" please!

A stitch in time...

We’ve been selling and delivering a lot of sheep and goats lately. Usually the goats are livelier and harder to handle than the sheep, but our last two deliveries were the exact opposite.

Today we had 5 goats to deliver. The three of us rounded up all the goats, sorted out which ones we needed and had them loaded on the truck so quickly we had to sit around and kill time before we needed to leave. All Right!

Some of the goats munching leaves off a catalpa tree.

Our previous delivery was quite different. We only needed to load 4 sheep. Easy enough. Ha! And again I say, HA!

First off, if our sheep don’t go in the shed the first try, it’s a problem. After that they’re spooked, flighty, and downright hard to manage. Part of the sheep did go right in the shed, but unfortunately, two of those left out were ones we needed to deliver.

Worse, one of those still out was an old ewe that’s half blind. Since she can’t see very well, she gets spooked easily. She runs right past open gates, so instead of going into the lot where we wanted them, she started running round and round in the main pasture. Sheep being sheep, the other three escapees followed her.

The three of us tried spacing ourselves in the field and heading the sheep back towards the gate. The four of them continually zipped through spaces between us and continued their laps around the field. Over and over we tried to head them in the right direction. Over and over they went in the wrong direction.

It became painfully clear sheep and people were all getting hot and winded. We needed a new strategy. We decided to try letting them out into their day pasture, then use some feed to entice them through the gate they’re used to coming in each night.

It seemed like a good idea, but the sheep did NOT cooperate. Instead of running around the pasture, they were now running in frenzied circles around the aviary and sheds, leaping and bouncing against things along the way. More time passed as sheep and people ran themselves ragged in the muggy summer heat. Whose idea was it to try this?? Oh yeah, mine….

Finally the sheep went through a big gate into a lot by the shed and we were able to pen them up. However, it was quickly apparent our troubles weren’t over. One of the ewes had blood running down her face. Lots of blood.

Naturally, it was one of the ewes we were supposed to deliver. Upon close examination, I discovered she had a cut about 2 inches long above one eye, and the flap of skin drooped down every time she blinked. Oh great!

Evidently at one point this ewe bounced against the aviary and a bolt sticking out from it had ripped clear through the skin. After almost a decade of shepherding, I’d never had a sheep that needed stitches. This one did.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have any sutures. Also, I needed to know the buyer’s preference. Did she want me to keep the ewe until she was healed and deliver her later? Did she want to suture the wound herself? Did she want a vet to do it?

I called to see how they wanted to handle it, and at their request, we loaded the wounded ewe with the other sheep, and stopped at a vet’s office to have the cut stitched up while on the way to their farm. Nothing like sitting in a hot parking lot waiting on a busy vet after you're already hot and tired from running half the morning.

Once the wound was washed out, sutured up, and the vet gave the ewe a couple of shots, AND I paid the bill (there goes the profit!), we were finally ready to get the sheep to their new home.

Our friend with one of her Great Pyranees and a few of her sheep.

Fortunately, unloading the sheep was pretty easy, and we were able to enjoy a nice visit with the buyer. She has beautiful sheep and wonderful guard dogs and we enjoy chatting with her, but I must admit it was a relief to finally make it home again and put that fiasco behind us.

Which just goes to prove, a stitch in time isn't always a time-saver!