Spring Happenings

Did you think I fell off the face of the earth?

I know I haven't blogged in a really long time. I have this thing about writing blog posts with someone in the room. When people are looking over my shoulder, asking about what I am writing and the pictures I am using it throws me off, and then I can't remember what I was going to write rrrrrrr! But that's only part of my excuse. Do I really need to make excuses though? Its my blog and I can write as often as I like *Smile*.

I have been playing catch up on lots of projects, and things that just flat out need to get done. 

I have been fencing in our backyard around the rabbit area. I have been wanting to do this for a long time, but had to wait till the tree got partially trimmed or it would crush my fence when the branches were cut. So that got done. The goats and sheep loved the mulberry branches. After the fence is up I am going to turn my guinea pigs loose in that area. They will be able to eat all the food that the rabbits in raised cages throw out of their food bowls and all the hay that they waste. So they will act as my little cleaners. I am also growing grass for them, but its hard to grow grass when you have to constantly walk on it. The fence is also for prevention in the case a stay dog comes into the yard. I have seen too many pictures of peoples rabbits that  got their toes chewed off from under the cage (and much worse) by their neighbors wandering dogs.

Butchering rabbits. Call me weird, crazy, bunny killer. I don't care. It turns out that after a few rounds in butchering rabbits now, and getting past the not so good feeling of having to take an animals life, that I actually enjoy processing rabbits. No its not fun taking an animals life, but that's part of life, and to live life must be taken (all you vegans, don't even bother commenting). Butchering is time consuming, and work, but I enjoy doing it. Its rather interesting to be able to thoroughly inspect every part of your food as its processed. You get to see the liver, gallbladder, kidneys, heart, etc. and make sure that there is nothing wrong with it. 

I had to clean out all the rabbit pens when our major rains came to an end. All the shavings, and wasted hay was beginning to break down with their poo. I shoveled it all out and dumped load after load in one of my raised beds to fill it up. I should say that this is after I took half of my raised bed frames and set them on top of the other frames to make them twice as high and half as many. So now my garden is less to maintain. It was getting to be to much to water and weed. I decided over the winter that it was something that I needed to cut back on. I only have so much time and energy, and I had to decide on what things are most important. I had a extra pack of pepper plants that I didn't have room to plant in the main garden, so decided to plant them in the raised bed in the garden that I filled from the rabbit pens. The hay and shavings hadn't had the chance to break down all the way, so I wasn't sure if the plants would do well. It has been a few weeks and those plants are now twice the size of the pepper plants in the main garden and much greener.

A couple months back our neighbor had a black rabbit show up in his yard and he caught it and penned it up. Then about a week later my mom woke me up at 2 AM saying that one of my rabbits got loose and was running around the yard. Oh goody! I pulled on a jacket and shoes and we headed out to catch this rabbit she said was white. Then we found a fawn colored doe. It wasn't mine. I put it in a cage and we looked all over to find the white rabbit and never did find it, but none of my rabbits were loose. This was a nice little surprise to have this rabbit show up, because I had been thinking about buying a normal furred doe for breeding, so I could see what its like to process normal furred rabbits, because I only have Rex and they are harder to skin than normally furred rabbits. A couple weeks later the fawn doe pulled hair and made a nest. She wasn't pregnant, but she wanted to be a mom. So after a trip to visit my Rex buck, she has kindled 5 nice big healthy kits.

Almost all our goats and sheep have kidded / lambed for the season. At least I hope! Hyacinth is due any day and I'm still waiting on one of our standard size sheep. A couple months back my mom took me to my doctors appointment. Its out of town, so its kinda kills our whole day, but we enjoy the trip, as my doctor lives in a really beautiful mountainous area. When we got home that evening I went out to feed the sheep and goats before eating dinner, and Puddin was in labor. She was pushing and pushing, but there was no sign of any lamb. With all the goats we have had kid, we've had VERY FEW that needed assistance and that is usually just pulling a large kid that was presented normally.  I tried feeling around for hooves or a head and couldn't make out what I was feeling. My mom tried and had the same problem. It was dark out and it felt like I was working on a ship in a bottle while blindfolded. Whatever direction it was in, it wasn't making it into the birth canal in that position. My mom went inside and called a friend that used to raise sheep, while I tried more. I couldn't tell if I was feeling a ear or what. Our friend said to feel for a tail. That was it, a short Shetland tail. Trying to turn it seemed impossible, her contractions were fighting against everything I was trying to do. Finally I managed to find a hock and followed it WAY up inside her uterus and grabbed its hoof and then found the other and as carefully as possible pulled them around. Then I pulled the big ram lamb out backwards. He was a big guy, its a no wonder it was so hard to maneuver him around in there. We expected that by this time he was dead. At some point in the maneuvering I felt his leg move, but thought it was just me. No he was alive! I couldn't believe it. I swung him around to get the fluid out of him. and we dried and stimulated him with towels. Puddin practically needed some stimulation herself at this time, she was spent. It took her several minutes to regain herself and then she started to lick her baby. I put him on to nurse for a while and then we got Puddin up. She was shaky, but OK and then she was STARVING. After getting that giant baby out of her she wanted FOOD. We have had goats do this after having big babies. They suddenly have room to eat! I was so glad Puddin had a live baby, since she lost her baby last year thank to our goat Jetta. She loves her son and keeps him at her side at all times. Such a cute mama.

Back I think the end of January I got the idea to plant some seeds out in our main garden and put 2 liter soda bottles over them as mini hot houses. This wasn't completely my idea as Herrick Kimball of The Deliberate Agrarian had done a post on how he plants tomato seeds and puts Wall-O-Water's around them. But those things are expensive! We have one main slicing tomato that we all love and that's Ananas Noire. You cannot plant the garden without planting Ananas. Well my little experiment worked. The tomatoes and squash germinated. I think my onion seeds were too old, and come to think of it the pepper seeds I used didn't germinate for me last year, so they must not be any good.

At the time that we would usually be planting our garden we had tomato plants blooming. There are now some little fruit on the plants.

If I remember right, my goat Dandelion was the first to kid of the season, and had a sweet little white buckling. At three days old something ate him out in the back of our pasture. I had taken the alpaca out of our pasture when she kidded, so that he wouldn't bother her. Unfortunately that was a mistake. Lesson learned.

My other goat Daffodil had a beautiful set of twins.

Doeling

Buckling

I have been supplementing her morning and even. After a while Daffodil didn't like her nursing on her (she's rough on her moms udder), so she wasn't getting enough to eat. Now when she see's me she comes pouncing up to me. Its so cute!

Do you remember Dolly? Our sweet little bottle baby from last year that was born with contracted tendons. Here she is with her darling son. She delivered him all by herself, and he has nice strong legs. Most people would have culled her for fear that she would pass it on to her children, but it wasn't genetic it was a lack of room in the womb. She's turning out to be a good mom and her son is oh so sweet.

Here are some of the lambs playing. The one in the front is Puddin's ram lamb, behind him is Maizee's ewe lamb, and in the background is Mugsy our lamb from last year with her own ewe lamb.

And our standard cross with Shetland lambs peeking out from behind the tree.

I have another blog post in the works, but its going to take me a while to get it all together.

Kimberly

Sweet Shetland Sheep Times Three

A lot has happened since the last time I posted. 

My sweet Myrtle died. She got bottle jaw, and we tried everything, but she died anyways. Unfortunately that's part of raising animals, and it always seems to be my favorite ones.

Welcoming my Brother and Sister-in-law's new Son Ashton to the family. Notice the onesie. My Brother is a mechanic, so their getting him started early.

I crocheted this hat for my Sister-in-laws baby shower. It's made out of Satin Angora from the rabbits I used to raise years ago. The problem with crocheting a hat for a baby that's not here yet is you don't know how big of head its going to have. So I went by the measurements I found for a newborn hat, but when he was born, it was to small. He was 7 lbs. 13 oz. I guess our family makes big babies. So now I'm going to redo it, hoping I have enough yarn left.

Sophia taking a nap on me while visiting. She's such a little doll. I love having babies around.

If you saw my last post from the National Heirloom Expo, I posted pictures of the sweet Shetland Sheep they had there on display. Well.... My Mom got a trio of them.

 The goats were afraid of the newcomers at first. It was kinda funny. Eddie (the ram) was just trying to check them out, but they acted like we had just turned a monster loose in the pasture.

I cut down all those thistles the next day, but I still have a lot scattered through the pasture calling my name.

We sold Maestro (the bottle ram we raised) a couple days later. He had rammed me once. (Hey he put my back back in place for me!) That was to be expected being a bottle ram, and I was willing to deal with having a bottle ram, but since he had already done his job this year, and we got the new Shetland ram, we just didn't need him. Before we made the decision, I looked into crossing the Suffolk ewes with a Shetland ram, and it seems to be a very desirable cross. Since Shetlands are small it greatly reduces the lambing problems, and Shetland meat is supposedly much better than the commercial breeds of  lamb meat. I'm curious to see if the lambs will come out with short or long tails, since Shetlands are naturally short tailed, but I will have to wait till Spring 2016 to find out.

Sir Locksley died a few days ago. Lucky for me, his wife is pregnant. So hopefully their will be a boar in the litter. They are a really hard breed to find.

 I found this yarn I spun many years ago from Kool-Aid dyed mohair from the Angora goats I raised. So I crocheted a hat out of it, but haven't taken a picture of it yet.

 On one of my recent visits to my favorite doctor, we arrived early. So my Mom and I checked out the local thrift store. I found this book for $2 that I have been wanting for a long time.

 And these boutique cotton yarns for $1 each.

 And a totally hippy skirt. I love it!

Kimberly

Tiny Critters

My Moms button quail hatched out these cute little chicks. They are the size of a bumble bee when they pop out of their shell. The quail weren't taking care of them when they hatched, so my Mom put all the eggs in the incubator. Every time she opened it, they were like popcorn bouncing around.

The camera must add 10 grams to a chick, as they sure look a lot bigger in the picture in my hand, than in person. The picture of the chicks next to the wide mouth jar lid full of food is a better size comparison.

My Peruvian guinea pig popped out two adorable little boys. When I went out to feed in the evening she already had them all cleaned up and dry. She's quite the happy little Mamma.

Since our garden hasn't been doing well, I haven't taken very many pictures. So I thought I'd show you all some some strange things around our place.

This bug was dragging a big fat spider down into a hole it dug in our backyard. It drug that spider a long ways to that little hole, and kept running back, and digging more dirt out of the hole. 

It didn't look like it would fit.

But it eventually made it fit. Food for its young I guess.

Now these things used to entertain my Brother and I as kids. Heck, they still entertain us. If you've never seen them before they are called Doodlebugs or Antlions. Just catch an ant, toss it in the sandy hole, and watch the little claws pop up out of the sand, grab the ant, and drag it under. Here is a link that has a video, down towards the bottom of the page, of them catching and eating ants.

Kimberly

A GREAT Aunt At The Ripe Old Age Of 29

Call me prejudice, but I think I have the cutest Great Niece ever. Sophia is 6 days old in this picture. She is a BIG baby at 8 lb. 12 oz.!

I just realized how few pictures I have taken this summer. Our garden is broken this year. All the starts I grew my Mom planted out in the main garden, and the quail and ground squirrels ate them off. So we replanted, but nothing has done well, and the weeds took over. I think my Mom has now given up on it. I'm thinking we need to let it rest next year with a cover crop, and then turn it into a permanent garden with weed block.

What do you do when your gardens broken? Go to a produce stand and load up the car. Well that's what we did anyways.

I have one raised bed in my little garden that I planted some Annas Noire tomatoes and Armenian cucumbers, and they are pretty much the only thing that's doing well. Even the wheat grass I planted for the guinea pigs won't grow. Maybe its the wrong time of year for wheat grass.

 This pretty butterfly has been visiting our front yard for a couple weeks. Not sure what it is, but it's not a Monarch. It continually flits around from flower to flower, and back again. Its a pretty sight to have out our window everyday.

Can you spot it in the bottom left corner.

Kimberly

Raising Animals Isn't Always Rosy

***An update on my pictures of polled vs. horned in my last post. Both doelings are over 1 month old have not developed horns. So swirl or no swirl obviously doesn't matter. ***

We still have several does to kid. I waited as long as possible to put them with Kanga, since they are on the small side, and it will be their first kid. Last weekend Morning Glory went into labor, and her kid was stuck in a position with its head turned back. My Mom and I took turns trying to get the kid rearranged, but could not get the head turned around. We were left with only one option. Pull the kid out, and hope for the best. The kid was lost, but Morning Glory was OK. Goats are amazingly tough animals. We felt so bad for her. So has such strong mothering instincts, just like her Mother Jubilee. We left the kid with her, hoping she would realize it was dead. But she still cried for it when we took it away, and she is left with an udder full of milk. I wished we had a abandoned kid to give to her. She seems to be a little happier the past couple days.

I didn't have any good recent pictures of Morning Glory. 

Here is one of her when she was born.

 And one from last winter.

I'm so grateful we still have her.

My Mom's Diamond Doves had these cute little babies.

I took the picture a few days ago. Unfortunately they threw one of the babies out yesterday, and smashed the other during the night. They were doing so well. I found some larger nests my Mom had stored away. Maybe they will do better next time around with a more roomier nest.

Last Wednesday I walked out to the pasture in the middle of the day, and right when I reached the gate I heard a crash. There had been a huge hawk nest in the eucalyptus trees, and the clumsy baby hawk had flown back to the nest and knocked it down. The nest went crashing down through the tree branches. I hurried out to take a look. It turned out it knocked down another bird nest on the way down. I found two baby sparrows hiding in the grass. 

I brought them up, made them a nest out of a coffee can, and fed them. We used to raise many types of exotic birds, so hand feeding is nothing new to me. They were already feathered out, and yesterday they learned to fly from perch to perch, so hopefully they will learn to eat on there own soon.

My little guinea pig mops on the lawn.

While I had the guinea pigs out, this little praying mantis fell on the lawn.

 A pretty sunset.

Dandelion had this darling little boy this morning all by herself! What a nice surprise to discover this morning. 

Tired Mama.

Kimberly

Happenings and Lots of Baby Animals

Well it seems I sure haven't been doing well with keeping up with my blog. I think about things all the time to post, but never get around to actually posting them.

I have finally been able to see a Endocrinologist over the past several months. My doctor was trying to get me in to see one since last Fall. I have had so many weird health issues, that she said it was basically beyond her knowledge, and required a specialist. So after waiting, and waiting I have been sent to the most wonderful doctor. A Christian doctor that really spends a LOT of time with me. In fact I couldn't believe it when my Mom and I left his office the last time, and looked at the clock. We had been their about 2 hours, and he spent that whole time with us. (Yes, I drag my Mom in with me. That way she remembers all the things I forget to say or ask, and I don't have to repeat everything to her afterwards.) He is tweaking my thyroid dosage to get it just right. Not just within the normal range, but perfectly in the center of the normal range. I am very sensitive to the most minute change in dosage. He does a few tests to see how fast my muscles relax (which are relaxing to fast), and that also tells how off my thyroid is, but they are getting a little better. I can feel this difference, like I might actually be able to gain muscle strength with some more improvement. I am soooooo happy to have been sent to this doctor. Can you tell I am happy ; )

I have been on a gluten free diet for quite a while now, but have discovered more food issues. So now I am on a gluten free, dairy free, and peanut free diet. That leaves a VERY limited diet, but I don't feel dizzy every day from my right ear being clogged. The inside of my lips aren't swollen, and my stomach isn't hurting on a daily basis. And the strangest thing of all went away. I am only going to mention this for the hopes of that someone else out there that has this problem will find the answer. Because it is very embarrassing. My sweat smelled like cat urine. If something made me nervous or scared me, it would make it worse. I was always insecure when out in public about this, that if I started sweating that someone would notice. Although I don't think anyone did, because I was very careful and used antiperspirants. Upon removing DAIRY from my diet it is GONE! I told my doctor about this, and he said he had never heard of it before, and seemed to find it very interesting. All I know is that I tried google searching it, I could find people with this problem, but no one had an answer. So I hope that people will find the answer now, because otherwise that was just a very embarrassing thing to write about for nothing!

That is enough about my health, here are some pictures of what I have been up to, and some new babies on the farm.

 I slowly but surely built this four level cage, over about a two month period, for the guinea pigs. So they will have plenty of room. It was a clothing rack for hanging clothes in, that a store was throwing out.

 Linoleum floors to keep them from spoiling the wood, and for easier cleaning.

  

I went cheap, and made all the latches with scrap wood, and nuts and bolts I robbed from my Dads shop.

I just finished this one today. I made it last year to hold these 2'x3' cement mixing pans that work great for GP's, but they needed to be contained, so they couldn't jump out. I added wire mesh all around and doors. It's finally complete, yay. But unoccupied for now.

Vicky stepped on a bee. I put plantain on her foot with a band aid for a while. She hopped around on three legs all day, till the swelling went down.

 Tulip had this cute little girl that looks just like her daddy Kanga. She had her in the evening, and the next day when I went out to check on everybody, Tulip had something hanging off of her. I looked closer to discover it was a little mummified baby goat! I guess something went wrong and her body mummified it to protect the remaining twin. I looked it up and its kinda rare. She was perfectly fine, and never had any problems.

Daffodil had this flashy big boy. He is polled meaning naturally hornless which he got from his Daddy Kanga. Although he was presented normally at birth, we did have to assist in pulling as he was a big guy, and Daffodils first kid. My bothers 8y.o. son was over visiting and got to watch the whole experience. Afterwards he thought he was going to throw up. Boys! It was good for him to witness birth, even if it did churn his stomach.

After his bellyache wore off, my nephew helped me take these pictures. I was trying to show the gelatin coating on the bottoms of the hooves, that starts shedding off right after birth. It protects the mothers insides.

Jetta had twin girls! Who also look like their Daddy. You guessed it, Kanga.

 One doeling has swirls.

And the other doesn't. This is supposed to tell if they are polled or not. The swirls are supposed to have horns. We will have to wait and see if this is true.

 Sir Locksley and Lady Miriam (both Texels) a couple days before she had her babies.

 Proud Mama with her two little sons.

Running back to Mama.

Kimberly