It is that time again

So it is that time of year when we start getting all of you involved with what is going on here on the farm.  It starts with breeding season and moves to birthing season.  If you have followed us for any time at all you know that all of you are the ones that get to name the babies born here on the farm each year.

With that said you should know that it is now breeding season.  The Milk Goats are already making friends with Matt.  He is our new Billy we got from Dana AKA Bitty Boo.  We actually got him last year but it was after Breeding season and our girls weren’t in heat anymore.  So this year we are sure he will do fine.  This year we are also adding Leighton to our milk goat herd.  If she produces well and takes care of her babies we plan on starting to rotate who gets milked for us and who just raises babies each year.

So right now  I am planning out who will be bred to whom.  Then on the First of October we will be penning everyone with their buddies and Breeding season will be in full swing.  We will be running three pens.  The Merino/meat sheep, The Shetland and the Fiber Pen.

This is what I am thinking so far.  This year it is Rammie’s year to be the merino and meat sheep Ram.  Then of course Burl will be with My Shetland Flock.  That leaves Ralphie to once again take on the QT Cross Fiber sheep.  There will be a few exceptions though.  Snow is Burl’s Daughter so she will run with Ralphie.  And the three babies Mom kept this year are Ralphie’s Daughters so they will be run with Burl.

That is the plan anyway.  I will let you know if anything changes.  I also have a new plan for the naming convention.  Each year we normally have people call out what they would like us to use and then we have a poll and everyone votes for their favorites.  Well, each year less and less are people actually voting and that makes it hard to get a convention with a lot of naming options.  And more times then not we run out of names before we are done birthing everything.

With all that in mind Mom came up with a really good idea.  This year you get to vote yes or no on it and if everyone agrees we will have so many options and so many ways to take part in this years lambing it isn’t funny.  So what is this great plan welllllllll ….. Here it goes.

For the 2019 Birthing season we want to honor Everyday Heros.  That means in order to name the babies you would have to tell us a story about your everyday hero.  Then if you are interested for a fee we will send a letter and certificate to your everyday hero letting them know that we named a baby here on the farm after them.

For example:  I want to name one of the babies after Mom.  I would call that name out on social media and tell a short story Why she is my hero.  Then if my name is used I will be asked if I want the letter and certificates sent to that person letting them know.  If I do I will be given an email address to paypal the funds to cover that cost of it and I will email the name and address in which to send it.  Then if someone else has another Christy to nominate we use either a number or a letter after it so the Farm can tell them apart.  There could be a Christy 1, Christy 2, Christy S, Christy O … ECT.  When they go to their new homes they will then just be known by the name Christy.    And we have a ton of names to use for birthing season.

So what do you think??  Would all of you be willing to help us celebrate Everyday Heros in 2019?  Or would you rather continue to do the voting on other conventions to use each year?  Please let us know what you think

He said a very bad word

So I guess it is time to come clean about why we have been so quiet about what is going on with the puppies of the farm.  If you follow us on Facebook you know that just over a week ago Carl got very sick.  Then within days Wilbur did the same thing.  We thought it was something they ate … Boy were we wrong.

So Carl was just fine when I was playing with him about 3 pm one days last week.  By the time I put the Puppies in the house and Mom got home less then two hours later Carl was throwing up and couldn’t stand up very well.  Things got worse pretty quickly.  He got a fever that came on really quick that lead to him shaking from being feverish.  His muscles started to tremble and he couldn’t control any part of his body.  After some talking we had come to the conclusion that Carl had probably ingested some of the mushrooms that had been popping up around the farm over the last few weeks.

Carl then started to act like his belly hurt so he was treated for pain with a shot of medication we had on hand. If it didn’t work we could get something different in the morning from Doc’s office.  We gave him the shot and then we also gave him some saline solution under the skin to help him stay hydrated.  Mom put out a call for Prayers on Facebook and after that we put him in a kennel on a pillow right by me as I was sleeping on the couch.

I slept all night with my hand in the Kennel on Carl.  He stayed calm and slept really well.  Mom got up and checked on him several times in the night.  By the time that Mom got up to start her day Carl was ready to start his as well.  He stood up and walked right out of the kennel over to Mom.  He was wobblie but he was fine.  We kept a close eye on him for the next day or so and he stopped wobbling and was back to his old self in about 48 hours.

The next day Wilbur showed signs of the same thing.  He never threw up like Carl did but he was much more wobblie.  We thought it would pass as it had with Carl but Mom put out a call for Prayer on Facebook anyway.  Wilbur didn’t seem to be in pain.  So we kept him hydrated and in a kennel in the living room just as we had for Carl.  However, things didn’t go as they had with him.

Wilbur got worse.  He wobbled more and more and then couldn’t stand.  By The third Night He couldn’t do anything but lay on his belly and his head would bob around.  That is when we decided that we would treat Wilbur as we had Carl.  Another call for Prayer was put out and we waited to see if Wilbur was strong enough to pull through it as Carl had.

Wilbur got a shot just as Carl did and then we did the saline solution under the skin.  By the next morning Wilbur was improving but not as well as Carl had.  First thing Monday Mom sent Me with Wilbur over to Doc’s while she went to work.   She said that she didn’t think we were right on the first diagnosis and she wanted Doc to figure it out.  After an exam and a test or two it was confirmed.

Wilbur hadn’t eaten anything … In fact neither had Carl.  They both had DISTEMPER!  For which there is no cure.  In fact many puppies don’t live through having it.  Somehow we had missed it because not only were they full of worms when we got them but they also Never had the tell tale Cough or any of the other standard symptoms.  There was no reddened eyes or watery discharge from the nose and eyes. Neither dog became lethargic or tired or anorexic. There was nothing that would have led us to believe that we were dealing with a deadly disease in anyway.  Until a Fecal test confirmed it.

So I took Wilbur home with orders to just treat symptoms and give him the medication that we gave Carl each day for the next week.  Doc Said that other then that it was anyone guess.  However, he said that since Carl had gotten through it he saw no reason that Wilbur wouldn’t pull though as well.  I gave Mom the bad news over the phone while she was at work.  Then put out yet another post asking for Prayers but not accepting any Negative thoughts or speaking any Negative words about what was going on.

Over the next 5 days Wilbur started to come back.  He only made little steps in the right direction but we took each victory we got and praise God for them all.  Everything from feeding him to making sure he got enough water to keep hydrated became a chore.  We learned to add water to his feed so that he got both with one task.  We learned to help him stand and balance for short periods of time and we learned we loved the little fart more then we knew.  Now 7 days after this started Wilbur is just a little wobblie but he can get up and down on his own, he can walk and run and play.  He still falls down a lot and isn’t very coordinated but he is doing so much better and we know he is going to be just fine, Praise the Lord!

Farm life is rough

Sometimes life on the farm isn’t so pretty.  Sadly, when life gets ugly it isn’t just one thing.  Nine times out of Ten the ugly snowballs from an ugly day to an ugly week pretty quick.  This last week or so has been one of those Ugly seasons here on the farm.  Like they always say “when it rains it pours”  Well, we aren’t in drought conditions anymore.

So as many of you already know a week or so back we lost Baby Girl.  We worked the sheep like normal and we are just guessing but we figure that our wormer wasn’t working anymore so when we switched to a different one this time and wormed, the release from the worms made her get to much toxin from the worms dying.  If that makes any sense.

Then we had the whole Carl eating the mushroom issue the first part of this week.  For those that don’t know.  Carl is one of the puppies and he had a regular day but Mom came home from work to find him very sick.  He was throwing up, feverish and didn’t have any motor skills.  It happened fast.

I had him out playing until about 3:30pm that day and by the time Mom got home about a quarter to 5 he was throwing up and lost control of himself.  We called Doc and he thought that Carl had to have ingested something toxic.  When we searched out where they were playing we found that there were mushrooms that were popping up everywhere.  We have some white ones and some that are red and others that are orange.  We never thought anything would eat them but Doc thought that it wasn’t impossible.

Without knowing what Carl had gotten into we had to treat the symptoms.  He was given pain meds and he was kept hydrated with saline solution under the skin.  He was also treated for his upset tummy.  After that all we could do was wait to see if he would pull through.  He was put in a crate on pillows and made as comfortable as possible and I slept right beside him with my hand on him at all times.  Mom was up checking on us every little bit.

By midnight Carl could actually hold his head up by himself again but he still didn’t have enough control to keep his head from bobbing or his legs under him.  However, by morning when Mom came in and said his name he bounced out of the kennel and when right over to her like nothing happened.  He had a bob in his head and he was a bit shaky on his feet for about 2 days after that but now he is normal and into everything again.

Then just a day after we noticed that Carl was back to his old self, I went riding and found that Derf had gone down in the pasture.  Again without knowing why he was down or what had caused it we had no sure fire cure.  We worked to get him to shelter before it rained and then we began treating every symptom that came up.

All the stops where pulled out and he was even given medications right into his veins to get it into his system faster.  We treated every symptom  as it presented it’s self.  We were out there getting soaked in the rain trying to keep him dry.  We were out in the wind and mud left by the rain and for about two days Derf was never alone.  In the end everything we did was in vane as we lost him anyway.

If you have followed us for any time at all you know Mom and I have very different ways.  I find that spending time in the arena, roping helps me clear my head and deal with things.  So for the next day or so that is where I was at.

As for Mom she has to write through her tears.  This is what she came up with to deal with the whole episode.  She called it “The End”

He was beautiful and full of life as he played and ran
She loved to watch him, she was his biggest fan.

His black mane and tail flowing like the wind
As he raced to the fence to see his old friend.

But life can be unkind and cruel
She knows that giving him her heart makes her a fool.

It had happened without warning
and soon sent her heart into mourning

They had all tried to save him
But soon the light in his eyes grew dim.

They had done all that they could do
Of a sure cure no one had a clue.

Her heart hurt as the end drew near
The end result she had come to fear.

One day he is on the pasture grazing away
The next he was buried and there he would stay.