Big Split

 

Another ewe and three more lambs went out in the pasture this morning. This afternoon we did another set of tails and testicles. There were seven this time. 

Lisa managed to catch Nike alone and got him isolated. He's the next one to go to Flemingsburg. It will be interesting getting him loaded.

That's Nike on the other side of the creek.

We had smoked pork roast for dinner tonight. It was delicious. We'll be having smoked pork fried rice tomorrow or the next day. Pork sandwiches too. It was a pretty good sized roast

Tulips!

Link to time lapse video of me splitting one of the huge logs.

The logs weigh at least 300 pounds, maybe more. I'm getting them split into manageable chunks that we can come back and split later with the splitter in the horizontal position.

 

The loose chunks are from the second log I did tonight.
The ones on the rack are from the log in the video.

 

Lisa should be able to lift these if she wants to split some.

The Lonesome Steer

 

We got tails and testicles done on five lambs this morning. For those who don't know "tails and testicles" is when we do the needful processing on new lambs each year. It goes like this:

1. Lisa catches the lamb as I get the two syringes ready that she has pre-filled with the proper dose of medications. One is tetanus and the other is CD/T. She hands me the lamb to hold and she takes the syringes and gives the lamb the shots.
2. I hand the lamb back to Lisa and put a scrapies tag on its ear with a special tool.
3. If it's a ram lamb it gets a castration band on its scrotum.
4. Both ewe and ram lambs get a castration band on their tail to dock it.

Today's batch had three rams that had tiny testicles and it was cold so they were even harder to find and keep down in the scrotum. I eventually got them. The other two were ewes so they were easy, just shots, tags and tails.

These three were the ones we did yesterday so they got released into the pasture today.

We got the hay bale back up on its end. I hammered an old rake handle into the middle of the bale and used it to hook up a block and tackle to pull it over. I braced it with a couple of stretcher poles and a ratchet strap.

I got the rest of the branch wood from Bath county split and stacked today. I cleaned up the off cuts and dropped the chunks in the chunk wood bin. We have barely started the big trunk wood logs and already have enough for next winter and most of the following winter. It's a good feeling seeing all the wood stacked and knowing the house will be warm. 

Every day in the winter and early spring I walk down the hill with some cattle feed. They hear the dogs barking and see me walking down the driveway with the bucket. They like food so they start heading for the feed bunks and meet me down there. Except for Nike. Nike isn't the sharpest tool in the shed. That's him over in the other pasture looking at the other two as they eat. He eventually makes his way down to the gate and to the bunk but there isn't much left by then. 

Every day Nike is late for dinner. He's a special steer.

The girls walk with me. They love it. Except Cassie. She just stands on the porch and watches.

The shed in the sheep's spring pasture has a big mud hole at the gate. I had some bags of concrete that got wet so I put them in the path with some gravel and stones. The ewe's were leaping over the mud. This should be safer.

Meet Bobby

 Bobby is this year's first bottle lamb. He's Ivy's small ram lamb. He has a small thin body and a gigantic head. It's been said that he looks like a bobble head, thus the name.

Heather and Andy came over to help clip the ewe's hooves. With their help we were able to use the sheep chair. It's much nicer than holding them. They get put in it and they're stuck there.

They are in a safe and comfortable position for working on hooves.

They don't like it much.

Ivy took some special care.

I worked on the compost pile for a while while they were doing hooves. There are only so many people who can crowd around a sheep. I made better use of my time than standing around. I try to work it when the weather cooperates. I just shovel it all from one pile into another so it gets air and stays mixed up. The tomatoes seem to like it.

After the compost I ate lunch and split some firewood. We had some left over from winter but these three full racks were empty. They now have the last part of the locust trunk from Nelson's dead fall and the branch wood and four of the trunk logs from the ice storm tree fall over in Bath county.

I filled about half of the empty rack in the foreground.

This is just some firewood.

I'll try to finish the branch wood tomorrow and start on the big logs.

Later Poppy and Luna walked down the hill with me to feed the cattle. 

The white specks on the cattle are pear blossom petals. They were hanging out under the pear tree.

Lisa's hay bale fell over. I'll go down tomorrow and figure out how to stand it back up on end. She uses it to flake off for the ewe's in the tubs.

A lot of trees are in bloom now. This is the crabapple.

What? I've been busy, that's why.

 

The cherry trees are in bloom and the ewes are having lambs. It's been an interesting couple of years for everyone. Hopefully things are making a turn for the better.

Poppy with the cherry blossoms

Lisa's been taking care of the lambing as she usually does this time of year. I help with the shots, tails and testicles. Today we worked on one of the ewes that is getting released back to the pasture tomorrow. I turned her over and Lisa started trimming her hooves. On one of her back ones the clipper caught the sole and it started to bleed. It was bleeding pretty good so I held pressure on the wound while Lisa hurried into the house to get the first aid stuff. She got it to clot and we think the ewe can still go out to pasture in the morning. 

This ewe had three but only one survived,
the one in the wagon here made it.

We're still gathering firewood. Andy found some for us again. He gets out more than we do and he has a good eye for firewood. The last batch was from Bath county a few miles from Andy's house. It was a big oak tree that came down in the ice storm at the end of January.

The cut logs are big. We rolled them up on the trailer with ramps. They came off the trailer with a gravity assist but getting them stacked on the racks was a chore.

This is just the trunk cuts. There was a bunch of branch wood too.

 

I'm not sure if this blog will continue on the same path. I'll try to post more about what we're up to here in Kentucky.

Happy Holidays

We had a nice Thanksgiving. We didn't have anyone staying here this year but still had a great family get together.

 Yoda has been sitting by the fire to keep warm.

Heather was trying to sneak up on me.

 Bryan and Cathryn were there. The girls like Bryan.

It turned cold again this week. We got a little snow but mostly wind and cold.

Poppy still likes to stay near the fire. Cassie has more hair than Poppy now so she's okay with the cold.

It looks wintry. 

The ewes like it when it gets cold. They have the front pasture and the pond pasture now. Ellie is over in the top pasture. 

The calves are getting beefy. They're staying in the ram pasture until the big cattle go to their final destination.

Jeff doesn't like the beefy visitors.

We had to bring the hose up to thaw it out. It sat in the bathtub overnight.

The latest foster dogs. Missy is the little one and the other one is Shadow. They're retired brood bitches from a puppy farm. 

First Snow

It snowed yesterday afternoon and most of the night. It was pretty out this morning. 

The day before it was all ice. I was in Lexington yesterday so I got to drive home in it. 

There were big wet flakes then it turned to the smaller ones when it got cold.

Dennis is in the front yard with Joanie while the ram is in with the ewes.

It really wasn't much accumulation because the ground was still warm. Everything is wet now.

Cassie had never seen snow. Poppy was showing her how to play in it. She loved it.

Cassie found a sun beam.

Poppy curled up with her favorite blanket.

Even Yoda was getting warm by the fire.