I worked until 8 PM last night and had to go down in the dark to bring the sheep up. I brought the ATV for the light and wore my head lamp as well. Both that ATV and the head lamp are worth their weight in gold. As soon as I got into the ElectroNet, I caught Dreadlock’s baby and carried him out, then sent Gel around the sheep.
Interestingly, usually as soon as I open the ElectroNet, Rose high tails it for home, but last night, she stayed with the flock the whole way. Good girl!
The ElectroNet is set at the far end of the twelve acre field that I rent which adjoins a 20+ acre field so there’s lots of room for sheep to get away. Wally would have brought the sheep up before he went to the auction, but he was nervous about doing it given how far away the sheep were. The lean really hard into the adjoining field when you are moving them. Gel is more than capable of bringing them up, but he is not 100 percent reliable working for Wally.
So it was up to Gel and I to bring them back in the dark.
We got them going and I set up the ATV behind the flock and asked Gel to drive them on. They tried to lean into the adjoining field a bit, but he kept them going straight. Darned if that dog wasn’t leaning on those sheep last night. This is the first time I’ve seen him leaning on sheep during a drive. I had to ask him to slow down several times. This is a good thing though! He’s been very reluctant to drive in the past. I didn’t want him pushing too hard because of the other new lamb who was born this week. I wanted to stay behind the flock to use the headlights of the ATV to make sure we didn’t loose anyone.
It was a bit scary being out there in the dark and I was glad to get everyone up for the night.
A little boy bought Luna’s buck kid last night for $19. That was a really good price for a bottle baby. They usually only bring about $12. Wally said the boy was very excited about winning the baby. I left Luna’s doe kid whom I’m going to name Dusty up last night. Luna is still quite fussy on the milk stand and I only got about two quarts out of her, but it will get better in time. It’s funny, I’m so used to milking Rain that milking Luna feels a bit foreign to me.
I made a batch of cheese yesterday. I think I’m going to hold on to this batch and use it for myself rather than selling it. I haven’t been able to make cheese in quite a while and I missed it.
Three days off from work! Yea!!! Wally and I are going to go to Tractor Supply this afternoon and get two cattle panels to make an alleyway to push sheep through in order to examine and worm them this weekend. On Saturday we are driving to Elkin to get a truckload of rabbit manure for my gardens. Rabbit manure is the absolute best fertilizer and mulching material. I was going to plant peas down in the main garden, but I think I’m going to set a line of field fence and plant them in the garden up against the house. The vines will be pretty growing up the fence and I can put in some Morning Glory seeds to grow up over the peas for the summer months and then re-sow peas in the fall. I love fresh peas!!!!
Off to move the sheep down to the ElectroNet and then get some major house cleaning done.