Surprise Lamb, Bull! Wooly Lawnmowers

Today started out rather interesting. We had planned to make a trip to Grand Junction to do the in between batches fo lambs shopping but had to change our plans.

First we had a surprise late lamb. 9 pounds 9 ounces and doing fine. Mom had him up dry and nursed when we found them. I didn't take any pictures because the next bit of excitement was this bull.


He had smashed down the wire fence in the back corner. We got him back out the gate and with the cows and called the owner to tell him about the problem. This is the same owner whose cattle break into the hay field every single year. We explained that he'd be getting a bill for the fence repair and replacement wire as soon as we got it done. Colorado is an open range state but if you have a legal fence in place and an animal breaks it down you can get it repaired by the livestock owner.

Since the shopping trip was kaput we decided to do the Friday scheduled work today instead. Main task was getting the lawnmowers working around the main house lawn.



We have to use jug panels to keep them off the porch or we'd have sheep into the house if they could manage it.

Moving Fence Panels

Larry's back to build another section of fence. First task was to remove the welded wire panels that made up the temporary fencing.


He used the brush rake to move the panels.


We built a large stack over by the guest house in front of the shop.

Lambs, Rambo & a new fence

Ewes and lambs are doing well. All of the lambs are of very good quality but we still have a bunch of ewes that we hope will lamb.



The lambs are learning about the electric fences. But some just look especially cute as they rest.


This is Rambo


He is now on mom number 4, Ken, who is the only one able to get him to drink. We don't have very many bottle lambs here, he is our 10th in 12 years, so we are not skilled at raising them. Rambo was upside down and backwards and by the time I got him out he wasn't breathing. Ken got him going and when he stopped breathing several times Ken got him going again. So now Ken has a small wooly child. Rambo is doing well now.


We are getting another internal divider fence built and this is where it will go. We had to move the gated pipe to give Larry room to build the fence. It should be done by the end of July.

Building Fences

We decided to build a welded wire fence around the front pear orchard field portion that we hayed last year. That will give us 2 grazing paddocks in that area. We would normally use electric netting but these need to be safe for the rams and they tend to get caught by the horns in the netting.



Here Ken is using the tractor to move a pile of the panels down to the edge where we will start building the fence.

New Fence Done & Wide Loads

The new middle divider fence is now finished. It looks wonderful and will be a much better fence than our temporary welded wire one.





The sheep, on the other hand, are really looking like wide loads. I hope they lamb soon, they are really getting big.

Solar Sheep & More Fences

One of our pregnant ewes catching a few rays.


The evil sheep eye.


Caren and I. She wanted a scratch but was a bit concerned when I held out my arm with the camera and it made such a funny clicking noise.


Larry is back to build a replacement for the "temporary" divider fence that has been in place for almost 9 years now. We've got 2 sections of fence we want to put in this year. Both are internal and will be small low wire.

Sheep Nests & New Fence

Our sheep dig nests in the bedding pack and sleep there. No lamb eggs for Easter though.
Here is one of our ewes in her nest.


We got the last bit of the west divider fence done today. Still have to fix the top section that goes over the gated pipes but we're nearly ready to put ewes out on pasture.

Gates Up!

Larry got all the gates for the last section of elk fence save one up this week. We'll have to either add more dirt under them or an additional piece of wire. They are down on the ground as close as they can get but the ground slopes enough to make sheep size holes on the bottom in some places. They sure look nice though. The last gate will be added this summer. We need to have a brace pole put in the sheep pen to hang it from and we can't get in there to dig the posthole until we move the sheep out onto pasture. So Larry will be back to do that in the early spring.

Fence Wire

The weather is warmer, much of the snow has melted so Larry and Andrew got 2 sections of the fence wire up.


It's not tied off on the posts yet but it's in place and looks wonderful.

New Year Start

Larry came out on New Years Day to deliver the gates for the elk fence. We are storing them out front so they are easy to get at when the snow melts enough to put them on.


Then we had to dig out the wire and get it moved over to the new fenceline. Larry wants to take his tractor home so we moved the wire first.


End of the day, lovely sunset.

More Fencing

To get the back cedars section ready for Larry we had to take down the old fence that was there.

THis is where the new fence will go. Ken moved a bunch of rocks out and smoothes the ground.


Another view of the new fence.


Sighting down the new fence line.

New Divider Fence

With the front west orchard pasture now reseeded back to permanent pasture we needed to install a more permanent divider fence.

This fence is far enough away from the trees that we can get the tractor and marker down beside them but still not too far into the pasture.

With a good solid welded wire fence we can save this pasture for hay, or graze it with rams or just stockpile it for later grazing by the ewes and lambs.

Good fencing will give us more options in how we use this new pasture.

Larry's Back!

Larry's back to do the next section of big elk fence. This will be the last tall fence we put in. It will go from the hay barn around behind the house and will also enclose a small section of the cedars pasture.

We had to start taking down parts of the old fence. Here Ken's getting all the wire off the old corner brace.

Pulling posts.

Cool Tool!

Every year we tear down the welded wire pens so the manure can be scraped out. Then we have to rebuild them. This usually means several days or weeks of pounding in t-posts by hand. Blisters and sore muscles are only some of the hazards of this task. This is getting very old so we went looking for some alternatives. Big hydraulic post pounders that mount on the tractor are one option but then you have to maneuver a tractor to each post location and with our rocks that could become as difficult as putting them in by hand. Then we found this tool. It's an air powered post pounder. We bought one and it appears to be working fairly well. It's still hard work to put up the fencing but we got the entire pen for the adult rams built in one morning and the ram lambs pen built in another morning.

Sheep Shots

31 July we gave all the lambs their first vaccinations and also did a deworming. Nose bots are a real problem this year so we have had to watch carefully and deworm more frequently. Here the sheep are going back up to their grazing segment. We use electronet just as a guide rather than a herding dog to move our sheep from place to place.

New Sign & Fence

Yesterday Larry and Ken got the new sign holder welded onto the corner of the fence and the sign up and installed. We still have to paint the holder but it looks great!


Larry and his crew also finished installing the short section of fence below our open field on the west side. It also looks great and will keep the sheep safe.

Lawnmowers

We got the ewe yearlings out to graze the little bits of grass coming up around the guest house. Why get out a lawnmower when you have sheep! But the grass must be too young still, it doesn't taste good yet and they didn't like it. They did have a wonderful time racing all over and checking out the shop porch but we need some more sun for the grass to get sweet enough that it's fit food for sheep.

Of course with real grazing going to happen soon it was time to get out all the electric nets that had been stored for the winter in the barn and make sure they were all ok. We really should check them before we put them in storage but somehow we never manage to get it done. So the first task of the grazing year is to check all the nets and repair any broken wires. We already checked the fence chargers and batteries and they are ok. So here we are stretching out each net and inspecting it. Ken repairs any broken bits with hot melt glue and wire as needed. We got all the stored nets checked and repaired. The only ones we did not check are the ones being used to keep the dogs in. We'll check those and repair them when we move the dogs around for grazing guard duty.

Shop and Sign Progress

The new sign hanger is done. We still have to paint it black but it is finished. We're going to have it welded onto the big elk fence at the corner. It will be visible from both sides of the road there.
In the shop news the garage door got installed and painting is starting inside. Next week the linoleum upstairs will get installed and the base boards painted and installed. Shelving will be the next major project to finish.