Farm Day – May 2015

Posted on May 9, 2015 by Robin

Where is Dona when you need her? As much as I like taking photos I don’t take very many on a Farm Day because I’m distracted. Seven Farm Club members were here this morning to help with some specific tasks.

We accomplished those easily all the while enjoying each other’s company. This is such a great group of friends First we caught all 76 lambs. We weighed all of them and vaccinated the older ones. We chose four ewe lambs and 4 ram lambs as the most likely options (narrowing it to 2 each later) for taking to Black Sheep Gathering next month. Because my flock lambs in March the lambs are still young and it’s hard to think who I might want to take to the show in June. We also caught the 4 yearlings who did not lamb this year to choose which of them I’d take and also to replace their lamb ear tags with larger easier-to-read tags. After we finished with the lambs I showed Gynna how to go about halter breaking lambs that she is going to take home with her in a few weeks.The birds were happy when we finished in the barn because then they had free access to their babies without worrying about all the people and dogs.

Timm Ranch wool ready for the mill

After lunch Kathleen, Gynna, and Peggy went to the barn and helped me change this pile into……this one. By sucking the air out of the bags with the shop vac we condensed that pile of wool into about half the space. That’s a much easier job with more than one person.

Ginny found an out-of-the-way place to sleep.Later this afternoon Dan put the mower on the tractor and I mowed the pasture behind the barn.

I’ve been trying to clean out the freezer and I found a turkey the other day. It’s in the oven now and I’m getting ready for turkey dinner (without all the trappings because that would take too much work).

Drone View

Posted on April 21, 2015 by Robin

My son was here with his drone again. It is always interesting to see the place from a perspective I wouldn’t otherwise see. I still think it’s odd to see this object hovering and darting about.

The sheep aren’t big fans unless if up high enough that they don’t notice it. Here is someone else who noticed it.I don’t know if she wanted to warn it off… …catch it and kill it… …or play with it. However, she never got close enough.

Here are the views:

From over the barn looking east “Across the Road”. The green to the right is part of our pasture. The brown to the left is the neighbor’s place. Our house and garage, etc is in the center at the bottom of the photo. From over the barn looking south. The green in the lower half is our pasture. I’ve been strip grazing from right to left. This view is looking north. That line of trees just above the lower quarter or so is our boundary. The hay field is the neighbor. By the way, except for a few trees between the house and the road we planted (or let grow) all the trees that are here.The view to the west. Our border is the dirt road and canal in the center of the photo. The drone is hovering over the barn.

Farm Day

Posted on February 22, 2015 by Robin

This year’s pre-lambing Farm Day overlapped with Stitches West so some of our members chose shopping over barn cleaning, thinking that their yarn stashes needed a little reinforcing. However we still had an effective crew and finished our scheduled chores in just a couple of hours. (Dona was shopping so thanks to Lisa for providing some of these photos.)Lisa, Cindy, Alison, and Stephany helped clean the barn and vaccinate all the sheep. Betty came later and we skirted fleeces.We gathered all the ewes in the barn.

Some are looking quite large.

We checked eyelids of the ewe lambs for anemia using the FAMACHA scorecard and dewormed those who scored 2 or 3.Amaryllis is always happy when Lisa comes.

Faulkner was all fired up after yesterday’s tryst with Donna, who spent the day with him in anticipation of July lambs, but alas, it was just us Farmers who came to call today.After skirting fleeces in the afternoon……Betty and I treated the ewes to snacks.Usually Farm Day lasts well into the afternoon but today everyone had places to be (including me who went to Berkeley to see out-of-state cousins who had all gathered for a birthday celebration), but it was a beautiful morning to spend with friends.We didn’t do much hard labor today but someone was tired out.

My Weekend in iPhone Photos

Posted on February 16, 2015 by Robin

What a beautiful weekend we had, although I’d rather be able to say that it’s been raining and cold like winter is supposed to be. I wonder if this is the future. That will take some major adaptation. Regardless, here are photos from warm, sunny Solano County.

I usually don’t put the ewes out on the main pasture until late March when it has dried out. However, this year the water has drained away and I will take advantage of the grass growing now. If it doesn’t rain more this will be it until (and if) we get irrigation water.Waiting for me to change the fence.Rear view of one of the ewes due to lamb in about 2-1/2 weeks.More rear views. These ewes won’t lamb for a month or more.

Thatch left over from the overgrown dallisgrass last fall. Nothing grows under it–at least not useful for sheep. mushrooms This was growing inside that pile.While walking around the pasture I saw something (rodent) scurry across this obviously well-used path from one clump of grass to the next.

Speaking of rodents this is a view I see every morning when I go in the chicken house. Well, not this exact view. There are always new holes and new piles of dirt. There are only 2 chickens and I think I am feeding a whole colony of rats. I posted this photo on FB and was surprised at the number of responses. The overwhelming suggestion was to get terriers. Three dogs is enough and I won’t get another. If Maggie gets a chance she will kill rodents but she will also kill chickens, which is why they are in the chicken house. Next suggestion was the old-fashioned snap type of trap. I have used those for mice, but for rats it sounds disgusting. I think I will get some though. I tried a sticky trap under that garbage can but they just covered it with dirt. Faulkner. I sent photos to someone who has been asked to supply rams to participate in a Year of the Sheep celebration in San Francisco this week. I suggested Faulkner because he is easy to handle (relatively). They want horned rams so I sent more photos….but probably not with spots. They are still discussing it and I haven’t heard the final word. Isadora and Foley Even if the rams don’t get to go to the city, some of them are having fun. It’s time to breed my ewes that will lamb at the State Fair. This is Foley and Isadora yesterday. Today it was Crosby and Clover. I hope that this will be one answer to another rodent problem. This is a trial straw bale garden. The gophers have made it impossible to grow anything successfully in this part of the garden. Last summer I put two bales out here and started watering them the way you’re are supposed to. Then I went to Texas to wait for my granddaughter to be born. I gave up the garden idea until now. I have planted lettuce and carrot seeds in this one and chard in another. We’ll see what happens.

I took a quick trip to Sacramento Weavers Open House to pick up the things I had on display there. These are a few of my blankets. This is the first year in many, many years that I did not spend the weekend there demonstrating weaving. It felt odd to show up at the end.A friend’s purse that uses my horn buttons for the closure and to secure the strap.I tried this AVL loom with the e-lift. One step on the button and the shed changes. No lifting 16 (or in this case 40) shafts with leg power.

Shearing 2015

Posted on January 3, 2015 by Robin

Although we had a cold start the weather for Shearing Day turned out great and a lot of people came out to watch and to buy fleeces. Ewes before shearing. Farm Club members handled all the jobs. I don’t have photos of all of them but FC photographer, Dona, will probably have some for me to add to another post. That’s Stephany and Gynna who wrangled sheep all morning. Alison and others helped skirt fleeces that people purchased. Here is a view from above. Carol and Amy are in place to sweep between sheep and to let the shorn sheep out the gate.

John Sanchez has been our shearer for several years. The fleeces are always beautiful and the sheep look great too. He’s prompt and he’s fast too. He finished everything in 3 hours.Looking at this photo I wish that I’d done a series of photos of footwear. There are a lot of stylish boots in our Farm Club.

Jackie kept track of names and cards… Mary scooping fleeces

…while Mary scooped the fleeces into bags. All Farm Club members rotated tasks and helped all day–answering dozens of questions from visitors and also helping in the shop. Thanks to everyone: Alene, Alison, Amy, Betty, Carol, Dona, Gynna, Jackie, Janis, Joy, Kathleen, Lisa, Mary, Peggy, Polly, and Stephany (and to Judy for joining us).Jimmy is one of two wethers (castrated male) who was well marked so that the shearer would be told to watch for different parts while shearing off the belly wool.

Amaryllis was probably glad that she wasn’t on the shearing list.

This is what Dan made out of the pressure tank we had to replace a couple of months ago. It provided a welcome place to warm hands. Maggie behaved admirably all day.Rusty kept watch.Ginny was in the barn with us but had her own pen to keep her out of trouble.

Bags of fleeces for me to sort through. 937 Donna (1)

This is how I felt at the end of the day.

Water and Fire and Water

Posted on December 4, 2014 by Robin

One of my friends was leaving at the last Spinners Night Out the Friday evening before Thanksgiving. She came back into the shop to say that she was sprayed in the face by water and asked if there a sprinkler on. I went out to look and found that the pressure tank for the well was spraying water from a rust hole. We turned the water off and the next day Dan welded a patch on the tank. That was enough to get us through the weekend (turning the water off at night because it was still leaking), but was not a permanent fix. After the welded patch–better than before, but only a temporary fix. I picked up a new tank in Sacramento. It’s nice to have a son-in-law who is in the well and pump business and could get me a good price on a tank. He wasn’t here for the installation but gave tech support on the phone. That evening I came home from a meeting and found Dan watching to make sure there were no leaks. On the Friday after Thanksgiving conditions were right that we could burn the brush pile that had been getting bigger all summer and Chris came over to do that while I was busy with other things. It was too big to burn in place so we pushed it behind the barn where it was farther away from structures. This is the aftermath of that pile. As that one was smoldering Chris set the blackberry pile on fire. He lit a palm frond on fire to get the pile burning. This one was getting a little scary. We really didn’t want that palm tree to catch fire. Good thing Chris is a professional. This was a HOT fire. I wondered if our two garden hoses were enough to keep it in check. It didn’t take long to get to this point. Chris dug a line around it and we let it smolder all night. This is the next morning. The other pile was smoking even two days later and after a light rain. Saturday night I heard a leak in the cellar. (This is a low-ceiling room beneath the house with access from the outside. Before the drought years this basement would flood 3-4 feet in the winter and we had to keep a sump pump running so that the water would not flood the water heater.) It turns out that the old water heater was leaking, probably as a result of the higher pressure that our new pressure tank was providing to the house. I won’t show a photo of what this room looked like before I cleaned out all the junk that was along these walls because that is embarrassing. Believe me that it was not pretty considering what kind of critters spend time in basements and the fact that it has flooded periodically. Fortunately this incident was on the weekend and Dan was able to install a new water heater on Sunday. This photo was taken this morning (Wednesday). Notice the water in the basement. sump pump That is why we have to keep this pump set up in the winter. It wasn’t used the last couple of winters, but we woke up to this: The water level was at 2.0 inches since the evening before. We haven’t seen that in a long time.

Five Months to Lambs

Posted on October 7, 2014 by Robin

Monday was Sorting Day (but not like at Hogwarts, although I know that some of you could probably come up with some Harry Potter analogies). It was also the first day of the Spinzilla competition. Spinners from Team Meridian Jacobs were going to gather here in the afternoon but some of the team members are also Farm Club members. Several of them came early to help with sorting ewes and rams into breeding groups.Faulkner, the BFL ram, was first to get his girls and they happy to meet him. I knew that Athena was ready because she had been hanging out next to the fence. But so were Delight, Delilah, and Shelby. Four of the seven ewes with Faulkner were bred yesterday. (The red on the ewes’ rumps is the mark from the crayon in the ram harness.)

Next up was Crosby, a lilac ram lamb. I wasn’t going to use him this year because it’s hard to split the flock into too many groups. But transport for the ram that I am buying is now delayed so I thought I’d give Crosby a shot.He just got back from Lambtown where he won Champion ram of the Primitive Breeds division. It was a small show, but a win is a win, right? The judge loved his fleece and so do I.The girls, however, were not as impressed. It seems that ribbons aren’t everything.To Crosby’s credit he tried hard… …he didn’t give up… 14052 Crosby (1) …but to no avail. None of the four ewes wanted much to do with him. I don’t have a photo but I did see him finally lying down by the fence looking exhausted and dejected.Alex was ready for his ewes. He is a yearling ram whose fleece is beautiful. I didn’t try to use him as a lamb last year because he had bluetongue in the fall. Even if he could have bred, he likely would have been sterile from the high fever. Out of his group of 14 ewes, Alex found only one ewe who was interested. Poor Celeste. With no one else interested in him, Celeste got all Alex’s attention. Good thing that I moved Shearing Day to January. Hopefully rain will wash out some of this color.

The rest of the flock is waiting for a ram to show up in a few weeks. Lambing season will be a bit longer this year.

Vacation Interlude – Back to Work

Posted on June 23, 2014 by Robin

I’m on Day 4 of describing our wonderful vacation to the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone last week, but I will insert a post of what I am doing now that I’m back home. This is the north fence of the pasture. This is AFTER grazing. The sheep don’t venture in this far once the combination of dallisgrass and blackberries grow so thick. Access is hampered since there is an irrigation ditch just in front of this mess (the left part of the photo). There is a fence under there. This was yesterday morning’s achievement. I dumped the branches in the corral and the sheep were happy to work on defoliation when it was easier.However I’m not happy that the branches get stuck in their wool. This morning’s task was to finish the job. There are plenty of these still on what is left and they will be easier to get to. With my luck though they will all ripen just about the time that I go to Texas for the birth of my granddaughter.

By the way, you’d think that I’d come up with another solution to this problem. See this post from just over a year ago. Maybe some strategic fencing to hold some sheep right at that fence line.

Stay tuned for our adventures in Yellowstone!

Around the Farm in May

Posted on June 2, 2014 by Robin

I went back through my i-phone shots during May, most of which I deleted. But here is a collection of what I thought was photo-worthy at the time.Sheep on new pasture lining up at the blackberry buffet.Goose on the roof. There was another just out of site on the high part of the barn. Note ongoing wool washing activity. Also blooming bottle brush in the background… Rusty in bottlebrush …which makes it clear where Rusty was hiding out. Felt flower done by someone who came to my weaving class. Baby wrap brought by another weaving student. I had no idea that baby wraps were in such huge demand and people will pay huge prices for them. I’d love to weave some but my shoulders start hurting just thinking of weaving yards and yards of relatively fine threads, even on my AVL. What I wouldn’t give to have joints that were 20 years younger. Playing with the iPad when I should have been sleeping I found this cool app that turns your photos into paintings. Mom’s and babies. This is Laura and twins.Jazz and triplets.

I spent a huge amount of time this month sorting fleeces that were beautiful except that they were filled with obnoxious burr clover. A lot had to be thrown out. This wool is finally in route to the mill. I found this tom cat with a foxtail in his eye, huge ticks on his neck, and very weak and skinny. Through the wonders of Facebook within 24 hours he was on his way to a new home where I hear that a vet has ruled out any severe problems other than starving and he is eating up all the food and TLC he can handle. My latest attempt at gardening in my raised beds that have been gopher-ravaged is to try straw bale gardening. I am in the phase of watering the bale to start it decomposing. Then you add fertilizer, keep watering, and then plant. My hope is that a gopher will not tunnel all the way up through the bale.

Things I see on the way to the barn

Posted on April 25, 2014 by Robin

Pink bottlebrush Look at how tiny this new leaf is. One of my special iris plants that I got from Pleasants Valley Iris Farm. Another one of the special irises. This rose looks fairly common but the fragrance is spectacular.Same for this one. These roses were on this property when we moved here in 1999. We moved them to their current locations. They don’t get much TLC, but hang in there. Several of the roses also have branches from rootstock growing up around them. I can easily identify those branches when they are flowering, but I hate to cut them off when they are so pretty.Yarrow.Amaryllis (not a flower).