Simply Sheep

[Beekissed]

The sheep are eating quite a bit of hay now that they are confined to their pen....been there since hunting season started and will stay there until we get fencing put in place. Hopefully soon.

Got new hay Wed. and it's great hay.....you can smell summer when you sniff this hay. Barn kept, put up right, lots of leafy green in there....horse quality hay. Worked in the sunshine and cold today getting it into the pen and under the hoop shelter, then put the last of the other hay into the other feeding station. Both stations full of fresh smelling hay and CP panel placed against it to prevent excess waste. That's a lovely feeling! Makes me feel rich.

The DL in the pens is working great, even with the constant rains we've had these past few weeks. The poop is just disappearing into the leaves and the DL is springy, absorbent and keeping the mud underneath where it belongs. Can't smell excess urine either, so it's definitely working thus far.

All sheep are fat as ticks and filling out in the womb area already, which surprised me as we have 4 more mo. to go. Poor old Rose will be dragging the ground by then if she continues to get this big, this fast. I'm betting she'll be having triplets.

Shine is filling out fast also, as are the younger ewes. Shine has gotten less jumpy and wary since getting more sheep in her herd, so we are having a better relationship...she seems to trust me more as her shepherd. She's one beautiful sheep and my favorite to look upon, though Rose is the sweetest and I love her moochy personality.

I feel so very blessed to have sheep again!!! Can't wait to see those twirly tails in the spring.

 

[baymule]

I have a milk crate I leave in the sheep barn. I like to sit on it, it puts me at their level. Some come to me for scratches and love, some don't. I've been catching the two keeper ewe lambs and holding them, scratching and lavishing attention on them. It seems to be calming them down some. Now I have a new little girl to hug and squeeze LOL.

I can't wait for you to have lambs, they are so sweet.

 

[flowerbug]

DL i read first as Daughter In Law... lol

 

[flowerbug]

priced lamb leg and rack of lamb yesterday at the big box store as an FYI, racks were $15-16/lb and leg was $7-8/lb. grass fed from New Zealand it claims @mischief.

 

[Beekissed]

Spent a little time today shuffling around things in the sheep pen, tightening down panels against depleted bales and moving DL around to cover high traffic areas and take some thickness off areas that need it less.

Only took a couple of minutes of fork work to even things out, which I love. The DL is performing very well, with no strong smells or areas of mud or excess poop. Just a nice, spongy floor of leaves, hay and other woody matter underneath.

Also raised a gate that's been needing raised to clear the thickening layer of DL, so that I could build the DL thicker by that gate, which gets the most traffic of all. Got a couple of weeks of rain every day coming up and want to be ready for it. I'm pretty satisfied with the results and now have plenty of room to build that thickness I so need there.

Wish I could send some of that rain to the land down under, where they need it most.

Let two sheep out on the land to browse in the nearby thicket, left the rest behind to insure they don't wander too far from the flock. Will switch those groups out tomorrow or the next day to let them all get some fresh soil under foot and some good browse to their diet.

Fences can't be built too soon around here.

 

[YourRabbitGirl]

Got sheep again, so thought I'd start a thread for sheep...we don't have many on here and none that are new.

I got a few Katahdin ewes, one 7 yrs and the other 3 yrs. Will be getting a ram lamb from Farmfresh, which a good friend will be transporting for me. He will arrive mid August and I can't wait to have some of her stock here in WV!

Still working on the sheep shelters and pens, as well as fencing for paddocks. This weekend we transported some HUGE free pallets from a sheet metal place, to use for some of the paddock fencing.

Here's a pic of a few of those....they are all 10-12 ft. long and 4-5 ft wide with 4x4 or 3x3 bones and 1/2 to 1 in. "skin" boards. Read HEAVY and bulky. Had to rent two trailers from Uhaul to transport them and made 3 trips with two trailers, so got 6 lg stacks of pallets plus a tiny stack I had tried to haul in my 4x8 utility trailer...prayed all the way home with those in a toad strangler rain.

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...and the sheep, Shine and Rose. Shine is the dominant sheep and quite wild and bossy. Rose is slowly getting more tame and will even let me brush her now while she's eating.
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These were bargain basement sheep, so not as large as I would have liked nor with the greatest of conformation, but they are the sheep God brought to me and so I thank Him for them! They are starting to grow on me, as sheep tend to do...lots of intelligence and a truckload of personality wrapped up on sheepskin.

Will be building on their sheep shed today and also outfitting a couple of stanchions, as I intend to milk these ewes. They won't yield much, but that's all I need to make a little cheese.

Right now I have a temporary hoop shelter and also am utilizing a spare chicken pen for two different shelters and pens that are divided by a pallet fence. It ain't pretty but it will do until my son and I can do a pole sheep barn next spring of a more permanent nature.

Sheep!! My most favorite of all livestock....I praise God for His provision for and of the sheep.

The fence seems strong and sturdy... It's better if it has some metal parts. and I hope you'll secure it with a good quality waterproof paint.

 

[Beekissed]

An update on the sheep....had a piece of a paddock done and them in it, but couldn't keep a dog inside that electric fence, so they were alone and vulnerable down there. Got a donkey just yesterday, had a lambing this morning and the donkey thought it was her baby....there was quite the tussle before I knew about it and could intervene. Lamb survived and seems to be doing fine....was hoping she would have twins, but apparently not going to this year. Got one more ewe to lamb.

The sheep are now out in the yard and the donkey in the paddock, until all lambing is finished. Still working on that paddock and should have another acre of it done this week and can move the donkey into that area and move the sheep back into the orchard paddock.

Ben has found a new family~I think~with woven wire fencing that I'm hoping will keep him in and doing his job....he'll likely be going there in 2-3 wks. He's been tied and will remain tied until then....tired of getting calls at 2 am about my big white dog on someone's porch 3 mi. down the road. Last time he took Blue along with, which is a HUGE problem.

Blue turns a year old next month and still is very much a puppy and not going to be a real big dog....no signs of a limp in him for a long time now and he's responding to most training appropriately...just takes him a little longer on some things. He's still wearing a coop blocker on his collar to keep him from stealing eggs, a shock collar for training on the lambs~tried to grab one the first time one came near~and barking incessantly at the donkey and his regular ecollar receiver for the boundary system.....never had a dog with so much hardware on his neck before. Sigh.

I sure miss Jake.

 

[baymule]

I was afraid there might be a problem with the donkey and lambs. They can be their own set of problems. Glad you got it straightened out.

I'm glad that you have found a home for Ben. He is a good boy, just a little wacko when it comes to storms. Trip isn't that bad, but he does hit the panic button. We let him in, he snoozes out in the floor, safe and secure.

And Blue. Yep, he is a puppy. He will drive you crazy, then someday, it will click and he will amaze you!

 

[Beekissed]

I was afraid there might be a problem with the donkey and lambs. They can be their own set of problems. Glad you got it straightened out.

I'm glad that you have found a home for Ben. He is a good boy, just a little wacko when it comes to storms. Trip isn't that bad, but he does hit the panic button. We let him in, he snoozes out in the floor, safe and secure.

And Blue. Yep, he is a puppy. He will drive you crazy, then someday, it will click and he will amaze you!

She pouted in the corner of the paddock for most of the day and then decided she was hungry and went back to normal behavior. I'll wait until June has lambed and all lambs are following Moms well and have no smell of placenta on them before joining them together. I really like this donkey....she could have been WAY worse and could have taken my head off, but she didn't. She was just confused.

Blue is no longer interested in the lambs since he got a zap for looking at them, so he's getting there.

 

[Beekissed]

Got two new ram lambs at a great price yesterday~$125 ea.~and I love their coloring and conformation, especially for that price. Both are around 2.5-3 mo. old.

Also added a new Anatolian female pup to the flock about a week and a half ago and she's working out beautifully! She's Eli's pup and he called her Charlie....don't ask me why...and she's so incredibly smart and well behaved for a little pup. Learning like lightning and already bonding with the sheep, learning how to act around them and also around us. I'm very optimistic about this one!

Blue has turned out to be a good dog and is doing well with chickens, ducks and lambs now(at first he wanted to grab a newborn lamb as I walked by with one....has since learned that they "bite" and wants nothing to do with any of that). He's guarding the new chicks well and is floating at night to guard the whole operation but is in his Ecollar boundary in the day.

Going after winter's hay today, got barn kept round bales for $5~20 of them!!!!~because the roof leaked on a few bales and caused some mold, he lowered the price on the whole lot and to clean out the barn in preparation for the first haying of the season. God has blessed us richly and I praise Him for His provision in all things!

Still waiting on June's lamb(s) to be born and the grass is greening and thickening up, trees leafing out and more chicks hatching tomorrow. Got 28 chicks tooting along behind broodies right now and will load up two more broodies with eggs tomorrow. Two ducks sitting on I don't know how many eggs, nor do I know when they will hatch, but it ought to be fun to see them~this will be our first duck hatch on the land.

Going to call the extension office next week to see about getting them to come out and evaluate where we can put a pond and get approx. cost for doing so. Hope to locate it up near the coop area so the ducks can live and swim safely there with protection from the dogs.

Farm things happening around here and God is the Author of it all and I praise Him!!!!