Sheep

Day 7, tile down.

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We started tiling immediately this morning in hopes of being done by noon. Mr Experience needed to make a couple of stops and go to Hermiston and I needed to go to Hermiston to pickup the supplies for the kitchen and pick up our grout.

I decided to let the sheep out of the barn area today and allow them to roam in the entire barn lot. There is some green grass and the lambs can play king of the hill on the large dirt piles. I told Mr Experience that they would be out and about and he would see them when he was outside. Once he commented they were out on the hillside. I looked out and spotted them in the barn lot and gave it no more thought. As we are leaving the yard to go to Hermiston I spot the sheep and horses on the back hillside where they should not be. There is only one way to get there and that is through an open gate! We have had some young male visitors that had left open two separate gates allowing the animals to escape. The dogs love this as they actually get to work the animals. Once the sheep spotted me with the dogs they ran down into the upper prime pasture on their own. I was trying to move them into the barn lot but Mouse was running on Mouse directions not sheep dog directions so he got the dominance treatment of pining down by throat and staying next to dad while Zeke got to run around and chase sheep. Mouse did get to run around the barn lot in the evening and he even followed a “go left, circle around” command. Now he did it at an all out dead run but he did do it. There were no sheep it was just to make sure and to give him the practice of listening.

We did our errands and picked up the grout, while at the new flooring store I spotted some granite and inquired about the price. If I do the install I can get a sheet for $30/sq foot, this means I can build a custom breakfast nook in the kitchen. I am adding that to the list of needed items. Upon our return to the house we decided to just finish! We figured it would only take a couple of hours. We were wrong it took four hours.

I am so happy with the results. Hopefully, tomorrow we can get it all cleaned up and ready and the grout installed. I want to get all the furniture back in place and ready for Annmarie’s return at 1600 on Saturday. We will see if I can make it .

I tried to show her a picture of my new hat last night and she asked me if I was gaining weight! Who would think that I am binging on cookies, candy, pop, chips, no veggies and lots of beans!? I was offended. I told her it was all muscle from the hard work. She told me 6 days was not enough time to build up that much muscle. I may eat a carrot tomorrow in her honor.

2018 started with a clean slate

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It is so much nicer to go out to the barn now that the Ram is no longer breathing. Some would claim that he is no longer of this earth. Not me, he is in our freezer, a friends freezer, his head and hide are being practiced on by a budding taxidermist and all his leftover parts are feeding all the wild animals. He is being very productive and generous in his death.

On Jan 1, we threw out fresh straw and neatened up the barn. Our supply of grass hay for the horses is dwindling quickly. Normally, the horses just eat what we feed the sheep but this year we got straight alfalfa for the sheep. I have some large bales that are a mix and we may have to break open one of those and feed it out to the horses. We have had no bummer lambs since the ram’s demise. We are fairly certain now that he was the cause of most of our 9 bummer lambs. Our bummer lady said that she has only lost one of the 9 lambs. She usually has around a 50% mortality as they are bummers for a reason. He is not missed. I can now wade through the barn and pet the ewes. There about 15 that come up and will let you scratch on them. We are still having babies. It should be ending soon. We were starting to sweat about running out of hay, farm nightmares are rooted in this calamity. It looks like we are going to make it no problem. We will be close on the small bales in the barn but we are going to have extra large bales. Hopefully, the snow will continue to pile up in the mountains.

Barn demise

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Annmarie is still not 100% but on the mend. This means I am still on chore duties until she gets better. I opted to start the day with oatmeal, toast and coffee. I am never in a hurry in the morning so I was prompted to speed up and get outside. I had shut the wooden chicken coop door last night as it was still a little light out when I got eggs. The finches were inside the coop, there must have been around 12 of them freeloading on the chicken feed and I did not want them coming back in or the chickens leaving. The raccoon has killed 5 chickens so far as they are too stupid to go behind the locked door when it gets dark. So I let the chickens out first then headed to the barn. Well there were three new babies in the barn and they looked like triplets as only one momma was paying attention to them. I ignored them and opened up the barn doors so the sheep could go outside and get a drink of water. Next I went to check on the momma with twins I put in the stairway area. Only one baby present, I had to dig around in the straw to find the little demised fellow. I went to the slider door to let the momma’s out and found another dead lamb trapped down next to the door! It had fallen down into the 3-4 inch gap and was on its back and could not get out. So both the carcasses went out by the gate and will be taken up to the boneyard soon. They will be well preserved in the snow until after the holidays. I fed the mommas and looked out into the barn and there were now three ewes with 5 babies and one huge orange baby covered in slime who keeps hollering and walking around. No one will claim the baby and after two hours I had to take the baby inside and dry it off so Annmarie could feed it and get it warm. Another bummer for the housekeeper, her 7th one this year and so far they have all survived. I tagged and banded all the babies before coming inside with the bummer. I wanted to give her a chance to bond and I needed to empty out the baby area and start over.

I went and got tools so I could do the two essential repairs to the barn. The first one was to dig out the straw and install a low board below the new feeders so a lamb could not slide under the feeder and get trapped. This went fairly smooth.

Next was to fix the gap problem at the sliding door. The opening is 3-4 inches wide as my 3 inch wide tape measure is buried in the deep end of the door. I had to do some digging to find a couple of scrap pieces of wood that would work, amazingly it was tongue and groove flooring and the tongue was intact and visible. I was able to find a piece of leftover tongue and groove flooring unfortunately the barn is crooked so I beat it into place and see a diagonal line across it. On one end I trimmed off almost two inches and down to nothing at the opposite end. I screwed in two boards to fill in the bottom support then cut my floor board on the table saw so I could make it fit.

Here it is with less than a one inch gap between the door and the floor. I even placed a 2×4 outside to keep the door from kicking away from the floor creating another gap. It looks kinda funny as this wood is perfectly clean but that won’t last.

While I was working on the barn Annmarie texted me to tell me there was a ewe with twins out in the snow. I told her no there was not as I had gotten everyone in and fed an hour earlier. I looked while we were on the phone and yes she was right, twins covered in snow with momma trying to lick them clean. I chased all the ewes back into the barn then swung a gate panel to create an opening into the momma and baby area. The brand new moms from today are in this enclosure. They all did well.

I had to go out late tonight to lock everyone in as its Christmas Eve and that same ewe had both her twins out in the snow. They had frozen snow every their entire body. I chased the ewes inside and tossed the babies after. She was already calling for them.

It snowed and the chore time doubled

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We are going to have a White Christmas this year. It is always amazingly pretty to see all the snow, it blankets the ground and covers all the imperfections. Unfortunately, it brings its own set of problems. Everything is harder as I now have to slog through six inches of snow. I attempted to shovel the sidewalks and a couple of paths through the yard but was unable to find a snow shovel. I was positive we had one in the wood shed, I was wrong. I ended up using a broom to clean off all the walkways, cars and front porch. I also looked for the extra 50# bag of ice melt I “knew” we had left over from last year. Nope, it was nowhere to be found.

After creating paths, cleaning off the walkway and a path all the way out to the cars I cleaned off the cars themselves. It got just over freezing so I was hoping the snow would melt after I cleaned it off. I was fairly successful with this technique. Now that didn’t include the time I ended up on my keister after my feet become horizontal faster than my body. I hooked my car battery up to the charger. We just got the car back from the auto body shop and the next day it would not start. Now it was a very cold morning so I am not ruling out a bad battery after sitting idle for 3 weeks but the charger will let us know if it is truly dead or they didn’t get something hooked up correctly.

When I made it out to the barn, there was a new set of twins and a very jumpy mother. I tried to casually sort out the mother with little success. There were four ewes with white and black heads. I finally managed to corral them all into a corner and jump on a white and black headed ewe. I was wrestling her to the ground and trying to pin her down when I realized she was the wrong one. I gave up trying to catch her in the barn and opened up the chute, about half the mothers crowded in. The one I wanted foolishly followed them and I was able to wade in and snag her. The trouble was I had her babies in the main barn and she was stuck in the chute. I ended up just heaving her over the pen wall into the baby area. It was a struggle to get her over the wall. I snagged both babies and dropped them over with her. I found one under the feeder again! I had stuffed more straw under the feeders but the sheep keep dragging it out and the babies keep laying under it. Next summer I will be installing boards so that the sheep cannot get under the feeders. I just need to make a spot where the cats can get in so no mice have a predator free zone.

Next was driving the tractor up to the boneyard to drop off the ram carcass. I had to use speed, four wheel drive and positrack, to get up the back hill. We have a good six inches of snow on the ground. I was able to get up the hill after a couple of tries. On the way down the dogs and I stopped to let the mommas out to water and to lock Mika into the old milking area. It is now covered in straw and she will be spending the days and nights in there to keep her hoof dry while it heals. She does not like this so I will let her out this evening to go drink while I do the sheep chores and then lure her back with food and grain. The horses and sheep are very compliant when you offer them grain.

Next was clearing the driveway down to the road of snow. I like to do this whenever we have any significant amount of snow. This comes from living somewhere with lots of snow. Always count on the next day bringing more snow so you need to get it removed every day or it will get away from you. I also need to move a large bale of hay down to the cows. This is very hard when the snow is deep. I drug and pushed a path all the way down to the cow gate. I then got the dogs and pushed a bale down to the gate. The dogs were placed just inside the open gate to keep the cows from escaping and bum rushing the hay bale. I pushed the bale to the far end and wrestled the feed panels around it so the cows could not stomp it all into the snow. This should keep them happy for the next five to seven days. Mouse decided that he needed to save me instead of guard the gate. He is still a little too eager we need another year to mellow him out. By this time I am cold to the bone and headed back inside to warm up.

I needed to get Annmarie’s birthday present finished. I had a custom cutting board made for the kitchen insert out of Madrone with black walnut accents. The problem was I gave the measurements incorrectly. I measured from the 1 inch mark and forgot to subtract that extra inch. I took it out and ripped 3/8 inch off each edge and sanded it back down. I will use one of the cut off pieces to add a lip on the front of the cutting board. The lip is so when Annmarie lays it on the counter to use as a bread making board it won’t slide forward. I just need to get some black walnut 1/4 inch pegs to make this happen. I put it in place and put a bow on it as today is Annmarie’s birthday. She is miserably sick and has slept most of the day. We had to cancel our birthday dinner plans for tonight.

When I went out do do evening chores there were another set of just born twins! These are tiny little babies and both were wet. I ended up chasing everyone else out of the barn and laying down straw in the stair area. It’s its own area that we normally don’t use. I made a thick layer of straw and put hay and grain in it. I snagged both babies and dropped them into the straw. She came right in but kept running out when I tried to shut the gate. I finally managed to get the gate shut on the three of them. Hopefully, she will finish cleaning everyone up and be well bonded by the morning. No way those two twins would have survived the ram.

It’s supposed to snow some more tonight!

The deed is done, it is now safe to go out to the barn

Steve Hardin3 Comments

We slept in horribly late this morning, till 0700. Annmarie thought it was decadent, I told her once every couple of months of not getting up at 0500 was not going to hurt us and most people would not consider 0700 sleeping in. I had big plans to go outside and work on the Christmas present but alas it was not so. I was thwarted by the ram one time too many. It happened again, another bummer lamb this morning! This is just not acceptable. As promised I switched my schedule around to accommodate the demise of said ram. After breakfast I had plans to put him down and a helper was coming out at 1130. I would have been at it for a while by then but there was a true emergency that took priority.

One of my mother-in-law’s cats was stuck on her roof and it needed to be brought down. Annmarie and I went down there, me with a large ladder. Annmarie crawled around on the roof top trying to catch the cat who did not want to be caught. There is a large tree next to the house that I am sure assisted the cat onto the roof. I hollered encouragement and comments while she was chasing the cat. It had been up there for 3 days. My reply was it was not hungry enough. Turns out that was true because someone had fed the cat on the roof so it would not get hungry. Annmarie finally managed to corner it on the outside edge of the roof and snagged it. The cat tried to pee on her out of fright. Everyone ended up coming down off the roof safely and my mother-in-law was happy, a job well done. I did actually put the ladder away where it belonged for the first time in six months.

It took both of us over ten minutes of searching to find the 10/22 rifle. I thought it was in the gun cabinet until Annmarie brought me the 243. I was never sure how she knew what rifle to bring as it was always a crap shoot as to what caliber I got when I asked for one. Turns out guessing was her main tool. She did not know that the caliber was written on the barrel and she could just look. We did not find the 22 rifle in the gun cabinet, or the coat closet or the laundry room or anywhere else we thought to look. I gave up and grabbed the ever trusty Walther P22 pistol. Annmarie questioned my choice as the pistol has a questionable kill ratio. We were discussing the merits of the pistol vs my proficiency with it when I spotted the 10/22 rifle leaning up in a corner behind the display case. I had moved it there when I was painting the stairwell wall and had forgotten it. I went with Killer, and put Laser Eyes back in the closet.

We had had multiple discussions about the best way to put down the ram. The general consensus was that a 22LR directly between the eyes would probably not kill him. They have an incredibly thick skull. I opted to test this theory and shot him in the barn near the door from about 15 feet away. He did not do anything but turn and run out the door. I had to wait for the sheep to mill around and get out of the line of sight so if I missed no one else got hurt. I did hit him in the head every time and he did finally go down. Luckily he fell with his head pointed down hill so I was able to cut one set of carotids with a knife and he bled out very well. This is important to keep the meat from tasting as gamey as it could be. By this time my helper had arrived, a slaughter virgin. He had never skinned out or cleaned an animal before.

I got the tractor and the virgin tossed him into the bucket. I tried to back down the hill to the little foot bridge but the hill was causing me to slide into the fence. Next thing I know the virgin was hollering at me because the tractor was on three tires and trying to tip over or slide through the fence. He stood on the upside of the box blade and I was able to pull right out. He didn’t realize that sliding around on three tires and almost tipping over are normal events for me. I lined up on the bridge and drove straight off the hill and over the little bridge and through the little gate. It was faster than going around. I then proceeded to clean out the animal giving instructions to the slaughter virgin. Once cleaned out we hooked onto it with spreading bar and lifted it up onto the skinning pole with the tractor. We then skinned it out and boned it out. The virgin only cut himself twice and managed to not do it so deep that he bled on the meat, extra bonus points for this. I had brought out five knives but no sharpener. We needed the sharpener. It is a lot harder to cut meat with a dull knife. We took it inside, washed it all up and proceeded to turn it into stew meat. I could not bring myself to turn the backstrap and tenderloin into stew meat. I cut it all up into steaks. The ram was incredibly fat! There were huge goblets of fat throughout his entire inner cavity and along the outside of his back and chest. Now that he is no more we are hoping we have to feed less.

As you can see in the picture below, Annmarie is incredibly sad that her nemesis and torturer is gone.

When she went out to feed the sheep tonight there was another set of twins born in the barn. They were both with their mother and bonded and doing well! If this continues it will be worth it. Even if we had just removed him for our safety it was worth it.

It has snowed 2 inches since it got dark tonight. Another reason that will cause the sheep to want to stay in the barn. It is now safe to just walk through and feed or play with babies without worrying about getting injured.