Sunday, April 29, 2007

And then there were three.....


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Last evening, Tulip gave us another heifer calf, Jen. She has a lot of white on her and is easily recognizable. It all happened while we were working around here, and I could have been there and seen the whole thing. But......another chance to see a
calf born slipped by me. I know it will happen sooner or later, but I
wish for sooner.

We have three out of a possible eleven now. Two girls and a boy. We want to be heavy on the girl side this year to enlarge our herd. Right now we have fourteen females. Three of them are too young for calving this year. Two did not produce last year and are getting a last chance this year. Time will tell.

Other news. I still haven't learned to never say "never". We are getting thirty
guinea hen keets around the end of May. They are supposed to be real good at
eating bugs. That will help with our organic gardening. (We are going
to have a garden this year. Yeah!!!) Ticks are included in the bug
thing, and we sure do have a multitude of ticks. With all the deer tick
and Lyme's disease stuff, the hens will have a big job to do. The other
thing that they do is sound an alarm whenever they think something is
wrong or different. I guess they are quite loud about it. "Well",.....she
said, as she ate her words......"I guess we will be having something around
here with feathers besides pillows." I hope it is a successful project. We will have to outfit housing for them and raise the keets from small things. Who knows how all of this will go. I will update you when it all happens.

Monday, April 23, 2007

And then again..........



Then last Saturday Pepper gave us this little guy. Meet Jimmy Palmer. Our calves this year will be named after fictional characters from television shows that we watch. I chose this name because Palmer is a small time player on NCIS and who knows if he will be there next year. Unfortunately, Palmer, the calf, comes from the cow that threw the calf that was ill and died last year. We gave Pepper another chance. We will be watching carefully to see if she just keeps throwing calves with some defect or whether this one will be healthy. Her calf last year was fine for a while but then slowly went downhill even though the vet tried everything he could think of to bring Schroeder back to health. We will keep our fingers crossed.


We are at fifty-fifty. One heifer, and one bull. Hope for heifers!!!! Other births are imminent, judging by the way the cows move around. I feel for them and remember the days. There is also one sheep that is "heavy with child".

And then......



A week ago today, Poppy gave us this little heifer calf, Abby. She is quite small, but active and thriving. It is the beginning of the calving season. More should follow since many of the cows are shaped liked eggs in the middle.

One month later.....



Here is the first addition. His name is Skooter. He is a rough tri collie dog. He is wonderful. So far he is easy to train and plays well with others. That is more than you can say for me. He is growing and has been here for over a month. He was born on January first so is almost four months old. He likes going for walks which is good for both of us. Suni thinks he is a pest, but he loves his old Suni and often lays down and sleeps sunggled up with her. He is learning to interact with Junior Minty Fresh, who was real testy at first. Unfortunately Pansy doesn't know enough to get away from him, and he tends to maul her. We have to work on that and getting brushed since he usually comes in from outside with burrs somewhere on his body.