Spring Cleaning on the Farm

Best fertilizer is the one you got.  Justin brought a couple truck loads of the sheep manure and many bucket loads of chicken manure to the garden.  A smelly job, but good for the earth.  

We found a place for the ladder.  AKA we gave Pepere Larry a couple extra odds and ends to fix up after he put up the new upstairs door.

He made the little door to match the large lower door.  It lets in a good amount more of light into the workshop  upstairs.  

The barn so far this Spring 2021.  If you do not remember what it looked like before, check out the post on The Barn; The finishing touches.

The roosters are not getting along this year as they had previously.  We have four beautiful and family friendly roosters.  It as a difficult discussion, but we have decided to give away Angus and Carliss to separate homes.  We’re hoping Jupiter and Cameron can share the rest of the space.  Please let me know if you’re interested in adopting a free rooster.  These are the two pictured above: Angus is above Carliss.

A full flock photo.  The boys are up front Lambert and Boston.  Ivy with her bell bottoms is behind them.  Nala and Natalie the Katahdin ewes to her right and the Southdown ewes to her left and in the back.  Do you know what got them to line up perfectly like this?

Yes.  They were meeting our new dog Boomer for the first time.  He sounds like his name, that’s why they all startled together. Boomer is a two year old hound mix that we adopted from the Portland Animal Shelter.

Justin has also been clearing out a new patch to the left of the barn.  This year we’ll probably have turkeys there. You can see the new open space and the large pile of lumbar up front.  I’m excited for the turkeys because we’re getting a heritage breed.  So they will be ver pretty.  Well also keep a few for breeding.  Expect lots of photos.  This spring we’re also getting some meat birds; it’s been a while since our last set.

I love early Spring flowers, it just really solidifies spring for me.  Happy Easter everyone!

Alexia made me these flowers from egg cartons and pipe cleaners.  She envisioned this craft on her own.  It was a great birthday present.  Save your quarters, she’ll be making a few bouquets worth for craft fair season.

A Growing Flock

 My children are always asking me what is your favorite animal? And it’s funny how easily I fall in love with a new animal when we add it to our little backyard farm. So right now high on my list is sheep. 

And our flock is growing. Obviously you’ve all met Ivy,  but here she is again because she’s too cute to write about without sharing a photograph. And now she has her sweater off.  She loves going outside to play... check out this little clip of her excitement that the door is open. Happy Bouncy Ivy Video

And last weekend we went to a farm in Milton Township, Maine and picked out two new sheep at EB’s farm.  Here is their Facebook page.

One Southdown ram lamb who will be the father of next year‘s lambs and one Hampshire market lamb. That little guy was a bottle fed lamb and is super friendly.

Meet Boston the Hampshire wether.  A wether is a male sheep that has been castrated.  They are considered better meat this way and therefore preferred for a market lamb. They are easier to manage at home and for showing at the fair.

Meet Lambert the Southdown ram.  We have his “papers” for being a purebred Southdown and of no relation to our females.  This will allow us to sell their purebred Southdown offspring... In case any of you readers have been motivated to start your own homestead.

He is one of the most handsome rams!  He will be ready to breed this fall.

Both of these little guys have already been weaned from their mother’s milk.  They have their own space in the barn to protect their health and our ewes and lamb.  They will be sharing the outside paddock until this Spring and we’ll separate them before Lambert gets big enough to be ready to breed. We will reintroduce them in September.

The other adjustment we’ve made is moving the Dolly Mama and Ivy out of the lambing pen.  We replaced the dividing fence with a Creap.  Think of this as a lamb’s playpen.  It’s a safe warm space for her to get away from the ewes, and they can’t follow her, but she can come and go as she pleases.

When the Spring flowers bloom, I will have some fun taking Ivy’s pictures.  She will be filling in more and looking beautiful.  Come again soon... the sap has been dripping from our maple trees so we’ll have a maple syrup post coming up soon.

Preparing for the Little Lambs

 Preparing For the Little Lambs

We prepared the lambing pens so that the ewes would have their own space to lamb and then bond with their babies. We had added straw to clean sawdust and the warming lamps above to help keep them dry and warm.   Lastly, water buckets were hooked high enough for the lambs to not trip or fall in, but the ewes can still drink, 

These are the raked out pens prior to setup.

We have since learned that is actually better to leave the old sawdust with manure packed down at the bottom with clean sawdust on top and that actually keeps the space warmer. (Note: for next year)

The pens with the straw and closed off gate.  One step closer to a safe private space for birth.

We had been spending more time with the ewes Dolly and Rosie and had been patting their stomach and around their backside to get them ready for delivery.  This helps acclimate the ewes to being touched so that they don’t have more stress if they end up needing assistance during their deliveries.  This will help them be more comfortable if assistance is needed.

While we were waiting for the lambs, we were keeping an eye out on the ewes’ progress.  This picture shows that the teets were pink and the bottom was also pinker.  We had also observed that the udder was full in appearance.  At this point we should have been checking on our ewes every 4 hours or so.  Something we did better with the second pregnancy (Dolly) after sadly missing the first (Rosie).

We also wanted to hang hay feeders in these lambing pens and instead of spending money on durable permanent feeders, we came up with a repurposed feeder from a feed bag and hay bale rope.  Alexia made these two feeders on her own.  Check out her DIY project video below!  It’s a link to our Pinterest video.

Link to Amazing Recycled Hay Feeder Video

By Alexia Castonguay 

Although it was sad to lose our first lamb from mother Rosie, we have heard that this is a common risk with sheep, especially first time moms.  We have learned a lot from that loss and the safe birth of Ivy and plan to lamb again next year.  In preparation for that and showing the sheep at the fair, we are purchasing a Southdown ram lamb and a bonus weather that will be a market lamb this fall. Yay!

Here is Dolly enjoying that recycled hay feeder made by Alexia.  If you haven’t checked out her video, please do and leave her a comment on what you think.  We did add a carabiner to make it easier to fill by bringing the bag to the hay instead of the other way around.

Here is Dolly being a great mom to little Ivy.  We are glad Ivy has joined our flock.  She will be shown at the fair this year.  If you haven’t met our little lamb, Ivy: check it out on her blog post introducing her to our family backyard farm: 

Ivy: Our Little Lamb.

Ivy our Little Lamb

 Introducing Ivy our Little Lamb

Our Castonguay This’N’That Family Farm just had some great big learning experiences with the lambing process.

Alexia was there at 11:30 at night on Saturday, February 20th for the birth and the newborn care of little Ivy.  Along with myself and husband, Justin.  This photo is right after we cleared her nose and dried her up after birth.  There is a red hue because the heat lamps are on.

We are definitely exhausted from the checkups and the labor and delivery, but we are also so thrilled to have a thriving baby lamb in our barn.

I wanted to share with you all as soon as possible the good news of her birth.  She had a quick check the next day by the farmers who we got her mama from and she is 12 pounds.  Note: (we need a little scale).

For a baby lamb, that’s great.  She’s staying warm with her little sweater: hand knit by Ann Salisbury for our youngest son. Thank you Ann; he grew out of it just in time.  We have two warming lamps set up over the pen and she is drinking her milk very well.

The Southdown sheep Mama named Dolly, or as I now like to call her: the Dolly Mama, is doing a great job caring for her newborn lamb.

Lambs have the highest risk of death in the first 48 hours after birth, so we are checking on Ivy and Dolly often.  Our other Southdown sheep Rosie, lost her baby and we are doing everything possible to give Ivy a better chance despite the freezing temperatures!

At the time of this writing, we are just about the 24 hour mark and she is going strong. I am going to use the information we gained from this experience to put together a learning post about lambing from the early signs to the newborn care.  There will be videos and one small graphic clip of the delivery.  

Link to video of Ivy on Pinterest 

Here is one snippet of a video of our lively little Ivy... I’m working with tech support to have it show here, but it takes a while... in the meantime try this link.

Having six of my own babies, definitely helped me connect with our laboring ewe and new baby.  The pediatric experience helped too, but I’ve never been part of a delivery team, so this angle of birth was different.

The other sheep in the flock showed their concern for Dolly during labor and seemed to support her.  They were also interested in meeting little Ivy, especially after she started bleating.  Rosie had been doing well since her loss, but the addition of Ivy has brought on some sadness; she understands now what she lost.

It was such a thrill to be there to help this ewe and newborn lamb.  Come back again soon to get more updates on our newest friend and more details of our busy night.

While you are here, please mark yourself a follower in the top right corner of the blog!  And if you have any thing you want to share, comment below; we want to hear how far our backyard farm life is traveling and we want our readers to see too!   Comments are screened before showing up on this blog.  Check back in a couple days and it will be up.

The Big Move to the barn.

 The Big Move to the Barn

From the small sheep pen to the large pen in the barn.

Here the Ladies are going out the barn door to the winter paddock for the first time.

 

Hardware cloth was added to this side of the window to prevent injuries and rubber barn mats layer the ground to prevent slipping.

  

A new hay feeder was made for their new home in the barn with space at the bottom for grain.

A view of their space from the stairs above moments before they moved in. There is space to add paneling and create a lambing pen within this space.

Their new space in the barn is much cozier and roomier then their sheep shed and they were happy to be back together, especially when they realized it was time for breakfast.

They stayed together as they explored their winter pasture.  Rosie and Dolly the Southdown sheep and Natalie and Nala the Katahdin sheep.

Checking out their new space and their surroundings.

Even though the barn is not fully completed, it is certainly functional and we are so happy to have our animals move in this rainy October weekend.

They acclimated very well and enjoyed their roaming ability.

We called their names and they stopped their nibbling  to look up. Natalie is the brown Katahdin on the left, Nala is the white Katahdin in the front, Rosie is the larger Southdown and Dolly is the smaller of the two.  I can’t tell from this photo, which is which.

The Southdown sheep are going for a snack of evergreen, while the Katahdins are searching for and munching on acorns.

The Southdown sheep just came to our farm a couple weeks prior to this big move to the barn.  Check out their arrival story on the post: What’s Two More?

If you would like to learn a little more about the barn itself, check out the post Building a Barn. And Building a Barn the Finishing Touches.