Wishing for summer...

New blog friends

We are pretty busy here on the farm but I do like to spend a few minutes looking at other farm blogs. I have been lurking here http://omelay.wordpress.com/ for quite some time I usually don't leave a comment but I thought it would be fun do follow her example and find a few new friends. So copied her post and will follow her example.
i rarely do these things but this sounds fun!
meme from Mavournin:
The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me. I will try to make these be about or tailored to those five lucky people. This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:
- I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!
- What I create will be just for you.
- It’ll be done this year
- You have no clue what it’s going to be.

The catch? Oh, the catch is that you have to put this in your journal as well, if you expect me to do something for you! And please link to your blog so that I can visit and read in case we are new friends.

Triplet had twins!

Well finally we are done lambing. All three ewes had twins. Triplet had hers on Friday evening and seems to be doing well she is letting all three lambs nurse and they look good. Teak is being a bit of a pain she doesn't let one of hers nurse we have to pin her to the wall to let the lamb nurse. I might have to go ahead and bottle feed him. All of the girls had rams!! Again!! 6 rams ! I don't know about our sire. I guess we need to decide what we want to do with the sheep. He sure is not helping me to build our flock but he is helping me fill my freezer. I am glad that everyone is healthy.

Triplet

Here is Triplet with her stolen lamb.. Naughty sheep! Look at that belly, I hope she has the lambs soon.

Lambs!

Proud Papa

Teak and twins

Kochia and lamb

Maternity ward

We have had a busy last few days. The ewes decided it was time to expand the flock. I went out to milk on Tuesday and noticed the sheep did not come up for breakfast, which is very odd. I was able to see the ram down in the far west barn with the ewes. I called to them and finally the Ram came running up but the ewes stayed put. Hum..... at that point I knew someone had lambed. I got some warm towels and ran down to see what was up. I found all three ewes and two sweet lambs. I was not sure who had lambed or if they were finished lambing. I scooped up the lambs and carried them up to the barn. The ewes followed right along. I put all three ewes and the lambs in the big stall because I thought that one might have another lamb. I got them water and feed and left them to settle in. I checked back in a few hours and Kochia was nursing a very cute white lamb and Triplet was nursing a little black lamb. I got worried because Triplet is huge in the belly and she only had one small lamb, I thought that she might have another lamb that had died or was in trouble. I watched them for 15 min or so and in that time I saw her belly jump all around. So we have a live lamb still in there. This was a full 12 hours after the black lamb was born. I thought it was VERY odd for this to happen but we let them be. I figured she would finish lambing in the night. I came in to milk yesterday and everything was the same??? It was so odd. I called some friends that have sheep to get some advice about Triplet. They said to call the vet. I called two local vets and they both said the same thing. Triplet stole Kochia's baby!!! We think that the black lamb was born first and while Kochia was having the second Triplet adopted the first. She lets him nurse and treats him as if he is hers, yet she still has a belly full of baby. Teak had her babies yesterday evening and they are healthy and strong. We will keep a eye on Triplet, I am worried she will have hers and then reject the little black lamb. She looked like she might be in early labor this morning I'll check back in on her later. Such drama!! Who knew we had a thief on the farm.

LAMBS!!!

Babies are here! Photos and the whole story later. I'll just say they are too cute.

Ducks

I got seven ducklings last summer. They were bought as future bug control. They have done really well and are quite hardy. When I go out in the morning to milk I often find them snuggled up outside. (The silly chickens are all hiding in the barn.) They are fabulous fliers and tend to fly all over rather than walk. They are a rather large duck. I am surprised at how well they fly. They often are found on top of the chicken barn pretending to be weather veins. They have stayed here on the farm and seem to be good at warding off predators. I hope that they are as good at attacking the pesky squash bug this summer.

Wind damage

We are on a bit of a hill here. We always have some wind and when the weather gets going sometimes we have trouble. A few weeks ago when the weather was 60 degrees one day and 5 the next we had a problem with the chicken barn. I guess the wind picked up the huge sliding door and flipped it over the top of the barn. These doors are very big and heavy. I don't know how strong the wind was. It had to be quite a gust to get that up and over. I have no idea how we are going to get the door back down. It is still attached to the frame at the top. This barn in particular has a pretty steep roof. Where is super man when you need him??

Triplet

 

Last year when it was time for the ewes to lamb I was sure that this ewe"triplet" was going to have at least twins. Her belly gets so big, it almost touches the ground. At lambing time she just had one HUGE ram. I was shocked at the size of the lamb and he was up and running in no time. He always was the largest and really did well. As we approach lambing time again I see poor triplet with her big belly and wonder again how many she has in there? The other ewes look quite large but triplet is twice the size as the others. Triplet got her name because she was a triplet. Studies have shown that a ewe that came from a triplet birth have a greater chance of giving birth to triplets. In sheep it seems that triplets are quite a genetic thing. I have been really pleased with the sheep they are easy to keep have not required much from us. I would like to see triplet with twins but I am worried that if she does have triplets I will be bottle feeding a lamb. We have raised bottle lambs and it was fine but at that time we had the goats and I could use their milk to feed the lambs. The lambs did well and grew nicely. If we have a bottle lamb this year I will have to buy milk replacer YUCK!! That stuff is horrid it stinks to high heaven and you kinda have to force the lambs to drink it. I would be so happy with a healthy set of twin GIRLS!!! Time will tell I expect lambs over the next few weeks.

Gladys

 

Mabel snoozing inthe warm sun

 

Back in business!

 

We took advantage of the crazy 60 degree weather to put the new plastic on the greenhouse. MY awesome husband built this for me to start plants. It has been a real blessing. We have five 55 gallon drums filled with water to help stabilize the heat at night and it is protected from the cold north winds by the garage. On a sunny day it reaches over 100!! I have to open the door and let in the cool air so I don't cook my plants. Last year we put a small space heater in there at night and were able to keep the temperature from dropping below 50. It is amazing!! We are hoping to expand next year to a larger greenhouse, we will see.