Handsome Rams Arrive!

The Boys are here!!!!

Handsome and sweet looking, isn't he?  He's not named yet.  I'm waiting for his breeders to name him.  Dick brought the rams down from Maine.  Having Dick deliver the rams was a boon given how busy I am with working on the barn.

Our two rams were born this spring and they have been here only a few days. Today was their first chance to leave their stall and go out into their pasture.  They sniffed and could clearly smell the herd of young ewes but they couldn't see them.  They tried flirting with my herd of Nigerian Dwarf Goats and got a couple of the goats kind of interested.  They ate a lot of grass, butted heads a few times and generally seemed to have a good time.  Tomorrow will be another day in and out.  In a few days we'll divide our ewes into 2 breeding flocks and let these boys get to work sparking next springs lamb crop!

November 9th! Beautiful Weather!!!

I've been enjoying working on the barn for several reasons.  First, I get to work with my brother and I really like that.  Second, I get to watch the animals and be more aware of herd health, herd dynamics and individual behaviors.  Third, I get to drink in all that beauty of the different flocks/herds in their pastures, the surrounding forest, the view through the bare trees to other mountains, etc.

I've really been enjoying our small flock of Cascade Farmstead ewes.  I think I finally know all six by name now.  I admit to having some favorites.

This is Lisette and I think she's very sweet.  She's the color of butterscotch, has no horns and is unfortunately the shyest but maybe someday she'll be tamer.

This is Lady of the Lake.  She's the friendliest and always ready to lead the herd after me.  They've eaten their pasture down quite a bit so it's time to move them onto another pasture I think.  This will be the first time they follow me down the center aisle of the pastures to get to another pasture.  I'm hoping it easily becomes part of our morning and evening routine.

This is the view down the road from the barn driveway to the house driveway and beyond.  The first half we have to plow because the town didn't have the funds to repair it after all the road fixing needed to get back to normal after Irene.

Okay.....this photo is from the late spring but I'm thinking about baby goats again because it's breeding season for next year's kid crop.  This is Leoneea with her twin babes Tao and Rasha looking out from behind a wall.   Leoneea has such a lovely look to her and like all the other goats was a great mother to her young. Tao still likes to climb into laps although he's a bit big and Rasha (the doeling) is a sweetie who likes nothing better than to get some patting.

Zetta gave birth to 4 babies; 3 doelings and a buckling.  This photo shows them only a few hours old.  I've been telling all the does this year to only give birth to 1 or 2 babies this year.  I don't want the herd to grow so quickly!!!

Note to Self!

Note to Self!!!  Next time I am painting or staining something remember to  try a sample of the chosen color rather than trust the color chart.  I was rushing to get the barn stained before winter and the temps have been dropping.  I found someone local to do the job and he and I both thought it should get done soon so I chose a color that I thought would be sort of a golden oak color.  I almost panicked when I came out of the barn to look at the front that had just been sprayed! It looked like yellow more than wood; sort of a yellow ochre color.  Yikes.  It's not like I live near a paint store and the stain had already been bought and winter is coming so I had him finish it.  It's okay...much better now that it's dry.  It's sort of a golden saddle leather color.  Next stain job will be in a color to mellow it a bit.  That's the fun of using translucent   stain.   Oh, and I'm pleased to report that most of the snow has melted.  Or at least half the field is bare now.  I guess my optimism is showing.

October Storm

We got a winter trial with 4 inches of snow on October 28th.  Then on Saturday we got about 24 inches of snow.  We woke up Sunday morning glad that it had stopped ahead of schedule and amazed to look out at the results.  The texture of the snow allowed it to create slumps over the balcony railing.

Here's a look down the driveway.

Here is our 20 foot pond in a photo that shows the depth of the snow.

It took us a day to get ready for the storm and then a day to clean up after it.  I managed to plow down from the new barn.....a good thing since the town doesn't yet plow that road.  Our town did plow to our house driveway although they sunk the big plow truck in the mud along the dirt road that leads to our driveway.  With a week of days in the 40s and 50s I'm hoping the snow melts and that the goats can go out to pasture for a few more weeks.  The dogs LOVE the snow and it was deep enough to make them look like albino Corgis!  They get excited when the snow falls off the barn roof.  They pounce on it yelping in excited falsetto.  Back to working on the new barn this week.

"Bowl with Eggs" still life in reality

Our hens have started laying and the eggs are such lovely works of art and such miracles.  Okay, so I'm easy to impress because I see the beauty and miracle of just about everything.  I'm particularly enjoying the sight of the soft blue/green eggs in a bowl that my friend Susan created and gave to me.  The color is a pretty close match although the greenish eggs vary somewhat in tint from blue/green to more of a soft olive green.

I'm also enjoying the garlic harvest.  Here's what a bulb of garlic looks like when it's just been cut down from the hayloft.  Below is after the roots have been trimmed and the outer layer of skins have been rubbed off.  Ready to add to the pile we keep ready to add to dinner creations!

Note: these garlic photos feature another piece of ceramic art by my friend Susan.  

Wish I had another sunny day to get some more up to date barn photos but here are a couple.  It's a lot further along now and the fencing is done as well but none of that has been photographed recently.  Well pump goes in this week and that's exciting for me since hauling water gets old fast.

Barn Building Progress

So here's the progress report on the new barn.  The goat stalls are finished.  These consist of a main stall about 16X10' for day use and next to it a 16X6' stall to put kids in overnight when I'll be milking the does in the morning.  These stalls have a removable panel in between them so kids will be able to see their moms and even sleep with just a wire panel between them.  If it proves better to have complete separation I have other stalls at the south end of the barn that can be kid overnight stalls.  The name of the game with this barn is flexibility so the kid overnight stall has 2 hay mangers placed in such a way that it could be divided in half if need be.  Beyond the kid stall there is a row of 4 kidding/lambing stalls and they are created by dividers that are created as needed by dropping 2X6" boards into metal tracks.  This means I can have 1 big stall, 2 slightly smaller stalls for 4 individual stalls.  Each has it's own gate  (or will have when my brother Jeff gets back from sailing his boat south)  and the aisle itself will be usable in a pinch for yet another kidding place.  Can you tell we were low on room last year?

Here's the kid overnight stall.

Notice that we have yet another style of manger here.  Jeff and I designed and built this on the spot starting with a length of 2X6 screwed from the other side as the bottom.  We created both sides by taking 3 pieces of 2X6 and sawing one of them diagonally in half to form the slant for each side.  Pieces of scrap livestock panel were attached with fencing staples, a piece of shiplap siding provided a handy groove to cover the sharp ends of the top of the wire and provide some height.  Strips of shiplap edges covered the other wire edges at bottom and sides.  Here's a closer shot:

Notice the peek gap in the stall partitions?  It's so that animals can peek in and out to see what's going on.  When the dogs are in the center aisle instead of with the goats they'll want to keep an eye on stuff and the goats certainly like to look out to see what's happening.

Outside the main herd stall is a 16X16' run-in shed area.  It's got openings to the north and west.  Since the wind whips across this field from the north we'll have a sliding barn door to keep the chill out during the cold months.  During summer the breezes will help keep everyone cool.  The floor of this run-in area is sand and gravel.  We'll build some platforms for here and in the stalls.  Goats love to jump  up on stuff and they especially like to have somewhere to jump up onto when the guardian dogs are feeling frisky and playful.  The windows haven't been put in yet. Still waiting on that except for the buck stall which is already occupied by a full grow buck, a full grown wether and 2 young wethers.
Here's the run-in area.

This run-in area is across a center aisle from the sheep run-in area which is designed and built the same way.  With long spans of 16' for the walls we had to figure out a system to stabilize the walls.  We framed them up and then hammered a 5' piece of conduit pipe and attached the wall to it like this:

We used cedar boards as apron boards along the bottom to keep drafts out.  The cedar is resistant to rot of course and can be replaced easily if needed.  The sill of the wall is more than 6" off the ground.