Category: Sheep
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Rams Out
The three rams we used for clean-up breeders were behaving very well, and we had increased their pen size. Today, we put them back in with the ram lambs. The older boys are big enough that none of the little ones will challenge them. They’ve settled who is boss. It reduces the electricity cost this Continue reading
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January Thaw
We always get a thaw in January. The days turn warm, the snow melts, and we have a mini mud season. I know it won’t last – it’s just a taste of the spring to come. We’ll probably need to add gravel to the driveways this spring. It’s amazing how gravel disappears so fast! The Continue reading
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Sheep Postmortem
We lost a ram lamb today. He’d been looking off for over a week. We’d separated him to a small pen to keep an eye on him. He wouldn’t eat or drink, but he’d eat fresh snow. We gave him Nutridrench, propylene glycol, and warm malt liquid. I couldn’t figure out what was wrong. He Continue reading
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Christmas Blizzard
We’re under a blizzard warning now. Ken plowed the driveway yesterday, but it snowed again. Here’s one of the ewes covered in snow. The sheep are doing just fine. They enjoy eating the fresh snow. They’re eating a lot more hay than normal, but it’s been cold and we have plenty, so I’m not too Continue reading
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Clean Your Ears
We got almost a foot of additional snow last night. Here’s a picture of Winnie cleaning one of the ram’s ears – he seemed to enjoy it. Continue reading
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A Lot More Snow
We got a lot more snow today. The sheep all love it – after all, it’s fun to eat snow cones! Continue reading
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Flat Stanley Has a Busy Day
Today was quite a busy day here at the farm. Things didn’t really get started until the afternoon, but we had a lot to do. Our first problem was the septic tank. We’ve had some sewer gas backing up into the house when we do laundry. The plumber came yesterday, and we found a trap Continue reading
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Sheep AI, Day Three
Day three proved to be hectic. We had poor post-thaw motility on the frozen semen for some reason, so we had to rearrange and collect the rams again and use fresh, cooled semen. With 56 ewes to inseminate and 15 rams to collect, it was impossible to get any pictures of the proceedings. Our cell Continue reading
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Sheep AI, Day One
We volunteered to be a test flock for a new sheep AI procedure. The plan for day 1 was to give the ewes their shots to bring them into heat. I didn’t get any pictures of the procedure, as we were working fast to get them all done. For the actual inseminations, we’ll be putting Continue reading
