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.