Spring and sheep!

We may well be three days short of spring when looking at the calender, we may well be three weeks short of spring as far as recorded averages for this area will tell us, but all the signs are here. Yesterday we hit 80F (26C) and, for the last week, night time temperatures have stayed above freezing point. The geese have returned, the chickens have started laying eggs with vigour, the grass is turning green and, most importantly, the sheep need a haircut. We like to have them sheared a few weeks before we start lambing but that sometimes proves to be a challenge. Last year with too much snow, we were faced with a barn that the shearers were unable to reach with their vehicles, first because of 4ft snow drifts and then later because of knee deep mud. As it turned out last year was a bad year for us, with only seven of our sheep bred. Not to go into details, it was a mini disaster for us that meant lambing paid for none of the usual bills, like paying for all the winter hay. These things happen, every farmer will tell you woeful tales of bad years but the only real solution is to look forward to better times (or to give up, which is not in either of our natures!).

We do not have sheep that are bred for their wool, such as merinos or Wensleydales, we breed meat sheep. Wool is not our prime object in shearing. We shear for clean sheep during lambing, so we can see what is happening as the delivery time approaches, and so the lambs do not have to fight dirty wool in order to get to their food source. We shear so that our sheep do not get too warm in summer and die on us. We shear to avoid nasty things like fly strike, when flies will lay their eggs in damp wool and a little while later maggots appear and do gross things to your sheep.

I have been to sheep shearing competitions in the northern counties of England and Wales, I have read books about Australian and New Zealand shearers and all have convinced me that shearers are a breed apart! It came as no surprise that Anita used to use a local man who I can best describe as "a sullen man of few words". He sheared all the local sheep, gave a fair price and was reliable, which is about as much as anyone can expect or want. When we decided to have sheep, we used this same man except, by then, he was into his 70's and slowing down. The year he retired we decided to use the same man as our neighbour was using. It made sense that he would do our sheep after the neighbour's, thus making a full day's work for himself. He arrived and within five minutes he was arguing with Anita, shouting at her, upsetting her to the point that I was ready to go to the house for the shotgun. His visit lasted 15 minutes and we have neither seen nor heard of him since. We still giggle at the way Anita stood up to him and ran him of the property.

Imagine our relief when the old shearer recommended some young men from just across the Minnesota border. The first year they came there were three of them and they did a wonderful job, last year we made an appointment with them that we had to cancel because of the weather and the inability to keep the sheep completely dry. This year Luke came on his own. We put up panels to restrain the flock and another 2 to enclose the shearing area that housed six sheep at a time. Jake helped with the sorting, Luke sheared, Anita de-wormed and vaccinated and I bagged the wool. It took us less than 4 hours to finish up with 32 sheep. We laughed, we joked, we shared stories and both Anita and I were impressed with the young man. He was knowledgeable, well versed in all subjects that we broached, respectful and did a wonderful job with the sheep. In fact we felt honoured to have gotten to know him a little better! He broke the stereotype I had in my mind of sheep shearers!

We are happy, about 60% of our ewes look as though they are 2-4 weeks away from lambing and all the rest bar one look pregnant. If the weather holds, this may be a good year! If, if, if! The sunshine has brought the kids outdoors, too. They spend their days playing and eating, and as they have started eating hay and weeds, we think we will start milking Daisy next week. I can't wait to taste the first goatmilk ice cream of the year and to start the first batch of cheese. Spring holds so much promise. 

Time to try something new!

A few years ago we lost all our egg-laying chickens to raccoons. At first we blamed the dogs, but it was 'coons! The following year we had no chickens and we missed having them and their eggs. It seemed wrong to live on a farm and have to buy eggs. We still raised our own meat chickens, but they were a separate breed that stayed a maximum of 8 weeks before they were either sold or stored in our freezer. They never reached maturity as we always chose Cornish Crosses for our meat birds. Some years we raised 700 of them and, no matter how many we raised, we always had customers willing to buy them, encouraging us to raise even more each year. We stopped raising birds for sale when the price of corn and diesel cut into the profit to such an extent that our effort was not being rewarded.  Now we butcher 35-50 chickens for our own use and that has left us more free time in the summer to pursue other activities that make a greater contribution to our winter readiness or projects that increase our self sufficiency.

Cornish crosses are a fast growing hybrid variety raised specifically to butcher within a specified time. The 'breed' has many flaws and weaknesses when you try to raise them beyond the 8 weeks needed to bring them to plump roaster weight, and while some claim it is possible, we have decided not to try, and each year have ordered our chicks from a hatchery. It has always seemed somewhat paradoxical that we need to buy 50 baby chicks each year in order to raise our own meat. Last year for the first time we raised our own layer chickens from eggs layed in our brooder house. With the aid of a very kind neighbour, we successfully hatched 50 +eggs and increased our layer population accordingly. This made us re-think our ideas on meat chickens.

We did some research into dual-purpose chickens, large heavy-breasted birds that will also lay 250+eggs per year. There are some very pretty birds out there but we decided to keep it simple. We will remove all of the roosters from our layer flock and keep the hens but, as our chicken house can easily accommodate 100 birds, we have decided to invest in 100 new dual-purpose birds. We looked at photos, asked questions, looked at a variety of hatcheries and finally decided on these breeds:

Buff Orpington:

Barred Plymouth Rock:

Black Australorp:

White Plymouth Giant:

25 of each will arrive at the beginning of June. We will have eggs to eat and sell and all but 1 of the most handsome roosters of each breed will be helped to our freezer. Each spring we will hatch 50-75 eggs and repeat the process, supplementing our flock and filling our freezer. I have read that caponising will improve the meat, but I think a well fed, naturally and peacefully raised bird will taste just fine! 

Now we just wait and look forward to the cute chicks.

Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge

It was hard not to fall in love with Petal when we first met her, too small to be a complete flower, she was the significantly smaller half of a set of twins. We bought her from a lovely young lady who travelled to meet us loaded with goat milk as well as Petal in a shoe box.

We learned that goats wean much later than sheep and our love affair with Petal was to lead us to many new experiences. She made us laugh at least once every day, she made us curse on a regular basis but life with Petal was never boring. We decided that as a bottle baby she would start her life at our home in the house and that was where she stayed for almost 3 months! By 4 weeks she was clean and asked to go outdoors to do her business and we quickly realised that we had a smart animal on our hands, smarter than any dog.

Possibly smarter than the cats! The rocker/glider had always been cat territory but Petal shared it with them unless she was using it as her own personal gym, in which case the cats found safer places to be.

She went everywhere with us, to town, to the 4th July Parade, to the Tree Farm; and everywhere she went she melted hearts just the way she had melted ours.

Her favourite sleeping place was with us, she would hop up on the bed along with the cats and if we woke her she would look at us as if to ask what our problem was with the obvious choice of sleeping arrangements.

There were times when she had to be restrained from eating our garden but even then she found ways of attracting our attention and showing that she was a little Princess, not livestock.

She taught the dogs to show her a suitable amount of respect and allowed them to share any treats we gave her but she always knew to turn her best side to the camera.

She was an important part of our lives, taught us that we didn't want to live without goats, taught us a great deal about fencing and taught us that most of our preconceived ideas about goats were 100% wrong! They really are not like sheep, nothing like them.

Petal went on to become a wonderful matriarch, looking out for her family of 2 other does and Randy, the buck. She taught them manners, kept them away from electric fence and made all our lives better every day!

She greeted us everyday, as soon as we opened the door, we would hear her saying "good morning". On our trips to the barn, Petal would be the first to welcome us. When we worked in the garden she would talk to us over the fence. She was right, though she went to live in the barn, she was never livestock, she was much more than that and we will miss her. We have other goats, we will have more goats but they are only part of our lives because Petal taught us that life on a farm is incomplete without goats. Coming home from a stressful day is easier when a goat is standing at the fence waiting to welcome you. Petal enriched our lives and we will miss her.

Her hooves are now tapping their familiar rhythm on the Rainbow Bridge!