Baymule’s Farm

[ducks4you]

Welllllll...heated hose is frozen at the end!!
It's the combination of below zero temperatures AND 25mph winds.
I had to carry 1/2 buckets of water from the basement this morning for the ponies. I will do the same in a few hours.
For those who say why? Because livestock can colic if they don't get water.
My boys could probably miss a week of hay, but that would lead to colic, too.
I have been throwing straw in their stalls and you let Them break up the flakes and spread it around.
The stalls look dry and pleasant.
They should get turned out by the weekend.
The hose will be working by Thursday. Some sun and temperatures in the 20's will make that happen.
The experts tell you to get them warm water, but with their coats and fat winter time bodies they can handle cold water. And, that's not possible in my knee condition, where I have to be extra careful where I step outside.
I also threw out the kitchen garbage and got the big cat to the street. When my help dug us out, he cleared the snow over the "sidewalk to nowhere" which starts at my driveway and that's where the pickup trash can has been going.
I took the time to dump the water and ice out of their small portable 30 gallon water tank and put it upside down. Won't have to buy a replacement that has cracked from ice.

 

[baymule]

Pictures of my very own personal snow storm. Yeah, kinda pitiful. But 50 miles south of me clear to the coast got slammed. Well, slammed for Texas. LOL

The South is having problems. News showed a blizzard in NEW ORLEANS! It will be 18 degrees here tonight but In Beaumont, right on the coast, low of 11 degrees tonight. That 11 degrees is sweeping across Louisiana. Those poor people aren’t any better prepared for that kind of cold plus snow, than we are. I feel fortunate that the snow stayed south of me.

I’ll be back on the Boiling Water Bucket Brigade tomorrow morning.

 

[baymule]

It’s 18F this morning, that’s real cold for East Texas. No fun! Still dark outside, I’ll be hauling buckets of boiling water to thaw out the buckets so sheep can get a drink.

 

[ducks4you]

Dunno about sheep, but keeping horses hydrated is VITAL. I am not an expert in everything horse, BUT, in June I will have owned horses through 39 winters.
A horse is a very tough animal. I own 3 HD horse blankets. They live on a shelf in my grain room and are covered in dust bc I rarely use them.
I would only use a blanket if my horse is ill and it's cold, OR winter trailering.
UNLESS you show your horse and have a winter clip there is
ABSOLUTELY NO REASON TO BLANKET YOUR HORSE IN THE WINTER!
I keep my horses out of their stalls in the Fall and early winter until absolutely necessary. They can grow a coat in 3 days, grow a heavy coat in one month and all you do when you blanket in the winter is to make them sweat and give them a chill.
PLEASE don't blanket your horse in the winter just bc all of your friends do this.
I have stalls and a 16 1/2' x 19' shelter. My horses tough it through very cold and very hot and very wet and very dry.
The one way to kill a horse is to mess with their digestive systems and food that is too rich, too high in protein, and chronic lack of water will make them colic, which is an extremely painful twisting of their intestines, and if they can't be walked out of it, they die a slow and painful death.
THIS is why I have been carrying water from my basement to the barn 2x/day in this extreme cold.
Just FYI...

 

[baymule]

Yup, water is vitally important in sub freezing temperatures. Plus I have moms with nursing babies, thus the Boiling Water Bucket Brigade, toting hot water to thaw the ice buckets. I’m out several times a day to keep ice busted and more boiling water as necessary. Lowest it’s been is 16F but it’s warming up, today’s high is 52F!!!! I’ll be able to turn the water back on at the meter. Low of 26F tonight and tomorrow morning I’ll only have to bust ice for the sheep.

I’ve kept the twins born Saturday, with their mom, plus the mom and triplets, in a small pen with a Quonset hut for small livestock,so I could make sure they got plenty to eat and plenty of water.

I’ve spent a lot of money this month on alfalfa, extra feed and a couple of protein lick tubs, to make sure moms and lambs had plenty to eat.

Lambs were supposed to be born in September to November but nobody listened to me. So I got December through February with a couple due in March.

 

[baymule]

It has warmed up to 36F DEGREES!! I bundled up to go outside st 32 degrees and actually got hot and had to shed my Carhart jacket. I only had to carry one round of boiling water. Supposed to warm up to 52 degrees today and only 26 tonight. I’m gonna turn my water back on this afternoon at the warmest part of the day. And get a REAL shower instead of a bath with a pan of water.

Pancake and Bon Bon didn’t lamb last night. One more night girls!
BUT lambing moved to the front field! Snuffy, registered ewe had twins, white ewe and white ram. Ewe will join the flock.

I have 7 registered ewes, 2 lambs from last year that survived the parasite attack that I’ll put with a ram in a few weeks, that makes 9, plus these 2 will make 11 next year. And still have 5 more registered ewes to lamb.

75% Ginger had a ewe, 87.5%. Fancy had black twins, at 87.5% eligible for full registration at 1 year old. Ram going to @margali on BYH, ewe joining flock.

Pancake and Bon Bon are both 75% and due….. hoping for ewes that will be 87.5%.

I have a feeling that next year and the year after, I’ll have an explosion of eligible ewes for full registration. I’ve worked long and hard for this. I’m seeing the goal and it’s getting closer.

 

[baymule]

Yesterday was sunny, gorgeous and I played outside. I cleaned out both round bale spots, and set new bales. I have only run son’s big 100 HP Kubota tractor twice, with son walking along beside me, telling me what controls to use. That tractor has so many fancy fangled controls, buttons and levers, I get confused. But yesterday I did it all by myself. Kinda proud of myself. I like to never figured out the brake lever, Why is the behemoth not moving and why is it beeping at me?

I’m comfortable with my little 23 HP Kubota, it is very simple to operate. But it just doesn’t have the oomph to get a big round bale off the ground.

There are 2 steps to get up to the seat of the big tractor and 2 grab bars on each side. I feel so high off the ground! I can’t see the hay spear unless I stand up and lean forward. But I got the bales speared and set. Well, maybe dumped is a better description. At any rate, sheep have hay.

This afternoon I get a load of dirt. It seems some idiot ordered 75 meat Cornish Cross chicks, I pick them up at the hatchery February 19. With so many, there is no place to brood them. There is no place to raise them. In my usual manner, I’m unprepared. If I ever got prepared FIRST before acquiring animals, the earth would spin off its axis and it would be a major world calamity.

When I pick up chicks, it will still be cold. I will have to have them by the house. They will have to be in the front yard where I can run an extension cord from the house. When it rains, the yard floods. Chicks for some stupid reason, cannot swim. The dummies drown.

Enter: dirt pile. My small tractor will make many trips with its little 4’ bucket, moving dirt to raise up the future hoop coop up off the drowning level of the yard.

I have to rob cow panels and a hog panel from the sheep pens and replace with sheep and goat wire. Annoyingly, I used wire to secure panels to T-posts instead of the hay string and zip ties that I now favor, but bolt cutters come in handy for that. Why waste my time and feeble strength struggling with puny wire cutter pliers? Two foot long handles on bolt cutters give me leverage.

I have 2x6 rafters pieces from the roof part of the shed that hurricane Beryl blew to pieces. Unfortunately they are still nailed together with 6” ring shank nails. Dang nigh impossible for me to take apart, which is why they are still nailed together. Maybe I can beat them apart, maybe cut them apart or maybe the hurricane will come back and finish what it started. At any rate, I’ve set my eyeballs on them as needed lumber for the chicken coop project.

I have 3 weeks to get this done and 4-5 inches of rain is predicted for the first week. Y'all wish me luck!

 

[ducks4you]

Oh, MY!!!
Been There, Done That, not to the tune of 75!!
Tt somebody yesterday, whose cousin lives close to New Orleans and measured 11 inches of snow from this storm, so it happened!
I didn't take any shots, but this week, when we were driving around in almost 0 degrees F, DH and I saw where a rancher had removed the round bale fencing and the cattle were laying on the hay, obviously bc it was radiating heat back on them.
Keep those little sheepies warm and watered and fed!

 

[Carol Dee]

Yesterday was sunny, gorgeous and I played outside. I cleaned out both round bale spots, and set new bales. I have only run son’s big 100 HP Kubota tractor twice, with son walking along beside me, telling me what controls to use. That tractor has so many fancy fangled controls, buttons and levers, I get confused. But yesterday I did it all by myself. Kinda proud of myself. I like to never figured out the brake lever, Why is the behemoth not moving and why is it beeping at me?

I’m comfortable with my little 23 HP Kubota, it is very simple to operate. But it just doesn’t have the oomph to get a big round bale off the ground.

There are 2 steps to get up to the seat of the big tractor and 2 grab bars on each side. I feel so high off the ground! I can’t see the hay spear unless I stand up and lean forward. But I got the bales speared and set. Well, maybe dumped is a better description. At any rate, sheep have hay.

View attachment 72146

View attachment 72145

This afternoon I get a load of dirt. It seems some idiot ordered 75 meat Cornish Cross chicks, I pick them up at the hatchery February 19. With so many, there is no place to brood them. There is no place to raise them. In my usual manner, I’m unprepared. If I ever got prepared FIRST before acquiring animals, the earth would spin off its axis and it would be a major world calamity.

When I pick up chicks, it will still be cold. I will have to have them by the house. They will have to be in the front yard where I can run an extension cord from the house. When it rains, the yard floods. Chicks for some stupid reason, cannot swim. The dummies drown.

Enter: dirt pile. My small tractor will make many trips with its little 4’ bucket, moving dirt to raise up the future hoop coop up off the drowning level of the yard.

I have to rob cow panels and a hog panel from the sheep pens and replace with sheep and goat wire. Annoyingly, I used wire to secure panels to T-posts instead of the hay string and zip ties that I now favor, but bolt cutters come in handy for that. Why waste my time and feeble strength struggling with puny wire cutter pliers? Two foot long handles on bolt cutters give me leverage.

I have 2x6 rafters pieces from the roof part of the shed that hurricane Beryl blew to pieces. Unfortunately they are still nailed together with 6” ring shank nails. Dang nigh impossible for me to take apart, which is why they are still nailed together. Maybe I can beat them apart, maybe cut them apart or maybe the hurricane will come back and finish what it started. At any rate, I’ve set my eyeballs on them as needed lumber for the chicken coop project.

I have 3 weeks to get this done and 4-5 inches of rain is predicted for the first week. Y'all wish me luck!

Good Luck! You WILL get 'er done. Nothing like a deadline to get one going. LOL

 

[baymule]

Well today didn’t go at all like I thought it would. I went to the post office this morning , came back and Specks was laying out in the field. She hasn’t been too perky the last couple of days so I was concerned. I went inside, came back out and Specks was in the newest pallet palace I built. She was prolapsing.

I went back in, got a prolapse harness, spoon and supplies. I haltered her and led her to another pen. I have never used a prolapse harness and it took me awhile to get her rigged up. I called @Ridgetop for guidance but she was outside, I left her a message. I was trying to figure out the spoon when I noticed something black sticking out. Not a prolapse! Premature birth. It was a tiny ear.

Lambs head was tucked downward, so the top of the head crowned. @Ridgetop explained to me that was causing the bulging lady hoo-hah. Head was not backwards, the chin was tucked downward and the top of the head was coming first. The big bulge I was seeing looked like a prolapse.

I pulled when she pushed and the lamb came out. Dead. A ram lamb and beautiful color. I was sad to have lost him, but I still have Specks. Specks is from Texas Five White Dorper, Cleopatra and Cooper Katahdin ram. She was bred to Little Ringo, who is white except for 3 brown spots and 1 black spot on his ears. Specks was white, covered with red speckles. The dead lamb’s color looked like an American Blackbelly, and he had white patches on his back, white on top of his head and 2 white feet. Gorgeous.

I gave Specks Nutridrench, B vitamins shot and antibiotics shot. I drenched her with warm molasses water. She just laid there, probably in shock. I left the dead lamb with her and about an hour later she got up. She ate a little, walked around, a little worse for wear, but ok. I took the lamb and disposed of it.

Picture of her pushed out bulging lady part that looked like a prolapse to me until a tiny black ear sticking out told me birth was on the way. Then the head crowned.

I’m posting pictures of Specks, lamb crowning. The next picture is the dead lamb. So if you don’t want to see, stop here. I recognize that some people don’t like such things, so don’t look.

Dead lamb. I put Little Ringo in the field September 13, at the earliest, Specks was 3 weeks early.

27 lambs. Minus one.