Posts from — August 2008

Gel has been dying to work.  Since I got the two livestock guard dog puppies, I haven’t move the stock out to the back pastures as I had been doing.

This morning (late morning) I took Gel out and we got all of the stock into one group and then I managed to separate out a group of four lambs.  Ah!  I remember what it’s like working a group of squirrely sheep.  Not fun and it shows me where Gel’s holes are.  I worked them for a while, then decided it was too hot to be working as hard as Gel was.  Then we separated off a group of four goats.  Much easier, to some extent.

After I get some sort of shelter constructed for the livestock and puppies, I have to make some sort of sorting chute so I can easily sort out three or four lambs or goats to work.

It’s really too bloody hot to be working.  Right now it’s 85 degrees, but because of the humidity, it feels like 95.  It’s been almost an hour since we were outside and I’m still sweating and Gel is still panting.

I gave the livestock guard puppies a lesson in being tied out.  They were less than thrilled, but it’s something they need to learn.  When I let them go, I attached light-weight, three-foot-long cables to the collars so I can grab the lines rather than their collars.  Kitty is fine with my grabbing her collar, but Rose doesn’t want you to put your hands on her.  Neither will walk on a lead.  Must work on that.

I bought a bag of Calf-Manna  to feed to the goats in a continuing effort to build them up.  While they are definitely getting better, I’m getting a little tired of dealing with sickly-looking goats and am close to calling Marcus and telling him it’s time to come and pick up his goats and sheep. 

Regarding the “I’ve been lazy” title to this post, I haven’t been training much and quite frankly, I don’t care to train these days.  It’s probably due to the heat.  I’m ready for cooler weather.  I spent a good part of yesterday mowing.  I mowed the duck pasture (which is about a half acre, maybe more), mowed the path and re-set my ElectroNet, and mowed about a third of my agility field.  One day, I either need to break down and buy a riding lawnmower (probably not going to happen) or minimally a higher-powered, wider, self-propelled push mower.  The mower I’m using now is a 21-inch, bare bones push mower.  Mowing is a workout for me.

I’ve been told this twice now in less than a week.  It is rubbish!

The first time was by the woman I bought Kitty and Rose from.  She was concerned about feeding sheep and goat meat to the puppies for fear that they’d decide to do some sampling on their own.

The second was last night by a guy from Michigan I was talking to about organic farming.  He said his cats would likely look at me and say no go to raw meat (no surprise there given they are kibble junkies), but he said, he didn’t think feeding raw meat to dogs was a good idea because it turned them into killers.  I told him no, that wasn’t true.  He said he had seen it happen.  That was when I told him I really needed to get off the phone to go and paint my toenails.

I am not saying domestic dogs cannot turn into killers.  I’ve seen it myself, especially in a pack situation.  Yes, they do run deer and they can and do get into livestock and maim and kill them,  especially if they are in a pack situation.  Put domestic dogs into a pack and they do things that they wouldn’t normally do on their own.

But does feeding a dog raw meat turn it into a blood thirsty killer?  No.

Giving your dog a bowl of ground meat or even tossing him the haunch of a deer is not going to make him go out the next time he’s hungry and drag down a deer, sheep or a stray cat.  Eating raw meat is a long way from the act of killing and consuming the meat.

Cats, however, are different.  Their manner of domestication was much different than dogs.  The common theory is that wild wolf-like creatures started to hang around human civilizations consuming their rubbish.  Those that were able to withstand the close proximity to humans had a higher survival rate than those who could not.  Why?  Because they were well fed.  They reproduced and gradually became tamer.  While dogs are anatomically carnivores, they are optimistic consumers.  If it can be consumed and sustain life, they will eat it.

On the other hand, cats started to hang around human civilizations not to eat their rubbish, but to prey on the rodents that were attracted to the grain supplies and of course the rubbish.  Cats were domesticated approximately 10,000 years ago; while dogs may have been domesticated as many as 100,000 years ago.  Some people, including myself, do not even consider cats truly domesticated.

I suppose, in some way, it is unfortunate that I cannot ask Gel to go out and run down a deer or two.  It would help to feed my critters, but I am surely glad I can send him out on a blind fetch and know that he isn’t going to savage the sheep or goats while bringing them back.  My cats, on the other hand, they are still scheming on how they can work as a group and bring down one of the lambs.

Can I tell you how much I hate ticks?  My dogs (and cats) do not get fleas, or if they do, it’s only on rare occasions.  I know fleas are out there, Kitty and Rose came with quite a collection.  I washed Kitty and Rose with peppermint castile soap which killed all of the fleas.  Now that they are on a species-appropriate diet, I’m hoping that they will not be so attractive to fleas.

Ticks, on the other hand, appear to be less discriminating.  I tried an herbal product that came highly recommended, but it seems the tick population around me is too heavy for an herbal preparation to work.  Also, my dogs are in the water (cooling off) almost everyday during the summer.

I gave in a few times this summer and used Frontline.  This is not something I’d normally do, but a few months ago, a female tick crawled off one of my dogs and laid her eggs in my bedroom.  Can you imagine how much fun that was?  I was complaining to my homeopath about the sensation of bugs crawling on me, only to realize bugs really were crawling on me!  I tried diatomaceous earth (DE) in my bedroom, but DE doesn’t seem to work against ticks.  I finally resorted to putting some Sevin dust under my bed which was were most of the ticks seemed to be coming from.  I vacuumed daily for quite a while.  The population is finally lessening in the house, but not on my dogs.  It seems Frontline isn’t working either.

You have to wonder if all these preparations that they sell for fleas, ticks, mosquitoes, etc. isn’t somehow, in the long run, making our dogs and cats more susceptible to these insects.  I have no more Frontline in the house and do not plan to buy anymore because (1) I don’t think it works and (2) that it truly is causing harm.  The woman who makes the herbal product told me that because tick-borne disease has become so common these days that I probably should resort to something stronger during high tick months, but I am not worried about tick-borne disease.  My dogs’ immune systems are not compromised like so many others are. 

I don’t want the darned things crawling all over me and I am sick and tired of picking ticks off my dogs but it seems I am going to have to dig in and live with it for a while and find other means to deal with the rotten critters!  I suppose I’ll set up a grooming platform in my duck pasture and once a day bring each dog in there and pick ticks off them and feed them to my ducks and chickens.  Think of the grain I won’t have to feed because of all the ticks I’ll be able to feed to my chickens and ducks.  I wish I could train one of the chickens to do the picking for me.

Two things that I am going to try to make a concerted effort to do is to get more red meat into my dogs (red meat is higher in B vitamins) and try to get some garlic into them.  Both B vitamins and garlic seem to make creatures less attractive to bugs.  I need to do the same thing for myself so I won’t be so tasty. 

Regarding other unmentionables, if you are on the fence, or know someone who is about whether to administer heartworm medicine to your dog (or cat).  Read this wonderfully written article  that will detail the truth about heartworm and the poison that is recommended to prevent them.

We had bad storms last night.  I was told we received about five inches of rain in a few hours.  The storm was so violent, it kept me awake from about 1 to 3 AM.  Then around 5 AM I heard Kitty and Rose barking up a storm.  I got up, got Gel, grabbed a flashlight and headed outside.  Keep in mind I was still half asleep.  As I was coming down the stairs, I saw a canine figure heading across the front lawn along side the fenced-in area and duck pasture.  I did a double take as the canine was light in color.  At first I thought it was Red’s dog Biscuit, then I realized it was a coyote!  A damned big one at that!

Gel didn’t even see him and I wonder now if I did, but Kitty and Rose were barking like crazy and when Gel and I came to the fence, at first they barked at us.

The sheep and goats were behind the ElectroNet and I had turned the power on to it before I went to bed, however, a portion of the fence was under water so I don’t know how charged the fence was.  Also, the coyote appeared to be as tall as Gel and Gel sails over the ElectroNet with ease so I would assume the coyote could have as well. 

So, did Kitty and Rose’s barking deter the coyote?  I’d like to think so.  Even though they are puppies, they sounded tough.  Would Kitty have barked as aggressively if she was alone?  Maybe, maybe not, but I do feel better having the pair of them in there.

Luckily all the sheep, goats and cats are accounted for so the coyote didn’t have breakfast on me.  Must get a gun and learn how to shoot it.

Tropical Storm Fay finally made her way up here to the Carolinas and we are getting some much needed rain.  I went out early this morning and put up a heavy duty tarp between the two large pine trees in the fenced-in area and Gel and I separated the goats from the sheep and put them up in the fenced-in area with two containers full of alfalfa forage and some goat minerals.  The weather forecast has rain every day for the next seven days.  Let’s hope that’s the case.  The more rain we get now, the longer I’ll have green grass when it starts to get cold.

I called in sick today.  No disease to name, just feeling generally achy, alternating between hot and cold, just plain icky.  I am so in touch to my body that I know when I’m getting sick and when it’s time to stay home and sleep.

This weekend I plan to make a more permanent shelter in the fenced-in area.  When it starts getting cold and inclimate, all of the outside animals are going to need better shelter.  The puppies seem to be enjoying being wet and muddy, but it’s in the mid 70’s.  I’m sure that won’t be the case when it gets down closer to 30 degrees.  Rose is settling in well.  I was a little concerned about her early on, but I think she’ll work out just fine.  The puppies got rabbit for supper last night which they really enjoyed.  I’m really glad I went to get Rose.

Separating the sheep from the goats is giving Gel and I good shedding experience.  Shedding is not something that I normally practice, but I see it is a good skill to have.  Fern is officially “put up” for a few months.  She needs to mature some more.  She seems to have hit a wall in her training and instead of butting my head up against that wall, I’m laying off her.  She’s a young dog, plenty of time for training.  I think if the rain lets up later this afternoon I may start up the ATV and carry my panels down to the back pasture and work on some driving with Gel.  It’s been too bloody hot to do much training, but it’s finally cooling off.  Because we have been separating the goats from the sheep, Gel is starting to get more comfortable with taking one group of stock and leaving the rest.  This is a concept he’s fought me on from day one so it’s nice to see him relaxing and taking my directions even if they are contrary to what he thinks he should be doing.  This morning he had to come between the goats on one side, separated by the ElectroNet with sheep on the other side and return with just the goats.  Previously, he might have hung up and refused to come forward with just the goats.

Sunday was a busy day. I picked up Wally at his house at about 6:20 AM. We had breakfast then drove to the mountains to get Kitty’s sister Rose. They were milking while we were there so we hung around and watched for a while. I went home with a gallon of fresh milk which I plan to make yogurt out of.

We got home and Rose had made a horrible mess in her crate.  Wally held her while I hosed her off and washed her with some peppermint castile soap.  She became a bucking, squealing bronco, but the soap killed the large population of fleas she had on her.  We then put her in the ElectroNet with Kitty who was very happy to see her.  Unfortunately, Rose hit the ElectroNet and got shocked.  Poor puppy had a rough day, but she’s now flea-free and knows not to touch the ElectroNet.  Last night she and Kitty were playing and having a good time.  As I write this, both puppies are lying under the big oak tree with the sheep and goats.

Once Rose was settled, we loaded up my dogs and headed over to Wally’s house.  We needed to worm a sheep who had developed bottle jaw (again!) and move them to a different pasture.  Moving sheep is normally no problem, but this time, we had the llama to contend with.  When Gel and I brought them into the barn so we could catch the sheep to worm her, the llama came in too.  I quickly shut the door so she couldn’t go back out.  We wormed the sheep, then opened the gate and prepared to move the group through the barn and down the road to the new pasture.  The sheep went out easily and headed in the right direction.  The llama went in the opposite direction.  I tried to catch her so I could lead her out, but couldn’t.  Meanwhile, the sheep are heading to parts unknown.  Wally was with them, but he had no dog to keep them to him.  I sent Fern to him and she kept the sheep with Wally while I went back to try to catch the llama.  Before I got to the barn, however, the llama came out with Gel moving behind her.  Good boy!  We’ll add herding llamas to his portfolio.

We put the sheep up, washed their buckets and gave them fresh water and then we had to deal with the undesirable task of shooting the sheep with CL (Caseous Lymphadenitis).  While it is possible to lance the lump and drain the bacteria, humans can catch CL and it’s extremely contagious to goats and sheep.  Given that this St. Croix has never looked healthy, we decided it would be best to go ahead and shoot her and get what meat could from her.  In looking closely at her though and thinking about the work involved in butchering an animal of that size, I considered just bringing her down to the back fields and letting the wild animals have her, but I couldn’t ignore the opportunity for free meat.

Shooting an animal is not pretty or easy.  We gave her some grain so she’d put her head down and Wally shot her.  I know the bullet killed her instantly, but the residual muscle twitching is disconcerting at best.  It’s bad enough with small animals, but with large animals, it’s much worst.  Yes, we can take our animals to a slaughter house and have them processed there and avoid the unpleasantness of shooting them ourselves, but the butcher adds a $40 to $50 kill fee plus $.30 to $.40 per pound for processing.  Then there’s the hassle of taking the animals there.

I was going to hang her from a tree at my house and process her, but by then, it was in the mid 80’s and just too hot to be outside cutting up meat.  I put a tarp on my kitchen floor and Wally and I brought her in and I got to work.  As expected, there wasn’t much meat on her.  Before we do our next sheep, I need to get a pulley system set up on a tree so I can hang the carcass and get an electric saw which will be appropriate for cutting through meat and bone.  A hand-held saw just doesn’t cut it.  Also, it needs to be done early in the morning and preferably during the cooler months.

After I was through and had all the meat cut up and in the freezer, I sat on the couch and thought about how most people get meat for themselves and their animals.  They go to a grocery store or butcher shop and pick up meat all cleaned and packaged.  Most people probably don’t even think about what the animal was like before it ended up placed on a Styrofoam tray and wrapped in plastic wrap; what is involved in the raising of the animal and the ultimate butchering process.

There was a time when most everyone raised and butchered their own meat.  Now it doesn’t happen very often.  Things are changing, humans (and animals) are loosing their connection to the earth and nature.  I’m not so sure that is a good thing.

Recently on the sheepdog list a woman posted this link  which is a petition to increase the required cage space for chickens, pigs and calves raised for veal.  The first post in response was from a man who said not to support this organization (HSUS) because if they had their way, there’d be no dog trials, no use of dogs on livestock, etc. …

I agree that HSUS is an extreme group, but there is no way around the fact that the animals raised in so-called factory farms are treated inhumanely.

One person wrote in response to the post that anyone with half a brain and heart can still see why animals need to be treated humanly [sic] if only for more money and profit. She’s got one part of this right, the money and profit, but animals do not have to be treated humanely in order to make money off them. Stuffing chickens (and other animals) in cages so small that they cannot move for their entire miserable lives is not humane; but money is still being made off them. In fact, there is more money to be made via factory farming than there is via regular (humane) farming methods. It’s a lot more difficult keeping chickens in an environment so they can be chickens than it is to stuff them in a box and wait for their eggs to drop onto a conveyor belt.

What particularly pissed me off about this post was a woman who stated that she has had flocks of free range chickens and that they are certainly happier while they are alive, but never die of old age and often die unpleasant deaths. Well, duh lady, you take efforts to protect your chickens from predators so they don’t die unpleasant deaths; and what part of living in a box is pleasant or happy for a chicken and do you think these factory-farmed chickens die pleasant deaths?

I’d like to stick a bunch of the people on that list in a box for a week and see how they like it. Heaven forbid that they loose out on their sheep dog trials.

Whatever relationship I had with Marcus beyond exchanging stock with him is over.  It actually has been for quite a while now.  For the longest time I grieved and fretted over it, but I’ve since come to the conclusion it is for the better.  I will forever be in debt to Marcus because it was because of his involvement in my life that I started constitutional homeopathic treatment for myself.  This treatment has made a tremendous difference in my life.  I feel better than I have in years, if ever really.

Prior to Marcus, my last relationship with a man was close to ten years ago.  I just wasn’t interested in pursuing a relationship.  But, Marcus made me realize how much fun it was to be involved with a man who shared common interests.  On a whim I bought a month-long membership on match.com (an on-line dating service).  I was a member of match.com back in the early 1990’s when it was first started up.  It was interesting and I met some neat men, but, as was pointed out by one member, I am not going to find the type of man I would like to spend time with on match.com.

I was going to just ditch the whole search-for-the-man-of-your-dreams exercise, but I decided to try a different on-line dating service called farmersonly.com.  If you read the founder’s statement on the face page, you’ll see that it is a place where I might find someone with compatible interests.  While I travel in the world of suits and four dollar cups of coffee during the day, I am not a part of it and do not fit in.  I’m the weird one who sometimes has to pick hay or other unmentionables out of her hair or spend a few extra minutes cleaning the mud out from under her fingernails.  I do not get manicures, spend hundreds of dollars on shoes or clothes or do any of the other things that city folk enjoy.  My life centers around my animals and the land.  Hard for city people to understand.  So I’ve met some really neat people via farmersonly and who knows, maybe something will come of it.

One problem that I’m finding is that the really neat men are usually several hundred or thousands of miles from me.  Not sure I’m interested in relocating, but I guess for the right man, I might.  The men who are local to me tend to be avid church goers.  Organized religion scares me.  In fact, in my match.com profile I said that if I had to choose a religion that suited me it would be Buddhism with a bit of Wiccan thrown in for good measure.  Ha!  That revelation got me an ugly piece of hate mail from one member essentially telling me I was going to burn in some unmentionable place because of my beliefs.  So, after having a go-round regarding religion with an avid church-goer on farmersonly.com, I made it clear in my profile that I am not a church-goer, wasn’t going to become one and if that was important, I wasn’t the girl for them.  I do believe in a higher power, I Just don’t know what form that higher power takes … it changes.

Oh, it would be nice to find a man interested in sustainable farming, especially if he already had a farm going.  I guess only time will tell on that front.  Meanwhile, I’ll have fun meeting and talking to new people.

I think that sometimes the work that you need to do with your dogs tends to present itself as needed.  On the way home from work last night I stopped and got some alfalfa forage and goat minerals.  The plan was to separate the sheep from the goats, putting the goats up in the fenced-in area to consume the alfalfa and have access to their minerals.

Now, when I want the goats to stay with the sheep, they don’t; and of course when I want them to separate, they do not.  It took us a while to separate the goats from the sheep because both of my dogs are extremely insistent on keeping the group together.  I can see that this exercise, which is going to become a nightly occurrence is going to teach us all a lot.  Now, if it were the sheep we were trying to get into the fenced-in area, they’d have done it very happily.  Sheep are pigs when it comes to grain or special food and they knew there was special food in the fenced-in area that they should have been eating, not the goats.

By the time we got the stock separated, both dogs had their tongues on the ground.

I toyed with calling Marcus and telling him we were going to send the female goats back to him this weekend because I wasn’t sure I wanted to put the extra money into food for his goats, but I decided I might as well keep them for now and while I had them, make a concerted effort to use them for working.  Tonight is the auction and Wally is going to be on the lookout for a replacement billy.

Unfortunately, it appears that I am going to be butchering a sheep this weekend.  My St. Croix has a lump on her cheek that appears to be Caseous Lymphadenitis or CL. A bacteria called corynebacterium pseudotuberculosis causes CL. Apparently sheep are more prone to internal abscesses while goats are more prone to external abscesses. If an animal is experiencing chronic weight loss, it may be carrying internal CL abscesses on vital organs. This sheep has never looked good.  I bought her as a cull early last year or maybe the year before.  She did have a lamb this spring.  I discussed with Wally taking her to the auction tonight, but I won’t get much money for her.  She’ll end up being slaughtered and she likely won’t be treated kindly prior to slaughter.  It seems the kindest thing to do would be to shoot her and butcher her myself this weekend.  I won’t get much meat off her, but every little bit will help.  It is possible to rupture the lump, clean it and let it heal, but CL is quite contagious and I don’t want to risk infecting the rest of our sheep.  This ewe is rough on the dogs when she has lambs so I guess it’s best to just go ahead and cull her now.

I found a source for some free meat.  I spoke to the head butcher of a small store in downtown Charlotte.  They carry very high end (expensive!) meat and do all the cutting themselves.  They throw away about five pounds of trimmings a day.  I asked that they hold it for me.  It will be mostly fat, but Gel and the puppies can certainly use more fat in their diet.  Whenever I’m at the local Mexican meat market I get scraps from them as well.  I pick up the first batch of scraps tonight.  Hopefully it will be okay.  There will be some fish in there too.  So far, Kitty has eaten anything and everything I put in for her.  Once her sister comes, she should eat even better because of the competition her sister will provide.  Last night, Gel must have been really hungry because he was eating the pieces of rabbit I offered to him while I was cleaning and processing them.  Gel rarely eats rabbit, especially not pieces of rabbit.  He ate quite a bit, then went into the living room, threw it up and ate most of again.  Lovely …

I got read the riot act by Kitty’s breeder yesterday.  I told her how I took Kitty for a walk in the morning with the Border Collies and how when we went back to where the ElectroNet is set, Kitty went back in on her own and wouldn’t come out.  Her breeder said, “I’m not going to tell you what to do, but I’m going to.”  Apparently LGD become quite territorial and they like big territories.  If I introduce too much area to Kitty too early on, she’s likely to become a wanderer.  Also, if she decides she prefers to be with me and the Border Collies, I’ll have a big problem on my hands.  I need to keep her confined in a small area (which she is in the ElectroNet) and once she’s thoroughly bonded with the sheep and goats, I can gradually start to extend it.  Ideally I’d like to have Kitty and her sister guard the entire 15 acres my house sits on at night so that they’ll protect the poultry, cats and four-legged livestock.  That means I’ve got a bit more fencing to do to completely secure the 15 acres, but it’s almost done now.  So, for now, Kitty and soon her sister will remain in the ElectroNet.  I’m really glad Kitty’s breeder is willing to point out the err of my ways so I’ll do the right thing by these dogs.

Without her knowing I was doing so, I was watching Kitty this morning as she mingled with the goats and sheep.  She’s really starting to hang with them exclusively.  Early on, she would sleep in the thicket and the goats and sheep were sleeping elsewhere.  Now when the goats and sheep are lying down, Kitty is right there with them.  Good girl!

After the class on Tuesday night, I’ve become a bit disenchanted by my photography class.  There is not a lot of structure during class and instead of teaching us things, he spends a good amount of time off on tangents.  More than half the class was spent watching him use a very expensive tool to calibrateone of the monitors in class.  I’m sure for a professional photographer, monitor color is extremely important, but I am not going to spend $300 on a tool to calibrate my monitor.  I suppose if I wasn’t buying LGD puppies, sheep and goats, I’d have the free money, but I don’t.  We didn’t even look at the prints from the shots we took last week.  So what I’ve decided is to continue to take the class (of course), learn as much as a can, and not worry too much if I do not have all the shots I need for the week’s assignment.  I have already learned a lot and I think I’m getting my money’s worth, but I wish there was a bit more structure in the class.  This is the first time this class has been offered so I guess that’s understandable.  There’s a class offered in the next session that I’m interested in, but I think I’ll take a break and maybe take another class in the session after that. 

When I had decided that I was going to take the plunge and get a livestock guard dog (”LGD”), I filled out an application with Carolina Great Pyrenees rescue. A few days after I submitted the application, I heard from a woman who worked with the rescue. We talked for a while and she had several dogs who might have been appropriate for my situation. I asked what the next step was and she said that the President of the rescue would get in touch with me to arrange a home visit. That was at least two weeks ago now and I have not heard back from either the President or the woman that I initially talked to.  I have called and left several messages.

During my conversation with the first woman, she told me that they were turning away a lot of dogs from rescue because they didn’t have room for them.  I told her that I’d also be interested in fostering. 

This is typical of my experience with rescue organizations.  If you do not fit exactly into their cookie cutter mold of the “perfect” adoptee, then you might as well forget about getting a dog from them.  This may not have been the case, they may have simply been too busy to get back to me, but if a home is offered for one or two of their dogs, I’d think they’d be making a concerted effort to return phone calls.  There was nothing in my application that would have prevented me from being a good adoptee, but who knows why things happen the way they do.

There is also the chance that someone reading this journal who knew the President of Carolina Great Pyr rescue called them and told them not to adopt to me because I am a bad person.  I’m not bad person and if that was the reason, then they can keep their dogs.

In retrospect, I feel better with my decision to buy Kitty rather than getting a rescue dog.  While it is going to be several months before she is of size to make any difference should my stock get attacked, she will get there.  She came to me with no baggage and hopefully little vaccine damage.  Dogs going through rescue are typically excessively vaccinated and I truly don’t want to deal with that type of damage, especially in a 100 pound dog with an unknown history.  I knew Kitty grew up with cats and poultry, she stayed with her mother until she went home with me at 11-12 weeks old (I need to find out when her birthday is) and I have the benefit of her breeder’s mentorship.  Quite frankly, even if the rescue organization told me a dog was safe with cats, I’d still worry about the safety of my cats.

Everything happens for a reason and I am happy with how things turned out.