Last night I managed to separate Gabriel from the cows, except Daisy May who was on heat, so Oliver had the other girls to himself. Gabriel probably nailed her, but still hoping that she'll have a pure Jersey calf instead of a mix, and if it's a mix, please be a boy. At sunset I took the bell grain bucket out, dragged the feed bunk from the chicken yard back to the main pasture, then went towards the cows ringing the bell. JuneBug was nursing on Daisy May far out in the field, so I had to ring and call, ring and call for her, meanwhile fending off all the others from attacking the grain bucket :) especially Dolly. With Gabriel bellowing in the other pasture, keeping up with the girls. A little different from this morning, crunching through the ice covered grass, calling the girls to follow me to the other side of the hayfield. Should of taken the bucket this morning, but thought they'd follow. Think I need to separate the 2 boy calves, Taxes and IRS, from the girls too, put them in with Gabriel. But then I'll have to milk every day, whilst I much prefer this 3-days a week schedule. Once Daisy May is not on heat anymore, put him in with the other boys as well. Then, when Seasaidh comes on heat again, bring Gabriel back in with the girls, then when Daisy May comes on heat, put Oliver in with them. That's the plan, in any case :).
I managed to harvest and dehydrate all the herbs before the frost, had to string up some of the nettles in the dining room as both dehydrators were full. Did basil, sage, parsley, comfrey and the stinging nettles. Wore my leather gloves to handle them, believe they don't sting anymore once they're dried, but I'm cagey about it. Looking forward to my first mug of nettle tea though. Getting back into doing my aromatherapy and herbal tinctures and potions.
Need some help in administering a dewormer to Hershey as he's too big for me to handle by myself. I did some pour-on a week or so ago as he seemed to have a infestation of sorts but think I'll do a general sheep dewormer now. His ears still look a little ratty but his neck seems better.
Got a few more chickens and roosters earlier this week, a friend of "Soup" Amy needed to rehome them as she's just been diagnosed with cancer. And she's soo young :(. I didn't realise that there were so many, Lori held the torch while I caught the birds off their roosts and put them in the dog crate - my hospital :). It was so heavy that I couldn't lift it by myself, so Lori helped. Put them in the back of the truck and while driving home in the dark, realised I wouldn't be able to lift them out by myself. No problem, I just opened the cage and carried them 3 at a time to the chicken house until there were about 6 left which I could manage. They included 3 white silkies, think 2 boys and a girl :) nice to have silkies on the farm again, and maybe one of the boys will fertilise the little Serema banty too. Good to introduce new chickens at night, but I've still seen some pecking order tussles between the new and old roosters. At night they are all in the chicken house, huddled together. Now they just need to learn the call for feeding time. Seeing that the cows are back in the pasture, I think I should get the ducks and geese back to sleeping in the chicken yard at night. The pond will freeze soon, so they need to be back up here.
Lisa has been terrorising the sheep, and I can't seem to patch the holes in the fence quicker than she makes them, so I've been tieing her up in the garage at night. She's adapted to it rather well, comes when I call her. Just still working on her chewing things. So far, she's destroyed the cold-hardy fig tree, the red raspberry, a few lavenders, both hostas, chewed the mallet, took some seed packets apart, chewed the brand new polystyrene tap protector into pieces, had a go at the fire extinguisher in it's box, covered the garage floor in egg carton pieces, unfortunately mainly ones that had my farm label :(. And today I found a broken temporary fence post I was keeping to mark the position of the asparagus down by the lower barn enclosure. Don't know what she did with the 2nd one and still haven't found the wooden ladle I used to mix Dollys' ration. I've since been using a weeding fork.
Rosco has been eating a deer in the woods, seen him going past the window with a leg in his mouth. Today he brought the head / neck up to the house, a 6-point buck ! Wonder who shot him and didn't get him. Must say, hunting season is always good to Rosco. But he won't eat raw meat that I put in his bowl ! Anni and Lisa clean up after he abandons it.
Slowly but surely I've been working through my to-do lists. Need to fix the auto waterer the cows ripped off the one water trough last night. Always something new to add to the list. It's never ending.
Put a fresh bale of hay in the lower barn enclosure this evening, but couldn't get Daisy May and Eleanor to follow me to it. I eventually gave up, they'll have to find it on their own. They'd better give me at least 2-gallons tomorrow morning. It was fairly easy as I cut the branches back, including the one that broke my nose. Used the pole saw :). Fairly proud of myself.