Jurassic Park on the Honey Grove

I've always imagined the possibility of some latent strain of dinosaur living in our primeval woods surrounding our pastures. Maybe it wasn't really a cougar that hauled off all those lambs several summers ago. Could it have been a velociraptor? Too many Jurassic Park movies, I know, and too many repeats on TV.

But, it does occur to me, as we currently host eleven large turkey poults, that Steven Spielberg probably took a flock of turkeys running through a field, lopped off their heads (digitally), replaced with dinosaur look-alikes, changed up the feathers a bit, and voila, the actors were ducking behind a large log as the animals came racing at them chased by a T-Rex!

I suspect this because of my own baby dinosaurs in the chicken yard. They are so different from chickens. They stick together in a pack and if one has an idea the others will follow. "Let's jump up on the fence rail." "Let's jump into the grape vine." "Let's see what is happening over here." "Look, I can fly." "Me too." "Me too." This is one way to exhibit limited brain power.

To add a little civility for the poor chickens trapped with this maniac crew, we lock the poults in their own area for the night. Here they can push and shove each other. Here, I can sequester them for an evening and morning meal, behind a locked gate so it is more easy to attend to the other animals in the yard, including our three bottle fed lambs. The yelling and carrying on when I enter their pen is amazing, and I have to be fast with the food or I am likely to get my fingers pinched. As it is, I have to warn guests they may have their feet or clothing pecked when they enter. For the small kids and parents alike, it is a rather alarming scene and many remain outside the enclosure until they have a full handle on what to expect. Some never come in!

The sole goose in the chicken yard tries to herd our baby turkeys. He is successful if they pay attention to him, but, as they grow older, he is more like the grumpy uncle. The lambs fight for their red nippled bottles, even as the poults drag them off. I have come back to the house several times without all my bottles, having turned my back for a second as one of the poults dives in and drags one into the tall grass. They will chase each other for dibs on the treasure. Of course, these are empty bottles. Second example of their very tiny brains.



Other times, the turkeys nip at the lambs and pull wool out in tufts. Mostly, the lambs know to stay away if they can, but every now and again, a crafty bird will approach from behind and give a big yank. They don't eat the wool, but rather like a baby, have to try everything just in case. Third example. Funnily enough, the lambs don't turn around and knock the turkeys over, even though they are 10 times the size.

Even while the poults are imposing as a group, the rats under the chicken coop are unfazed. We bought this batch of turkey poults from a breeder because we were concerned our own tom and hen turkey might not produce enough offspring for sale this year. At one point, the hen was sitting on 12 eggs. I took four eggs and placed them under a broody chicken hen as a safety measure. She hatched one and then let it die!

The turkey hen was diligent about setting, but I started to notice rat holes appearing near her nest. I checked and she had four eggs left. She kept setting until it seemed the days were up and she should have hatched them all. I looked and she had one day-old chick. There were signs the other chicks had hatched, but there were no babies present. Did the rats carry them off? Too grim to consider! I decided to act and took the chick from her, placing it a wire cage in the kitchen with a warm light and plenty of food and water. One chick out of 12. Not a great statistic. Annie has named 'her' Rose.

I doubt dinosaurs had this much trouble reproducing, but then again, humans never interfered with their natural breeding tendencies. Even these Heritage turkeys show interference and a lack of nurturing instincts. Then again, rats are a hardy lot. Look at Templeton in Charlotte's Web. I know our cat, Bubba, isn't that interested in taking on a rat, and he will take on just about anything.

So, today, I head out to close in all the holes and tighten up the chicken coop to discourage the rats. Hopefully, our hen will try another clutch and then we will have varying ages of flocking baby turkeys to remind us just how scary it might have been if these birds where as big and fast as our horses!



Photos: (top) turkey poults underfoot and pecking at my boots; (middle) goose trying to organize the poults with rooster ignoring it all and heralding the sunrise; (bottom) bottle robbers

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The Virus Among Us

It seemed like a good idea to bring a young ram lamb onto our farm. I mean, who wants inbred sheep? And the thought of a cross-bred hair sheep had this shepherdess all in a dither - with the potential for spotted sheep, no less. Ever working on my naivite when it comes to all things ag, it never crossed my mind we might be introducing something onto our farm that we didn't want, like a virus.

I have now learned a new term. When you speak of a virus-free or disease-free flock or herd, you call it a 'closed' flock. Nothing comes in and nothing goes out. Rather like a science fiction movie. Rather like a shepherd who knows what questions to ask.

But let's back up. Before ever thinking we might be contaminating our stable herd, it seemed reasonable to look for some way to increase the physical size of our lambs. Bringing in Katahdin hair sheep took care of the shearing problem and they even had nice personalities, but we soon discovered their offspring take forever to put on weight, and some never do. Crossing Romney and Suffolk (we call them 'woolies') and Katahdins brings some size, but then there is the wool problem.

Annie decided to put her genetics training to work and find us a solution. I had heard that OSU ran Dorpers. A little research later and we discovered this alternative hair sheep was bigger than the Katahdin and many lamb breeders were beginning to cross the two.

It's amazing what Craig's List has opened up in the way of shopping for anything, even Dorper ram lambs. We found just what Annie was looking for about an hour away with the requisite RR genetics, although at the moment I can't remember why this is so important. On a sunny spring day we drove my little Toyota truck over to the farm and picked out not my first choice, because he was already sold, but the second choice based on head and chest size...and feet.

Dorpers are known for their interesting coloring, often with black heads and white bodies. We managed to select a white Dorper because of the above-mentioned features, not because I thought he was the prettiest. We were assured his coloring was an anomaly and he would throw spotted lambs.

Annie had obviously thought through the introduction process for this young ram because we wanted him to feel comfortable around us - not overly friendly, but willing to come close. We would put the three bottle fed babies (Dusty, Eli, and Piper) into the chicken yard with our new purchase. This would make feeding easier and give the ram lamb time to get to know his competition and, soon to be field friends, Red and Piglet on the other side of the fence. We hadn't supposed the goose would mind.

Boy, were we wrong. First thing out, the goose grabbed our new ram by the lip and wouldn't let go. Then he grabbed him by the butt. We noticed his lip was bloody (all the goose got with the butt was a lot of wool). The goose then took it upon himself to start herding the lambs all around the yard. The lambs learned to give him a wide berth.

The bloody lip should have gotten better, but as the days went on, Annie and I noticed that our ram lamb had more and more sores around his mouth. I happened to mention this to a new sheep friend. She would ask her husband. He came back with something called Sore Mouth.

I called Oregon State's vet school and Annie started to look online. The reality hit. We had just introduced a highly infectious disease onto our farm with no real cure. Not only were we likely to infect all our sheep, the soil where the sheep were housed would carry the virus for up to 10 years unless there was a hard frost. Great, and we had really started to like this little boy - calm and cool...just what we wanted.

Two weeks later we returned the ram to his former owner for a full refund. That night at feeding we determined that all three of our bottle-fed lambs had the virus!

POST SCRIPT The ram is back on our farm because: 1) either most of our flock is infected (difficult to believe because our sheep were fields away from the ram lamb) or 2)our sheep, including the lambs, are allergic to buttercup, making their nostrils break out in sores. We think this is more likely since it happened to one of our horses several years ago in spring. The breeder agrees. He showed the lamb to shepherd friends and no one thought the outbreak looked like Sore Mouth. Phew! Now we just need to wait for the buttercup to stop blooming!


Photos: (top) Dusty, Eli, and Piper, (bottom) no-name ram lamb

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Almost Good Enough to Eat

Our adult turkeys must be duds because there are no nests and no eggs and thus no babies. What to do?! Enter the most fabulous catalogue ever invented - the Murray McMurray Hatchery catalogue, filled with birds of all colors, sizes, breeds, and types. Like shopping in a candy store! Our order of fifteen Heritage turkey poults (a variety pack) just arrived and now our Bronzes are in for the fight of their life...although I do wonder what two year old turkey tastes like.

At first we had the turkeys in a cage in the kitchen, but we have never had so many little birds at once and the conversation turned to overcrowding and the fact that Bubba kept sticking his paw through the wire mesh. We lost one bird the first night and another the next morning. Kind of expected, but tough all the same, especially as Heritage turkeys cost a whole lot more than little chicks. We knew it was harder raising turkeys, but the Thanksgiving benefits usually dollar cost average the losses for a relatively good profit.

We needed a better locale and Annie was actually the one to come up with a potential location. She had spied a section of the potting shed just off the workshop, a triangular area waist high with a dirt base. Used for years to store old plastic pots, a quick cleanup of the area revealed good space and an electric outlet. The only immediate problem? Cat access and the large rat hole at the back.

We plugged the hole, put down some straw, hung the heat lamp, and placed the remnants of some wire mesh known as hardcloth over the chicks, like a Quansot hut. The chicks loved the space but we soon realized this was a one night solution. Once enclosed, there was no way to reach the chicks, change their water, or give them food!

The idea was right. It was the execution that lacked imagination. I called Manuel for a creative solution since he is the king when it comes to making something from nothing, using only the materials at hand (Home Depot has seen a steep decline in my business since Manuel came into our lives!)

When Manuel first began to build the turkey "coop", the poults were inside it. Annie was worried they might die of stress, or a falling 2x4. Anyway, it was time for some imprinting and a little freedom on the grass. She scooped the chicks into a cardboard box and carried them to a protected spot on the lawn under one of the apple trees. She let them loose around her and tried to keep track of twelve chirping babies with Cisco at her side and Bubba in the bushes.



I happened to be in the kitchen and chuckled when I saw what was going on. Of course, I had to run for the camera because Cisco was being pushed to his limit with babies touching his feet and tail and imprinting on him instead of Annie. The fierce dog had become a lamb, but beware the black cat that tried to paw his charges or the goofy Louie who wanted to bounce into the fray. These babies were Cisco's responsibility. "Just don't touch the feet, not the feet!"

So I took these photos of a very confused dog. He looks as if he might eat one of the turkeys as soon as defend it, but the camera misses the furrowed brow as he bends his head low. "Are you okay, baby turkey? Why are you making all that noise?"



In the end, everyone relaxed in the sun and the turkeys stayed close-by, searching the ground for yummy things to eat. Amazingly, they have the instinct from birth to peck, but have to be taught to drink water! Silly, stupid birds. The sun warmed to grass; Annie and Cisco soaked up the spring weather; Manuel finished the enclosure; and the poults were introduced to their new home in no time. Of course, one snap of the jaws and we could have lost a turkey or two, but Cisco forgot his heritage for just a little while and all were safe in the end. Safe until Thanksgiving, anyway...
.


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Of Kids and Lambs

It's hard to take bad photos of children and lambs. When they are in the same shot, every picture becomes a holiday card for next December's mailing. Mostly these children are the daughters of our guests, little girls with an inate desire to hold our young lambs on their laps and feed them bottles of milk. So much better than a doll. Little brothers have been roped into the act as well, but often lose interest after a short time and wander off toward the tractor.

As much as I have felt the need to share our farm in a farm stay experience with guests who were strangers until their arrival, I now need to share the keen eye of these guest photographers who have captured fleeting moments on our farm with their kids. Often I have been standing beside these parents as they pointed their camera, wishing I had my own on hand. Note to self - never walk around the farm without a camera!

Luckily, I am the recipient of many of those fine shots. The photos in this pictorial blog have been sent to me in emails filled with wonderfully kind words about staying with us on the farm, experiencing life in the country, and interacting with our animals. Mostly about our animals! "How is Paco?" and "Is TW still little?". "How about Tater?". "Have the turkeys laid any eggs yet?"

This photo essay shows kids in love, kids at play, kids simply joyful with the experience of holding a small, woolly lamb in their arms. I like the distant shots too. The kid on the swing in our apple orchard frames the sheep in the distance. The young shepherdess in the first and last photos fell in love with TW (stands for Teenie Weenie)and became his playmate for her short stay with us. I think there were tears all the way home.

To all our guests out there who have sent me their wonderful photos, thank you! It was hard to choose for this. Oh, yeah, and for privacy's sake, I'm not using any names or putting these anywhere but on this blog. All I can say is, these shots are hard to beat because as much as they show kids in love, they were taken by parents in love. May these photos bring back memories for years to come!


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LIBby

It's been raining cats and dogs and now it is raining lambs and we aren't even out of March yet. Maybe I should focus more on the old phrase, "March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb," or, in this case, lambs. Our ewes appear to be lambing earlier than usual because Red let himself 'free' two weeks into October. Apparently the girls were just waiting for their chance. As of today, we have 22 lambs and more are dropping every day!

There have been a few tragedies so far, as happens during many lambing seasons. Lambs not cleaned off by their mothers will die from asphyxiation. Did the ewe inherently know this lamb would be weak or did she just not wish to feed so many babies? Did she even think about it? Another morning I arrived too late to help a ewe with her babies stuck sideways inside her. She was barely alive and try as I might, I could not get the first lamb unstuck. The ewe looked at me, lay down her head, and died. I wondered whether I could have saved the babies if I had just tried a little harder, but my vet neighbor said the lambs were probably already dead and there was nothing I could have done without a scalpel and a C-Section. A bit beyond my expertise.

Of course, this makes our lambing season sound horrible, when in reality every day we are carrying more and more bouncing babies into the barn for a few days of bonding with their mothers, some observation, some shots, an ear tag, and quiet. Watching them play in the stalls, at only several days old, always brings a giggle and a smile. The girls perform well for our farm stay guests as the miracle of life is enacted in front of their eyes.

For one family, in particular, this will always be a memorable March. They fed young lambs. They carried in new lambs from the field when we discovered more than I could handle on my own. They followed my sighting of buzzards overhead and accompanied me to the other side of the creek to pick up just born twins. And, as we dropped these near the barn, they watched a mom give birth to the third of three lambs. They also observed this same ewe rejecting one of them.

There are times when a ewe will decide, even as her baby struggles to nurse for the first time, that she doesn't want it. The lamb becomes something called a 'bummer' and requires human bottle feeding to survive. I am more aware these days to watch from birth for signs of rejection. I will hand-nurse a ewe for several days in an attempt to feed as much colostrum and mother's milk to her baby as possible. This makes the lamb smell "right" to the mom, but it rarely works to rebond the two. Switching to formula is expensive and requires regular 4-hour feedings to start. This doesn't make me a happy camper. My solution: bring the lamb in the house for several days so middle of the night feedings aren't so cold for either of us.

Enter the rejected lamb, LIBby, or so I named her in the end. Usually a name comes to me out of thin air but this little, white lamb just didn't speak her name so I could hear. I began to refer to her as the "lamb in the box" because I can't have baby lambs piddling on the rug and scaring the cat when they stay inside with us, so I set up a cardboard box with straw, placed near the old grandfather clock. It's a good spot - nice and warm and central to the household.

During our guests' stay, the mom and her daughters often held the LIB. Soft and warm, taken to nuzzling, I could sense a bond I wasn't sure could go anywhere. We have had plenty of children in tears as they left the farm and their favorite play mates. I made a joke. "Do you want to take the lamb with you?" To my surprise, this conversation had already been going on in the family. They thought they could keep the lamb in the condo to start and then there were friends with five acres who might like a lambmower. I pointed out the benefits of a Katahdin. No shearing, just hoof trimming.

They left without the lamb, not for not wanting her, but needing to lay the groundwork. Several calls and a day later, I drove my lamb in her box 35 miles to the Interstate where we had a sheep drop at a trucker restaurant! I pulled my newly named LIBby from the front seat and presented her to her new owner, the friend with 5 acres on the outskirts of Portland. She told me she would probably ditch the box for her radiant heat kitchen floors. This would be LIBby's new playground until she was large enough to spend the night outside. What a happy ending for this lamb. Love and attention as if for a dog. Our guests, as close visitors, to pet and brush her. A chance at a long life. Who could have predicted it might end this way?!

My only sorrow - I never took a photo of LIBby in her box. But, I do have several shots of her right before we loaded her into the car for her adoption. She's a cute girl. Hopefully, there will be future photos to come, and I will be able to report on her progress as a city lamb with a lawn as her pasture.



Photo: (top) Annie and Libby just prior to the lamb's adoption. Libby is 3 days old and has just started to take a bottle; (bottom) Cisco, the dog, walked into the shot and gave Libby a big lick in the face...probably because she tasted of milk!

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Mushroom Logs

I always thought mushrooms grew out of old logs by some act of nature too complex to understand (if your last biology class was as long ago as mine). We grew up on the toadstools of Alice in Wonderland and the Wind in the Willows, after all.

Here in the Northwest's coastal rainforest there are all sorts of weird things growing on logs, from mushrooms and moss to fungi used by the old-timers like ivory scrimshaw. Enter the human quest for variety, even as chanterelles and morels grow wild in our hills. Enter the Honey Grove Mushroom Company. At least that is what I am calling it for now.

If one feels like a mountain man (or woman) and has good, woodsy friends in the "know", then one can actually buy mushroom starts (a.k.a. mycology spores) and drill thousands of little holes into oak and maple and alder logs for may weekends in a row, with these same friends at your side, and the music blaring, as you stand in the car port and bat off the cold, damp, early March chill.

After filling these thousands of holes with the mycelium plugs and syringing melted wax on top of the holes to protect each plug, you end up with a pile of logs you have hopefully tagged so to remember the difference between the yellow oysters and the white, the meitakes and the shitakes, the lion's mane and whatever else came in the bags of funny, worm looking things.

This has been our main "event" for the past several weekends. Our mushroom plugs actually arrived in January and some of the more industrious in the group set right to it. Problem was, you have to find the right kind of wood to screw these little buggers into. It can't be just any wood and, since we specialize in an abundance of alder here, it, of course, wasn't on the good wood list for most of the mushroom starts.

Where to find oak in the Coast Range became the chant, at least at our household? Some of our friends scoured the valley area around Corvallis for friends with oak they didn't mind felling. That was the other part of the prerequisite. The wood couldn't be new, but it couldn't be old. Felled within 2-3 weeks was just right. What! This would mean you had time to scout the trees, convince the landowner you were just going to take down a few, leave them lay for several weeks, and still have time to come back and buck them up to fit in the back of the truck. And, the drilling and plugging hadn't even begun!



I had no idea where to find oak because we don't have that many friends in the valley, but why go so far afield? There was an oak stand right down at the end of Honey Grove Road and I had noticed a toppled tree that probably fell in January. I called the owner, a local logger, and told him what we were doing. "Sure, go ahead. Just don't let the cows out". I promised to trade him some gate latches for the wood.

I would like to say that we were smart by waiting until two of the four families had completed the mushroom plugging experiment. We certainly capitalized on not copying their mistakes, but really we were just late to the races, as they say. For once this was to our benefit. Our neighbor drilled his plugs too deep and may or may not see mushrooms out of his logs. His vet wife figured out how to melt the wax on the barbecue and use a syringe to get it in the holes, of which she gave us her leftovers from her vet bag. This was a great piece of field ingenuity!

Karen and Allen, after reading up on mushrooms and searching for techniques of plugging online, suggested we should team up with them to see if we could improve the process forged by our pioneer friends. With two teams of two working together, I think we had the more efficient production line because the job really broke out into 4 parts. There was the drilling of holes, the setting of plugs, the hammering of plugs, and the waxing of the top of the plug. Over two weekends we were able to insert all 6000 plugs and still stand up straight at the end of the day!

The logs have since been stacked in the woods in Lincoln log piles, some more artfully done than others. We have all chosen spots we think mushrooms might find attractive, either down by the Honey Grove Creek, under a canopy of fir and moss, or, in our case nestled into the side of a north facing hill not far from our spring holding tank.

Our location, while tantalizing for mushrooms, poses somewhat of a problem for collection. It's not as if I can peak out the kitchen door to see if a flush is coming on. I will have to make regular trips across the creek to check the logs. Whether the sheep will beat me to it, I don't know.

In the end, we won't know whether our technique worked any better than our friends' for at least 6 months and as long as two years. Don't expect the Honey Grove Mushroom Co. in a grocery near you anytime soon or maybe ever, but I like the sound of the name and maybe we will adopt it as our signature when referring to the act of standing in the cold with friends and music and a task at hand.





Photo: (top) Karen, Greg, and me sinking mycelium plugs into an oak log; (middle) a closer look at what we were doing; (bottom) Allen drilling the holes for the plugs

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Interruptions

This has been a month of interruptions. I suppose living on a farm is all about interruptions. How does the Little Boy Blue nursery rhyme go?

Little Boy Blue come blow your horn
The sheep are in the meadow, the cows in the corn...

Now let's substitute the rhyme with our own,

Scottie and Annie don't make any plans
The horses are on the lawn, the ewes just had two lambs....


It seems little boy blue was not minding his sheep very well when he took a nap under the haystack (Where is the little boy that looks after the sheep? Under the haystack fast asleep.) It could be said there are some parallels for not keeping track of the randy little ram lamb last summer or the open gate to the road last week. Hmmm, does farming make us simple or is this simply farming?

The above "interruptions" luckily didn't happen on the same day, not even in the same couple of days...but they could have. I shudder to think! The horse and donkey escape coincided with a gate to the road I forgot had blown open with the wind. We rotate pasture on our farm so the grass is not over-grazed. This particular day I decided to let the equines onto the yard in front of the barn. We have fencing around part of our house and there is a creek that is hard to cross so there is no way the horses can get "out" without exiting the main gate to the road. I consider this gate my last line of defense, but it does no good if it is left open!

Imagine my surprise to hear Annie calling me from my office at the back of the house. Did I realize the horses were on the front lawn?! We both grabbed boots and jackets and ran outside. Now the question became, how to get these animals back into a pasture when the grass was so much more lush and green right where they were? Taking them all back via the main road seemed like a bad idea, but the gate to the orchard might prove tantalizing. Or not.

Annie grabbed Tater by the mane and he just ripped larger mouthfuls of grass. Moralecia had no intention of moving either. I looked around for something to lead with. There was one sorry looking piece of baling twine hanging in the carport which I quickly wrapped around Moralecia's neck and then instructed her to get her fat head out of the weeds and come with me. Reluctantly she complied - not fully understanding I had little control with my piece of twine.

At this point, Tater decided to become a rodeo horse and took off slipping and sliding up past the greenhouse, around it, ducking under the rose arbor, digging his hooves into the wet grass, looking at the open gate and Moralecia, and then taking off again. Chaco decided it best to follow his mare and trotted after us. The donkey ignored everyone and kept on eating.

Ultimately, the one that gave us the most trouble was the donkey! He refused to be herded with the rest, refused to go through the gate to the orchard, and ran back and forth behind our house with Annie, me and the dogs jumping up and down. After he had had his fun and run through my flower beds several times (why can't the animals tell these beds are special compared to the grass!), he gave up and cantered in his donkey way down to the horses.

We would have been done with this silliness except, when we put horses and donkey back in the main pasture, I didn't realize another gate was open leading to the barnyard and thus to the road... We went through the entire dance a second time later in the day. What is the saying: "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me!"?

Our lambing 'interruption' happened about a week before the horse escape. Annie discovered, as she was racing through morning feeding to be off to her genetics exam at her school 45 minutes away, there was a new lamb in the loafing shed. Wait, it's not April. How could we have lambs? Mom breeds for spring lambs. Spring - the natural time for babies - warmer temps, longer days, better grass, happier shepherdesses (this would have included Annie).

Except this morning there was a new lamb in the loafing shed that needed to be caught (hard to stay 'school' clean while doing this) and sequestered with its mom in a stall in the barn (no fresh straw down yet, and, where's the heat lamp?!). Great, all this an exam too!

Unfortunately for Annie, she had just decided to compile a genetic study of our sheep (applied education!) so we could cull for preferred traits. Now she had a problem. Obviously Red couldn't be the father of this lamb because it hadn't been five months since he was introduced to the flock. He also couldn't be the father of the lamb born the next day either!

Annie's plan for a decisive breeding study had just gone awry. As they say, but not usually on the farm, the question now became, "Who's your daddy?!!!" Annie looked at me with her brows furrowed. "Remember, mom, when I told you you better separate those randy little lambs from their moms before they hit sexual maturity? Remember last August when I thought you were late? Well, guess what ?..." The problem: we don't know whether our new daddy is a full Katahdin or a Katahdin-cross, nor how closely related he is with the ewes (as in "mommy" or "auntie"). As they also say, "Eeeew....."

Life is back to normal today. It's been raining buckets and the lambs are almost a weeks old and hopping all over the place. The horses are bored and the donkey wants to be brushed, when he is not being a brat and running away. We expect lambing 'interruptions' in a month, and, for now, we are simply farming and hoping we don't become simple in the process!



Photos: (top)#101 asleep on the hay; (bottom) Paco the donkey looking cute, but uncatchable

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A Portrait for Rosie

When I unwrapped the painting at Christmas I knew immediately it was a portrait of Rosie. What other sheep could it be! Greg's comment was pointed. If I could now identify our sheep by name, and in their own portraits, I had been on the farm too long.

Actually, the painting was a wonderful gift from my mother. She had seen it at an art show in Vermont, 3000 miles away, and immediately thought of me. See how that goes? I have been transformed in the minds of family and friends from urbanite to farmer in no more than six years. Guests to our house can now expect to see our Judy Dater and Mark Klett photographs, and our large George Segal print, intermixed with a portrait of a sheep! I might call this our rural eclectic period. I have also added a print of a large tree just for good measure!

To think an artist took the time to paint her sheep is rather endearing. In fact, this painting is not intended to be a portrait of Rosie but rather another favorite ewe named Stella, most probably a resident on painter Caryn King's Vermont farm. See, there are others out there who name their sheep! Where I write stories about our farm animals, Caryn paints the personalities with a liveliness that makes others say, "My, that is Rosie...or Lily, or Lammie, or whomever". Her sheep come alive as they peer through fence rails or face the viewer straight on. Caryn also paints pigs and chickens and rabbits, even posters for the Martha's Vineyard Agricultural Fair, a fair I attended 40 years ago as a kid with my spotted pony Perky. Small world or what!

Why would anyone paint or write about their sheep? There is this odd thing that happens, I suspect mostly with small-scale sheep owners. When lambing season is upon us (usually springtime when the first daffodils are blooming), the barn and pastures become playgrounds for bouncing, playful babies. It's hard not to think lambs are the cutest things on earth. They jump spontaneously in the air. They have small pink noses and long legs. They are soft and wooly.

Certain lambs sometimes stand out. They have more personality, a bold way of being around humans that gives them license to be special. Rosie had this boldness as a lamb. She had freckles on her nose and none of the wildness some of our other lambs exhibited. Ruled by her stomach, Rosie let me hold her as a demonstration sheep for our guests and didn't mind if the dogs ran and played around her as long as she could be in the barn for exta hand-outs.

Then she grew up! Now at 150 lbs. she can no longer be described as "cute" when she pushes past me heading through the barn door looking for extra feed. Rosie is a bit of a sneak here. She has figured out how to slide the door just wide enough to squeeze through when I am down closing the paddock gates. Getting her back out of the barn is always a game between the dogs and Rosie and me. They bark and run around. Rosie darts from bale to bale grabbing mouthfuls of hay. And I yell at all of them at once.

The portrait of Lola shows an intelligent, kind face. The photo of Rosie shows something similar with a little added curiosity (the tipped head). Don't be fooled. These girls look best as pictures on the wall, their inner-lambness long gone but captured in a pose.



Photo: (top) Rosie's portrait; (bottom) Rosie as a yearling lamb

All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2009 Scottie Jones

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Ice Fences

Ice fences won't hold in the sheep, but they are a phenomena of nature and beautiful to behold. January was an unusual month for weather on the farm, with bright, sunny days and freezing temperatures. I think we mentioned choosing the Coast Range of Oregon because of its temperate rainforest and mild winters? Hmmm. But, this year we had ice fences every afternoon. So many I had to photograph a few just to remember them when summer comes.

The skies have been clear blue, a welcome change from rainy gray. The stars at night have been so bright in the cold air, it's easy to catch a falling star with only the tip of the head and a minute of time. I have kept the blankets on the horses during the days and the heated electric coils on the outside faucets so the pipes won't freeze at the barn. Sure, we have a creek running through the property for the animals to drink, but the horses seem to prefer the water tank, and it seems good to have two sources of water for the animals, don't know why.

Usually, January is a time of power outages and aggravation. Snow and ice take on a more manageable perspective when the sun is out and it is obvious the ground is probably slippery, not just wet. I bet most folks in other (colder) parts of this country would not agree, but for western Oregon, this, like the ice fences, is a phenomenon to be appreciated for now.

Even if the rains come back, which they will, and the ice fences are replaced with the cedar split rails that have stood sentinel around the orchard since the original homesteaders lived here (sounds dramatic, but the place was only homesteaded in 1895), I have the digital photos to prove this January was like no other we've seen (also not dramatic- we may only be the third owners but we have only been here for 6 years!).

The only animals getting past my fencing at the moment are the chickens, ice fences notwithstanding. I think the rascals are actually scooting under the garden gate leading into the chicken yard. Not satisfied with close to a half acre of bugs in the garden, they are squeezing under our main gate, free now to wander the entire farm in search of even better bugs. I don't half mind as long as they are scarfing up baby slugs and fertilizing my perennial beds hidden under piles of autumn leaves. For this, I can even ignore the leaf litter scratched all over the green lawn. It's a chicken thing.

What's too bad, on reflection, is that I never got a shot of a chicken looking as if it were perched on one of my ice fences. Now, that would have been something to show the grand kids!



Photos: ice fences in January

All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2009 Scottie Jones

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Freedom Fighter Rising

Take a young horse that needs a job. Take pastures wet from snow melt and rain, and forage that is waterlogged at best. Take boredom at night and a bale of hay within view. Mix this all together and what do you get? Tater, freedom fighter rising, picking at the stall latches until he has mastered the fine art of opening carabiners, and anything else I try. The horse can be down-right irritating!

This nonsense continued on for most of the week. At first, per usual, I thought I have forgotten to clip the carabiner through the stall door latch. Then, I thought Annie must have forgotten. Each morning I would arrive to a barn scattered in hay and poop, stall forks on the ground, chairs tipped over, and the poor lamb recovering in the sheep stall huddled at the back corner. Exactly how much hay, and whose, did Tater think he needed?

By the end of the week, I had determined that neither our daughter nor myself was being negligent about the clip, because I couldn't even find the clip this last time. Tater had not only opened it, and the stall door, he had gnawed through the rope holding the carabiner onto the latch. There was no sign of the clip anywhere in the loose hay on the floor. Had he eaten it? I hoped not.

Besides the fact that each morning's clean up was now taking me an added 30-45 minutes, the escape factor was not only annoying but also worrying. How was I going to stop this behavior, and what would happen if Tater learned how to open the gate to the feed stall? I decided to look through the racks of Alsea's general store to come up with a solution.

I came home with two. The first snap clip was opened in less than an evening and spit onto the floor. The second was a spring clip requiring a strong thumb to bend the bar back and a wrist twist to pull the clip out. At least, that is what I thought. The next morning, it too was lying on the floor. By this time, I had figured I could cut down my clean-up time if I didn't leave extra hay on the aisle floors. I think this is when Tater started to doubly terrify the lamb by leaning into its stall to reach the hay bucket. So not cool for the big horse!

I finally decided to try an old blanket latch I found in the tack room no longer attached to its blanket. It was smaller than the other clips I had been using and worked in a slightly different fashion. Maybe smaller was better? When I walked into the barn the next morning everything was in its rightful place: the horses were in the loafing shed, the lamb was still huddled in the corner of its stall (I let it out a day later to be with the flock), and nothing was disturbed inside. Glory be! I had a solution for the moment.

I still look out the window of our dining room before heading to the barn in the morning to see if I can catch horses peering over the fence. It's a good sign if I can see some movement. As I have said before, there is something verging on admiration for a horse that tries so diligently to escape. I mean, who would think that Tater could even conceive of the idea, much less spend hours perfecting the technique of opening clips? I have thought to set up a web cam some evening just to record his antics because I can't honestly figure out how he accomplishes this feat with his big horse lips, flat teeth, and a nose too long to see past. If I ever catch him, you can be sure I will post on YouTube!

Photo: Tater and me out in the barn field last summer posing for a story

All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2009 Scottie Jones


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Lamb-sense

I think the lamb must have sensed my discouragement with his failing condition. That, or it really did have a conversation with Greg when he came out to the barn with his gun.


The lamb had been in the barn for almost two months, trying to recover from a cut foot that had become infected. I had treated it with a dose of antibiotics. The lamb seemed to recover, but then started to lose weight. The wound had begun to bleed again. This morning when I came into the barn, the lamb was lying prone in its stall, sweaty and lethargic. I suspected it was giving up. Damn sheep - I hate it when they do that!

It was time to ask Greg for some compassionate assistance because I had an appointment in town. Could he please put this lamb out of its misery? It seemed the decent thing to do.

But, Greg is a compassionate guy and often gives second chances. He saw something when he went into the barn. He saw a lamb that just might make it if it understood the alternative. When he picked it up and told it to stand, or else, the lamb didn't crumple back onto the floor. Somewhere along the line Greg and the lamb came to an understanding. It could live if it would live.

When I returned home, Greg met me at the door. He looked sheepish (bad pun). It wasn't this lamb's "time". I went out to the barn, wondering what Greg had seen that I had missed. And there was the lamb, standing in the stall looking at me as if to say, "Fooled you! Fooled you! I will survive!!"

We were back on track, at least for today, but what a mess. When the lamb had collapsed the previous night it must have hit its head. There was a big knot above its eye where it had scraped off the wool and skin. I don't think we had ever had a sorrier looking lamb - all skin and bones, and now battered.

I put some feed out and darned if this youngster didn't go straight for the bucket as if I had been depriving it of food all along. Just to be extra nice, and because our daughter made up the first gruel, we started to feed a hot mash of molasses-soaked grain. There is nothing like warm porridge to put a child right, so maybe it would work with this lamb.

It became a simple farm story, really. The lamb started to put on weight; the mash was no longer necessary; and pretty soon I turned the little guy out with his buddies to fend for himself.

What's a little unusual is that the lamb never received a name, especially after spending so much time in the barn in recovery. Maybe this was because I often have our smaller visitors come up with lamb names and we had a dearth of smaller visitors. Maybe it was because the dark of winter makes me lose some of my creative edge. Or maybe, and this is probably the closest to the truth, I know that this lamb's life will be a short one he has no control over because I have healed a locker lamb, a slaughter lamb, a butcher lamb, whatever you wish to call him. As I have mentioned often before, I don't name animals we eat or send to market.

For now, this lamb leads a peaceful life on pasture with his mates. Soon enough the spring grass will begin to grow and he will naturally gain weight. Then, we will see. I may put him on Craigslist as a "lawnmower" since he is no longer an antibiotic-free lamb. If there are takers, he will get a second chance. If not, we shall see. We shall see.

Photo: locker lamb riding it through the winter on our hay so they can put on some weight!

All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2009 Scottie Jones
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Radio Flyer

Dear Mr. Radio Flyer President,

I wanted to write to let you know that the red Radio Flyer wagon, found discarded in a back alley in Phoenix over 20 years ago and subsequently refurbished by my father-in-law (I think all it really needed was a new handle and some fresh paint) has served above and beyond all expectations.

When our kids (his grandkids) were little, this wagon was used for walks to the park (I walked, the kids rode). It was used to haul dolls up and down the driveway and toys from the front yard to the back. Our dog, Sandy, was often hitched to the handle to pull one or the other of the girls...sometimes the stuffed monkey and bear. Tipped on its side, the wagon made a good fort wall.

Once our kids were grown, we often used the wagon for gardening projects and to move items too heavy or unwieldy for the wheelbarrow. I personally liked having 4 large tires to keep the thing balanced. There were probably some years in there where we didn't use the wagon at all, but we kept it safe and dry.

Then we moved to a farm! I wonder if your people ever thought about the many uses their wagon could provide to ease the chores of farm life?! Much like the 101 uses of duct tape in the world (I think there are books about this), I could write a book.

Throughout the year, our little red wagon is used to haul hay, straw, and grain to the barn, from the barn, out to the chicken yard, and down to the garden. I have to balance my loads carefully because most of them weigh in excess of 75 lbs and the path is narrow and full of dips and holes. If I had to do this with a wheelbarrow, I am not sure I could make it across the bridge to the barn.

In fall, we use the Radio Flyer to bring the vegetables in from the garden and lots and lots of buckets filled with apples from the orchard. I also balance drying racks full of potatoes and onions, dragging them across the bumpy lawn to the root cellar. This year, we even used the wagon to take our heavy cider press out onto the grass where we pressed grapes and plums for wine (thought it would be too messy in the carport). Once the carboy glass jars were filled with liquid, we hoisted them back onto the Radio Flyer to move them to a more permanent storage area.

In winter, our little red wagon serves as the perfect transport for split wood we use in our wood stove to heat the house. The logs are just a little longer than the width of the wagon and stack nicely so that we only have to make about three trips between the wood pile and our inside bin to fill it. I have discovered that I can even drag the wagon straight into the laundry room so I don't have to walk as far.

In spring and summer, our Radio Flyer is filled with containers of flowers and veggies for planting. This is kind of an ongoing process as I find color holes that need to be filled or a special sale of something pretty to put near the front door. The wagon also is good for carrying the potting soils we need and all the tools of the trade.

So, all in all, I don't know what I should have done had we had left our Radio Flyer back in Phoenix when we moved. You have created the perfect farm tool: simple, durable, and totally useful. Exceeding your customers' expectations is always a good thing. Congratulations on a wagon for the generations, since I soon hope to be pulling my new grandson around the farm too! Regards,



Photos: top - Radio Flyer filled with chiles and tomatoes from the greenhouse; bottom - Radio Flyer loaded with a bale of straw headed for bedding in the barn.

All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2008 Scottie Jones
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Trapped Again

"Where's Cisco?" Karen asked when she came through the door to find me sitting on the carpet surrounded by non-working Christmas lights. I looked up, my concentration on a tiny fuse broken. Yeah, where was Cisco?

Karen, Allen and I had returned from our morning walk with three dogs instead of four. Not to worry. We had lost Cisco at the last turn down the trail and so close to the farm you could almost see the barn. We figured Cisco was following the scent of a squirrel or a deer. He knew his way back.

But, that was now two hours ago.

We had tackled the STEEP hill today, something not everyone in our group likes to climb so we reserve it for special days. I will have to admit that I am impressed at our ability to actually make it to the top because driving to the top to drop dead animals (yup, this is our sheep drop precipice hill) requires low gear.

Like any challenge and any hill, the best part is coming down. The dogs think so too although they do seem to run off the road whether we are going up or down. It's a challenge sometimes to keep them within ear shot or view because there are so many great smells and small animals, ostensibly, to chase. Today was no different. We had come home with three dogs before.

With the hill behind me and chores completed, my primary focus was getting the Christmas lights up on the house before...what? Before we looked un-merry. Cisco was not my problem but the Christmas lights were fast becoming one (or many). Snaking around the kitchen floor, every strand I had plugged into a socket so far, and I had used a variety of sockets, refused to light. How could this be when they had worked just fine a year ago when I took them down?

With vague instructions to Karen and Allen, who had come down to help me with late fall garden prep, I hopped into the truck and headed up the road to see if I could find Cisco. Was he stuck in a culvert or caught by his collar somewhere? Why did I insist that the dogs wear their collars out in the woods? So if they were hung up and strangled, someone would know where to bring the body? I got out of the truck and called and whistled. It was silly, really, to have taken the truck at all because I couldn't hear over the motor noise, and the distance from where we had last seen Cisco was only a short walk from the farm...even shorter than I remembered.

I drove half way up the hill before turning around, getting out of the truck to call, walking part way into the brush, listening for barking or whining. Nothing. No movement at all in the forest. No twigs snapping. No deer retreating from my entrance. Not even the sound of birds. I returned to the farm. Could Allen stop what he was doing and bring the dogs?

We almost gave up. We yelled and called and whistled and the dogs ran on and off the path. I ended up back at the place I had first started my search. The gully was steep sided - not something a dog could climb out from easily. I looked at Louie, Allen and Karen's yellow lab, standing still, his gaze on me, then away. I looked again and, under a fern, about a yard away from him, I saw Cisco lying quietly. He blended so well with the forest floor I wasn't sure what I was looking at and his position was peculiar.

I called to Allen I had found the dog, but something was wrong. It wasn't until I was beside Cisco that I saw the trap grabbing his front paw tightly. How long had it been? My God, at least three hours at this point. Cisco didn't make a sound. He just looked at me, scared and quiet.

Getting a dog out of a trap is a tricky thing at best. Getting Cisco out of a trap adds to the challenge. This is the dog that doesn't get his toenails clipped, he is that picky about his feet. He and I had been through this procedure once before, about two years ago, so I knew how the trap worked and what to watch out for in terms of Cisco's teeth. I had to get Allen up to speed on the trap, but he was the one to suggest we throw a jacket over the dog's head and body to keep the peace.

The trap ended up being stiff. I never could have released it on my own. Allen's first try didn't work and it took him standing on the ends to spring Cisco's foot. Adrenaline helped. We released the dog and he ran off toward the road to join the other dogs, lying down to lick his foot from time to time. Allen grabbed the trap and we yelled for all the dogs to stay close. Who knew if there were other traps around.

For the second time, Cisco was a lucky dog. $150 vet bill and antibiotics were all it took. I called Fish and Game only to find that the trap was legally registered and anyone can trap on public land, the land we were hiking. What? Did I okay this as a tax payer! Trapping is a horrible way for an animal to die. Better it be a bullet than a leg-hold trap.

I met the trapper a couple days later. It was illegal for me to keep his trap, even if my dog was caught. The guy let me know he had pulled all the traps from our road and surrounding area, not realizing there were folks walking their dogs in the woods. As he said, it was not his intention to catch family dogs. This is an increasing problem, I was told by Fish and Game. People moving to the country and walking their dogs. New ways butting up against old, causing trouble all over the place.

The trapper answered every question I asked. He and his dad had hunted out all the beaver down Honey Grove years past, and now he was working on bob cat and coyotes. What for? Pelts for clothing. Until the economy tanked this fall, he was getting $40-$50 a pelt. The life of a bob cat is worth so little? An animal that hunts rodents to live, when even Bubba our killer cat can't keep the rat and mole population under control, but bobcats might? I could have argued the point but to what avail? At least the traps are off the road and bobcats and dogs are safe for a bit up the Honey Grove.

Photo: I took this picture in the fall when the leaves were at the end of their color and the road we hike was as beautiful as I have ever seen, when I am not looking at my feet to make it up the steep bits! Wonder how many times we passed that trap without catching a dog!!

All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2008 Scottie Jones
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Making Wine (sort of)

I have recently become a wine-maker. To say I proactively investigated all the nuances of wine-making would be seriously misleading. I am a wine maker because the plums started fermenting on their own in the large buckets sitting in the carport, and I didn't feel like spending hours picking the stems off the table grapes to make raisins. One could interpret this as laziness, alternatively as being overwhelmed with just too much fruit. I would prefer to think of it as making lemonade out of lemons, or, in this case, wine out of fruit.

My mom assures me that the grape wine will likely be in the category of Manischewitz. I had been hoping for something along the lines of a nice French table wine. A few friends have squinted their eyes ever so slightly when I mention I am also making plum wine. Not sure why. Then, again, I have never sought out plum wine at the store, so there may be a reason for the lack of enthusiasm in my mates and the absence of plum wine on store shelves.

Once I determined there was a wine-looking liquid being produced without any assistance on my part at the bottom of the plum barrels, I stopped by the local brewing store for some yeast and a lesson. I walked out with lots of yeast, an additional carboy (6 gallon glass jar), and an hydrometer looking something like a thermometer but with less decipherable markings.

Scooping the worst looking plums off a crust at the top, I gingerly sprinkled a sulfide solution over the rest to kill unwanted yeast and begin with my own. I listened to a few friends about how to start the yeast activation, watched it almost bubble over the top of the bowl, stirred the solution in with the fruit, and waited.

Well, I didn't exactly wait. We had hauled the largest tubs into the greenhouse once it became evident that the night temperatures were too cool and I was going to need to wrap my tubs with some sort of insulation to keep up the heat. I ended up using electric blankets for the warming part and an old vinyl table cloth to seal the tops. Appalachia, here I come! Every day I stirred the mixture a couple times, as required to break up the must. Even tried the liquid from time to time - very dry! Hmmm, probably should have added more sugar at the beginning.

Determining when to press the fruit skins and pulp had more to do with actually having time to do it and a couple good days of clear weather. Annie helped me drag the tubs outside and set up the press in the grass. We started with the table grapes, and found the entire thing worked quite well, with clear(ish) red liquid flowing gorgeously into our first carboy.

We worked next on the plums and found the task to be a lot more messy. Whereas the grape skins held together tighly when the liquid was pressed out, the plums had turned to mush. There was plum flesh flying all over the place and our two sieves clogged with pulp regularly, slowing down the process. We completed the crush with two full carboys of plum wine, still wondering whether this was an awful idea.

Lest I forget, we also pressed a handful of grapes from our 2-year-old vineyard. This will make a total of 2-3 bottles! The liquid had a rose color even though the grapes are supposed to be Pinot Blanc. Not sure (again) about the taste - seems very dry - but at least we can say we have a producing vineyard. Must come up with a label, probably a leaping lamb theme, or is that too queer!

Our neighbor,Karen, has followed suite in the vintner process, with a great deal more research upfront. She is using some of the apple cider we pressed this month to make hard cider...she hopes. She went into the same brewing store I did (only one within 50 miles) and came out with many of the items I didn't bother to buy, so between us we have a complete set of tools.

When Karen used my hydrometer, she actually read the instructions. Seems I was supposed to take a reading before any yeast was added so I understood the normal sugar levels. Without that first reading I will never know the actual alcohol content of my wines, which may or may not matter if they taste like Manischewitz!

Karen is much more philosophical (and kind) about my fruit-into-wine adventure this year. She says if the wine tastes horrible, then we just try again next year with a little planning in place to prevent some of the issues we experienced our first time out. I figure, if the wine tastes horrible, I will redefine the old adage again about making lemonade from lemons and make lots of Beef Bourginone (beef cooked in wine). Should be yummy.

Photo: 3 carboys (plus one in box) full of what we hope to be wine. Lots of sediment. Time to siphon off the liquid and get rid of the gunk.

All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2008 Scottie Jones

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The Orchard Dash

Our personal interpretation of Keystone Cops mixed it up at Leaping Lamb Farm the other day. Arms waving wildly, livestock running away, more arms waving wildly, whistles, calls, livestock running the opposite direction, dogs barking, finally a pause while we all gathered ourselves for another go round.

The horses and the donkey had broken into the apple orchard and were eating all the apples I wanted to collect for cider making. This was so not cool on the animals' part! They needed to leave off and get back out to the hay field. Silly donkey. What was he thinking following the horses in.

The apple orchard behind our house is fenced for livestock control (aka horse, sheep, and a donkey). In the spring I often will put the ewes and their young lambs into the orchard so I can keep an eye on things. Come fall, when the trees are dropping their apples to the ground at a prodigious rate, I latch the gates shut. This gives me a chance to harvest some of what is on the ground. It also keeps the horses from picking apples off the trees, often within easy reach for both them and me.

Every now and again, I will open the gates, first to the sheep for some ground clean-up and then for the horses to finish the sweep. It's a mad dash for all and nothing goes to waste. I just have to keep an eye on things so the horses don't over eat and end up colicking. We don't need any vet calls.

The day began peacably enough. Allen was helping me with "honey-do's" and the task was pretty straight forward in terms of apple pick-up. Drive the Gator into the orchard, fill the large buckets in the back, drive back out of the orchard and move on to the next task. The next thing I know, Allen is yelling into the house for me to come quickly. The horses are in the orchard and they are eating the apples as fast as they can manage. I stopped what I was doing, pulled on my boots, and went out to see if we could use some herding techniques to push three horses and a donkey back out the gate. Luckily the sheep hadn't picked up the scent of an open gate.

We tried our most successful shepherding approach, with big arms and yells. Our horses looked like they thought we were idiots. "What the hell are those people yelling at?!" Herding horses from the ground isn't really herding at all.

Tater ran from us, but with his head down, sweeping up apples at his feet as he ducked away. Moralecia followed suit. Chaco didn't move at all since I don't think he saw us clearly anyway. Paco, the donkey, stayed the farthest away, watching (and learning from) the commotion. Pretty soon, we were all running in circles. The horses were bucking and mashing the apples as they ran over and through them. I cringed every time I saw more apples under hoof. Tater jumped in the air, lost his footing, and fell to the ground in the slippery grass. It barely slowed him down.

This was going nowhere and we needed to break the momentum. Allen, having learned much more about shepherding on our place than chasing after crazed horses, looked relieved when I suggested he stop for a moment while I went in search of baling twine. If I could catch Moralecia and walk her towards the orchard gate, I suspected the boys would follow.

Apple in hand, because it seemed the going bribe at the time, I walked up and tossed the twine around her neck. Lucky she's a good horse and responds to the lightest of rope as if it were made of steel. We headed toward the open gate and a beckoning hay field.

Chaco looked up, finished the apple in his mouth, and moved after us. This made Tater nervous as he bore down on us at a fast trot. Which made me nervous. I told Allen to keep an eye on the big quarter horse so he didn't get plowed over. Paco brought up the rear in his funny all-four-legs-off-the-ground-at-the-same-time gait.

I suppose the worst part of the story is that Tater opened the gate to the orchard as Allen watched. And, it wasn't just any latch he opened. It was our safe, secure U-Latch gate latch that is supposed to be 'Houdini' proof. I know after three years, with lots of nighttime trial and error, Tater has had plenty of time to perfect his technique, but there may be another explanation. We humans go in and out of that gate all the time and we never said they were people-proof. Always the challenge for humans; always the opportunity for our animals.

So the animals had a brief escape into the garden of delights. Not enough to make any of them sick and certainly not enough to ruin our chances for a good apple cider pressing. Seen from afar, the two of us, Allen and I, trying to convince 3 1/2 large animals that the green grass on the other side of the fence was better than apples, was likely a funny sight. Just glad there were no passers-by. At least none we knew about! And, Tater won't tell, because getting in (or out) is half the fun.

Photo: (top) Horses in the hayfield, (bottom) Paco putting on an 'eyeore' face



All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2008 Scottie Jones
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A Matter of Perspective: Sheep vs. Farmer

Red, the ram, got "out" yesterday, although from his point of view he was finally "in". I had just let the girls onto the hay field as a gesture of good will - also, because all the yummy grass was down to the nubs in the barn field.

The hay field runs alongside Red's ten month, off-season quarters. Before I left for town, I noticed Red and Piglet, his son and BFF in exile, leaning on the fence and making rude gestures to attract the girls. Thinking back, it was only a matter of time. If you weigh over 200 pounds and lean long enough on the only gate separating you from your harem, the baling twine used to secure it for the last few years will eventually give way.

This must be why I found the gate wide open last night and a huddle of sheep at the far corner of the field with Red standing sentinel, even after I rang my Pavlovian dinner bell again and again and again. Ultimately, I had to walk out to the pasture in the dark with a flash light (the recent time change has messed with my feeding schedule) to shoo the renegade group to the barn for the night. Red did not win any kind thoughts from me on the hike back.

The following morning, after his surely ribald night, I debated trying to cut Red out of the group. The hassle of chasing him down and separating him seemed more than it was worth. Who wants to stand between a horny ram and hornier ewes and tell them they need to wait a little longer? Besides, Piglet was also free and having the time of his life surrounded once again by his sisters, his mother, all those aunts, and lots of ewe lambs! I had never checked my castration job with him when he was smaller and now I was having my doubts. Balls or not, Piglet seemed ready for anything.

Red's introduction into the flock two weeks early means we should start to have lambs in March. I guess this is okay except that March is a nasty month for rain and damp cold. It is also a nasty month for slipping and sliding through knee-deep mud to scoop up newborns and bring them back to the warmth of the barn. How nice if the mothers actually birthed their babies under the loafing shed on the side of the barn, but then, that would be too easy for the farmer. Once again, it is a matter of perspective. Are you the sheep looking for a safe, quiet place at the edge of the field or are you the farmer who has built a barn for just this purpose?

Red is the king of the mountain for six more weeks. This should give us time to solve the gate issue with something better than baling twine. I am thinking a gate that opens and closes on demand could be highly useful at that point in the fence, since I have tried several times to unsuccessfully squeeze between the panels and climbing over is precarious at best.

Too bad our U-Latch gate latch is not designed for this type of panel gate or it would be easy to secure. I suppose we could always buy a new gate, but from a farmer perspective this seems like a waste of money when the gate works as a fence most of the time. Here, the sheep perspective would likely concur. "Save your money. Use baling twine. After all, the gate works as a fence...most of the time (translated: just give us a fighting chance!)"



Top: Red, with a full neck ruff like a lion, a golden red color to his hair in summer (hence his name), a full chest and long legs. Bottom: Thinking about "it".

Copyright 2008 Scottie Jones. All Rights Reserved.
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Choosing the Biggest Lambs

I don't name my lambs that go to market on purpose. I don't want to have an emotional connection that might make me falter when we select which lambs will go to slaughter and which might end up as someones' pets. After all, this is our business...and I do love the taste of lamb.

The other day, I culled the first 15 of our 30+ lambs for their end-of-life trailer ride. This is the second year I have had to choose which lambs will live and which will die that day, instead of sending the entire group off as a lot.

The biggest lambs were the focus of my attention because I have a new buyer with certain expectations and I wanted to 'put my best lambs forward', so to speak. Without a scale, I asked my neighbor, Allen, to judge weight. In our highly unscientific method, he would grab a lamb I pointed out in the group of 60 moms and their offspring, drag it to a clear spot in the pen, and then hoist it off the ground. Okay, so how did this one weigh compared to the last one? Was it more or less? Did he think it weighed at least 80-90 pounds? The sheep were not amused at this process and bunched on top of each other in the farthest corner of the large stall. With 60 sheep, it was a large bunch.

As male lambs tend to be a little larger than female, we looked first for the boys. At birth I tag all the lambs so I can link them with their mothers. Additionally, if the tag is in the right ear, the lamb is a boy (think Ram). If the tag is in the left ear, it is a girl (think Lucy). Okay, so I use mnemonics to remember what I am doing!

Allen knew my system, but I neglected to tell him some of the ewes came with tags in their right ear because not everyone uses this system, besides which I didn't either the first year-or-so I was learning the business. At first, he reached for the largest sheep and the ewes, at 150+ pounds, pulled out of his grasp, running back to the impossibly dense pack of compressed animals.

I pointed. "Allen can you grab that tan lamb there between the smaller white one and the black ewe? Sorry, not that tan lamb, the other one with poop on its ear". Allen waded through tight bodies, packed together like a football crowd waiting for their favorite team and, when he reached my pick, grabbed it, one hand weaving into the wool, the other grabbing onto the head, pulling it between, or even over, the surrounding sheep.

This is wild, soggy, sweaty work because once we have a lamb fitting our selection criteria, we then have to convince it to run through a gate into a separate stall. The lamb rarely runs on its own. More likely, we have a person at its head and a person goosing it from behind, as we drag the uncooperative lamb, with legs braced straight in front, across the now slippery, pee-soaked straw floor. To visualize, imagine an old cartoon drawing with a reluctant donkey. Now put a sheep in its place.

From here on in, the lambs cooperate as little as possible. Adrenalin is pumping. They fly around the smaller stall, leaping straight into the fencing, crashing into each other, as we try to calm things down. The cull is completed. They settle down. Now all we have to do is wait for the pick up.

This year, the hauler backed his trailer right up to the barn door. We pushed the lambs from their stall into the large barn aisle, only to have them change their minds and dash back for the stall door. It wasn't happening. There were five of us. I had learned several years earlier what can happen if you only have two adults and a young girl. A trampled girl and escaped lambs! The lambs had no intention of getting into the trailer. Were they being precient or just obstinant? The hauler picked up the closest lamb and put it in the trailer. The rest followed. Just like sheep.

As the livestock trailer pulled out of the barn yard and onto the dirt road, the remaining ewes and lambs, not chosen in this go-round, were turned back out to pasture, most scrambling over each other to get out of the barn, some nibbling at the bales of hay meant for night feeding. In two to three months time, the remaining lambs should be heavy enough to go to market and we will repeat today's procedure, minus the weight guess.

For a short time we will have only ewes and then our next batch of lambs will be born. And on and on it goes. The wonders of springtime and birth, a summer and fall full of growing and play, and winter where life ends abruptly one day. And on and on it goes.

Photo of large lambs in stall - actually separated out from flock because they are ram lambs, not going to market

Copyright 2008 Scottie Jones. All Rights Reserved.
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