Sheep barn doors are done, and yes they are barn quality with room for sag and shifting.

It was a sheep morning.  It was looking pretty good, Zeke and Annmarie and Jonathon had gotten the sheep into the mommy area in just a few minutes.  It was looking like it was going to be a quick sort and tag and then onto the barn.  Nope, it was not to be.  The sheep did not want to go into the barn and one of the ewes with a set of twins broke away from the cluster and tried to run by Zeke.  He took offense as we had told him to guard.  He jumped on her side and grabbed a hold of her right side.  We hollered at him and he let go then the ewe turned and rammed him because she had twins.  He did not take kindly to this attempt on his dog ego.  He jumped on her grabbed her side and started to work his way to her throat.  I was running at him, screaming at the top of my lungs and swearing at him to let go.  He had her by the throat and was squeezing by the time I got close.  He let go just before I reached him.  I made him go to the far corner and then rolled him over onto his back and choked him until he submitted.  The dog is far too dominant at times.  He was not allowed to help with the sheep most of the rest of the morning.  Annmarie took him out later and said he was much more subdued and listened very well.  In other words, he found his good boy manners. 
We sorted and tagged the last set of twins.  Jonathon wrote down all the tag numbers as our spread sheet is a little outdated.  After all the mommas and babies were documented we ran in the boys.  The first one we sorted out was the ram.  We tossed him into the middle of the barn to run around until we had everyone else sorted.  Jonathan was sure the ram was going to sneak up and get him at any point.  He kept looking over his shoulder to see where the ram was located in relation to him.  After every one’s tag number was documented we let the ram loose with the girls.  He was very happy when he ran over to see all of them. 
We fixed the lower door from parts of the old one and a few new pieces.  The only compromise was I had to put the boards horizontally instead of vertically.  The boards were too short to go vertically.  I didn’t want a bunch of fresh colored boards on the bottom half of the door.  Again, I left lots of room for door shifting.  Annmarie says its for natural ventilation.  I think it is as good a reason as any.  The barn is totally ready for winter!  I just need to bungie cord the feeders together so the sheep cannot pull them over.  It is the only thing left.  I need to actually buy more bungie cords to make this happen.  I am way more ready for winter than I was last year.  It is getting easier and easier. 
 

Milk room cleaned up so we can walk through.

New sheep feeder in barn.

Yesterday was a barn day.  I had Jonathan come out and help me.  The entire barn was full of old wood we had moved out from the hay rooms.  He put all of that in the overhead walkway and storage room over the tack room.  I made a new 8 foot feeder inside the barn where the old jugs we removed were located.  It turned out very nice!  I was pretty happy with it.  It is good enough I may put one on the other side of jugs or the end of the barn.  Time and use will be the real test.  If it holds up well and the sheep use it we may build a few more in the next couple of years. 
 

New upper barn doors, now split in two.

Annmarie wanted me to put double doors on the sheep entrance to the barn when we first moved here.  Instead I put a large single door on top and the fancy 200# bottom door with the slider door built inside of it.  The door was so heavy it was hard to open.  The sheep all jostled and got stuck in the narrow two foot opening.  The track would fill with snow and straw in the winter and freeze solid.  It made for some hard door utilization.  So, now I am rebuilding the doors to be a double door on top and double door on the bottom.  Amazing how that happened.  I am trying to use up all the old boards from the old door. This time the door is only two layers of wood, so hopefully I will have less sag. 

Grain holder and chute installed.

Barn almost ready for winter.

Annmarie also wanted a funnel and bucket holder under our grain bin.  She had envisioned a box sticking out from the bin that you dropped the bucket into.  I had a hard time envisioning the support for that so came up with a new design.  It holds the grain bucket and directs all the grain to the right spot.  We will see how it holds up to a winters use.
Johnathon also spread straw all over the barn floor.  We were going to work the sheep first thing Saturday morning and it makes the footing a whole lot treacherous when offal is being absorbed by the straw.  Other than it being 105 F outside it was a great day.  It was hot!!

The calf did not take to getting caught initially.  He was fighting.  It’s always funny seeing your own expressions.

He did calm down once I had three legs.

trauma is complete they just need to leave.

Annmarie and I went out this morning to tag the new baby calf born last week.  There was great hope it would be a girl and we could keep it due to the wonderfully colorful markings.  Nope, it was a boy.  I spotted it while I was chasing the cows down our long driveway.  It took us about 1.5 hours to get the cows into the barn lot.  They just did not want to cooperate.  We had to go back and forth in the lower field twice.  We never would have gotten them without the dog, but he just doesn’t like to work the cows and has be continually prompted. 

It wouldn’t be a roundup unless they went far distances to get caught.

He also kept looking at me for commands every time Annmarie gave him one.  I just quit talking and let her run the dog.  Kinda like a remote with no batteries, useless.  Zeke finally caught on and was actually listening to her by the end of the second hour.  He got hot and needs a second hair shaving for the year.  I had initially thought one would do the trick the entire summer but obviously not.  He was a lot more active when his hair was shorter. 

Once we got the cows into the barn lot I figured it was easy.  Nope, we had one of the young heifers that did not want to go into the corral.  Mostly, because she is picked on by the other cows and didn’t like being that close to anyone because they picked on her.  We had to finally resort to tapping her on the nose with a stick when she tried to run past us before we got them into the corral.  This is only the second time we have done it but the babies seem to stay in the pen and everyone else eventually goes into the sorting chute.  I am still using 2×4 to block the chute opening at the far end as our gates are not fabricated yet.  We pushed all the adult cows into an adjacent holding pen in case the baby went through the chute also.  I tagged and banded the calf while Annmarie held it.  It was amazingly easy at one week of age compared to the last one Rob and I did at one month of age!
We were going to tag and band the sheep but there is a bunch of wood from the old house stacked into the barn.  I need to fix a few things in the barn.  I need a grain bucket holder, grain bucket feeder ledge, hay bale wall feeder and to fix both front doors and make them into four half size doors.  This needs to happen sooner than later.  I also need some mouse poison for the tack room.  I saw a bunch of new mouse turds. 

Pump pond started.

Yesterday was backhoe day. I had the whole day planned out.  I was going to dig out the irrigation pond.  Dig out the irrigation ditch in the orchard and knock down the ditch berm so I would have access to the ditch with my tractor. Then I was going to go down below the pond and fill in the old flood irrigation channels and level out the berm.  Over the years the berms have been built up to the point they are super steep and I cannot get into the ditch with my tractor.  My goal is to flatten all the berms so I can get into the ditch and clean them out with the little tractor. 

Pond complete.  If you look at concrete you can see the water line when it is backed up.

lower ditch below irrigation pump.

I had a plan of attack and stuck with it.  I rented the backhoe locally for only $250/day.  I had the irrigation pond done in one hour!  I spent three weeks on it this spring and paid someone to help.  Never again!  Now that I have a culvert in place I can drive the little tractor to the other side and make it flat.  In the spring I will drag it down another foot and then plant grass.  My mud pile was four feet deep but so unsafe I just left it.  In a couple of weeks I will try and move it with my little tractor to fill up an old flood irrigation ditch.  The ditches are unusable now and just make the terrain rough.  I will be filling them in all over the farm whenever I can.  I drove the backhoe into the orchard to tackle the berm and ditch.  The backhoe was making short work of the berm.  I don’t have as much practice with it so using the bucket to smooth out the dirt next to the ditch was not going well.  I will come back and do it with the little tractor.  I can smooth out a nice path with the little tractor and box blade, practice makes perfect.  I had just moved to the other side of the tree when I started losing moving power on the backhoe side.  I was able to move it around a couple of times before I finally just shut it down.  I stepped out and an old hydraulic hose had busted.  I managed to get three hours done before the rupture.  I went back into town to deliver the news.  The important part was done, the irrigation pond!  I also want to flatten out a spot by our propane tank for a potential lean to for the alpaca.  I won’t be building it this year but probably next year. 
I fired up the little tractor and went below the pond to clean out the ditch.  I made it all the way down the ditch to the school house divider fence.  Then I drove the tractor down to the school house.  My ditch had filled up/cows had eroded the walls because I just used the box blade to make it.  Causing the ditch to be shallow and wide, which allowed the cows to erode the walls.  There is one huge swamp down there now.  I dug old dry irrigation ditch out and then went over into the swamp until I thought I would get stuck then I four wheeled the tractor through the swamp using my tractor tires as a ditch.  This actually worked!  Now I just need to hit it with a hand shovel for 30 minutes and give it a couple of weeks to dry up.  Once it is dry then I can go in and dig it down with the little tractor.  I need to get the two culverts into these fields so I can actually get equipment across the ditch.  Digging the ditch down is going to make it impossible to just drive thru the ditch so the culverts are necessary. 

second room all clean now.

I spent all weekend cleaning out the house.  I emptied out 12 boxes of giveaway.  We are trying to get ready for company at the end of the week.  So I went on a binge and cleaned and emptied and threw stuff away.  After spending all weekend inside I figured it was time to tackle the old house.  I had tools and wood piled all over the floor.  There was not a horizontal surface empty and you had to step on wood or sneak around it to get any where in the building.  I just started throwing stuff out of the building.  We cleaned out the second room!  I have a couple more items to empty but not much and it is now useable.  The best part of the whole cleaning process was I needed a new pressure switch for the front irrigation pump.  I found a brand new one in the yellow cabinet!!  I can fix it myself and get the pump going next week, very nice. 

shop clean

I have to work tomorrow so my nephew is earning some summer money by hauling everything to the barn, the burn pile or the metal scrap pile.  The back porch needs some serious work also.  He will be tackling that also.  I gave him enough of a list that I don’t expect him to finish tomorrow.  The best part was cleaning out the building only took us four hours.  It will take at least that long just to move the stuff from the front yard! I will now be able to find all my tools and not trip on anything. 

shop now clean.

Trash heap and wood pile for the barn.