Hard to believe…

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That it’s been 3 weeks since our little fuzzy lamb nuggets were born!  They are getting so big now!  And strong, fast and a lot more independent.

Before, they would stay pretty close to their moms… only venturing out a few feet at a time.  Now?  heck they will race all over the homestead with their poor bellowing ma trying to keep up!  Even the ewes are starting to not worry if they rip off to join their fellow ovine gang to race around the joint, learning how to escape imaginary coyotes and other bad things!  They are just darling to watch… they jump and frolic and kick up their heels…  it’s the best TV station we have here at the farm for sure!

 

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This is little Harley and his sister Emma.  Aren’t they darling?  Harley is going to be our next herd sire, not this year, but perhaps in 2014.  Some ram lambs are ready to ‘do the job’ but it’s really best to give them a full year of growing up.  We are purposely not smothering and babying him so that he will be a respectful boy when he’s all grown up!

The other three boys are going to be fixed, so that they can join herds and be happy little whethers… great pets, good protectors and great fleece machines!  Like Fergus and Angus.

We will be keeping most of the ewe lambs…  but may offer a couple for sale…  we have too many black sheep now…  I was really hoping that both Holly and Noel would throw a little color, rather than just black, but no such luck!  And with both having twins… we now have 6 black Welsh Mountain sheep!  (Well, the lambs are cross Shetlands…)  I might be selling Noel and Holly to the right home if it comes along.  It was a hard decision… but I really would like to raise purebred Shetlands, and so that makes it a little hard to keep too many non-Shetlands.  We thought they were mixed Shetlands at the time, but after some research and confirmation from our shearer Emily, who has seen a zillion sheep…  we know they are not Shetlands.  We’ll see how it goes.  The Black Welsh are a rare breed as well, one of the only TRUE black wool sheep.

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We finally got the back pasture fenced in!   Thank goodness!!!  It was the last big frontier of grass here at the homestead and it’s done.  And pretty safe.  We have ONE little space that is a bit soft, but thankfully, everyone has forgotten about it.  We need to go and get a couple more heavy duty fence posts, as soon as the budget will allow.  Right now, they are so excited to just eat and eat, that they forgot about that space where a few of them can push under.   We just don’t keep them out there for too long and that makes them ready to eat all they can and worry about escaping later.

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It was sure an exciting day when we got the last piece of fence up!  Yahooo!    Of course, we have a few areas that we’d love to re-fence a little stronger, but right now, all the fences on the farm are pretty good.  I would love to say excellent, but that’s not the case.  Still, pretty good is better than tolerable.  And the best part is that the iffy areas are all inner areas, so at the worse case, escapees only get into another area.  And it is usually three of our flock that cause the most havoc.  Fergus is the worse… that boy can get out of just about anything he sets his little ovine mind to.  Funny thing is that he won’t go far and if you call him, he panics to get back in, just like a little boy caught stealing cookies.  Iris is good at doing the fence limbo if there is ANY weak spot, but her lambs are not, so as soon as they start to bellow about her absence, she, too, is trying desperately to get back in.  The last is Bridget, as she is small, like Fergus and can shimmy after him when they hang together.  But since it looks like she might be expecting too, she’s getting a little too big to make the fancy moves and I hope she’ll stop it.

Sounds like we have a lot of escapees… but really, it’s been 2 different occasions in the last three weeks.  And then we fixed the areas up tight and stopped that behavior.  But, hey, with livestock, they are ALWAYS thinking about eating and escaping.  I’m pretty convinced of that.  The grass is ALWAYS greener on the other side of the fence!!!

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Jessy caught me out on shepherd duty one afternoon… crocheting!  Hey, it was a lovely day, the sun was shining and we were still watching everyone in the back pasture… just to be sure the babies didn’t get out.  And I just had learned how to make granny squares… it was just lovely, that day, I remember it well!

We’re finally getting some decent temperatures, more like a normal Ohio spring, if you ask me.  And we are into May now!  This has been a tough winter on us all, that’s for sure.  But it’s looking so nice now and we’re getting our garden planted and more sunshine in us every day!  It’s very hard to be inside at the computer, if you haven’t noticed!  I’m sorry to be a little remiss in my blog postings… I do love to blog, but after 7 months of cold, I am just outside as MUCH as I can be and still keep food on the table and the bills paid!!!

But I think I can be a little more consistent in my posts!   And I have a bunch of fun photos and news about what we are all up to!    Of course, you can always check out Facebook farm page…  unfortunately, it is a little easier to post there, pictures and such, so if you want to know every little dumb detail of our days… it’s probably easier to check there too.  But you’ll get a little more “meat and potates” here at the blog.  :-)

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Aside from being a dirty little shaggy pony, Cody is still very happy and healthy and so thrilled to finally be in the back pasture.  He loves it out there.  He’s often at the far edge, away from the goofy sheep and just stuffing his face with lovely green spring grass.  Thank goodness he is not the foundering type, because I would hate to have to keep him from his afternoon grazing.  He loves it.  And after he has a belly full, he likes to lay out in the sunshine and just take a big old pony nap.  He is one spoiled and happy little Shetland pony for sure!!!

 

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About Mobymom

the banjo player for Deepwater Bluegrass, and the editor of BuckeyeBluegrass.com as well as the main graphic designer of the Westvon Publishing empire. She is a renaissance woman of many talents and has two lovely daughters and a rehab mobile home homestead to raise.

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