Shearing

Penny did a gorgeous job shearing and chatting with the visitors. Chris helping Penny, Amanda raking and visiting, and Julie running the shop; left me free to run around and visit with everyone else. It is nice to have friends willing to pitch in! Lots of lovely new fleeces to check out and one already gone; the loveliest red of them all off Creme de Menthe.

Habanera, one of the black does that had been in with No Size, had a buck and a doe this evening. The buck was first and big and up on mom in no time. The doe is slower, but should get it. I left them to work it out themselves and will go back out shortly. Habanera has had babies before, so she knows what to do. The babies don't always get it. They are both white.

I am beat, but can't go to bed yet. Have to go out and check animals one last time. Saffron's daughter, Mint, is likely to deliver tomorrow. I am definitely going to check the weather from 5 months ago. I bet births are related to cold spells. The badger doe and Jalapeno could deliver at any time also. The sheep, who knows? I will keep you posted.

Life is fragile

If you live on a farm you quickly learn how fragile life can be. At 3:30 this afternoon, Cascabel was up and drinking from her mother. I went back out to feed a little after 5 and found that she had just died. I still had her in the box, since I did not want her mother stepping on her. The swelling had gone down, so I was sure that she was going to make it. It was a shock to find her gone. A year ago, I would have cried buckets over her, but I guess I have learned that you cannot save them all. The best you can do is try all the standard treatments and hope for the best. If the veterinarians were more familiar with goats, less expensive, and not so far away, I might have taken her in to be checked. As it is, with so many others to care for and a poor prognosis, since she was less than a week old, waiting it out was the best thing to do.

Now I have to hope the mom will mourn quietly, since it depresses me horribly to listen to them cry when something goes wrong.

Hope to see some of you here for the shearing in the morning. And I sure hope Penny is feeling better!

Faces and Cascabel

This is Cascabel and her mom, yesterday, before she got bit.

My blog entry today was going to be about the faces of the animals, but I am too tired to be coherent. I took over 80 pictures of the kids sleeping and the faces of the adult goats.

I forgot to mention that the little kid that got bit by a rattlesnake received her name, "Cascabel". It is the Spanish word for rattle, as well as the name of a chili plant, so it fits my desert trees and plants theme. Won't be hard to remember her name!

Palo Seco was allowed out of his pen with his mom, since the other baby needed to go in. He follows me around, so I feed him and Desert at the same time. Desert is jealous and thinks that all of the bottles should be his. He was springing and chasing the other kids tonight, so I shoved him out in the area with the llamas. Brillo and Oreo thought it was great and chased him like he had been doing to the kids. He was too tired, when I let him back in, to mess with anyone else. I might do that on a regular basis. He has no real playmates and is too big to be safe with the little ones. He needs to release energy.

Strange things

The black doe born last Friday got her name today. I fed late, because I wanted to catch a bunch of the sheep and goats in pens for shearing today. I discovered a baby lying flat on the ground struggling to get up. My first thought was that a goat had stepped on the baby, but I felt funny spots on the side of her neck, which really made me think snake bite. I grabbed the baby, gave her a dose of penicillin and put her in a basket, after feeding her some of the goat drench. If she was going to make it, she needed the energy boost. To tell the truth, I thought she was a goner. As the day went by, it became obvious that she had a chance, and I decided that maybe she had been bit by a different type of snake.

When Penny arrived to shear, we sheared the baby's neck to see if we could tell anything. (That was the only thing that Penny sheared today, because she was weaving on her feet and quite obviously sick. I sent her home. Push come to shove, I can shear, if necessary and no one absolutely had to be sheared.) We clearly saw two sets of bite marks. Another friend told me that the rattlesnake is the only snake that bites that way, so I knew what it was. He advised antibiotics directly on the wound.

Marc and later Susan, a friend visiting from Patagonia, helped me milk the mom. I fed the baby a few times and then this evening went out to feed again. I have been keeping the kid in a box in a pen with her mom, so they keep each other company.Since the baby cannot get up and move, I did not want to leave her where her mother could step on her. I sat on the ground to feed the baby, thinking it was going to be another struggle.The mom started pushing the bottle in my hand and that baby started sucking. When she quit, I helped her stand and was amazed to watch her walk under her mother and proceed to drink. She was not very steady, but she has the will to live.

I feel like I saw a minor miracle and that my day has been successful, although I have to admit that I have not accomplished much else! But, a live baby is a good thing.

Quiet Day on the Ranch

All was quiet today. No new babies. I have 20 babies and 19 of them were born over 9 days. Surreal. All of the moms have accepted their babies. The little black one needs to be supplemented, so I have named him Palo Seco (dry stick, for those of you who don't know Spanish or the southwestern trees), because his mother is rather dry. He is really small and about the cutest of the bunch.

Texas Doe and her buck managed to get it going, so I let them out today. Tomorrow I will let out the other two does. Too many out at one time creates havoc. Moms kept losing their kids this evening. The kids were tired and the moms got busy eating and forgot where their babies lay down. Barbara had come out with her two and I ended up carrying them back to the outer shed, so she could drink and eat. She did not want to eat out of the buckets that I had given her. One of her babies wandered into the big shed to sleep and Barbara was frantic because she did not know that.

I have not had a chance to really handle all of the kids, but I was excited when I picked up Barbara's kids, because they have the ringlets that No Size's best offspring have. Texas Doe's both have these same ringlets. I have not seen it in any of the rest yet, but I have not had a chance to play with Latte's kids and I have only held two of Absinthe's.

If I had to make any guesses, I think that the sheep are going to be really active tomorrow. Garnet, the Jacobs ewe was at the front of the pen area, where she never comes. She is groaning, which tells me that she is close.

All of the pregnant does have moved under the mesquite tree at the back to get away from all of the babies. That is where the ewes usually hang out. Lots of grunting going on there.

I managed to wash two fleeces and spin a bobbin of yarn. Lace weight kid mohair dyed slate blue. Someone order a skein and I decided to do a second one for the shop. I have two more skein orders to fill and then I need to start replenishing the shop. I need bright colors!

Not just kids

I taught a Koolaid dyeing class on Thursday that turned out to be a lot of fun. I used a small skein to suck up the rest of the color from a lineup of 11 jars with all of the different colors of Koolaid that I could find in the Davis Monthan Commissary and the local Safeway and Bashas. This is the skein with the 11 colors. I wrapped it in plastic wrap and microwaved it to set the color. It is now hanging outside the shop. It is dry, but I want to photograph it in daylight before I re-skein it.
If you are interested, the reds, blues and purple have the most color in them and will dye more vibrantly than the other colors. Also, you need to watch for the word "invisible" on the package - it means no color - in case you have any doubts! Smells good, but...

Today's kids

The above is Barbara taken 2 days ago. She was patiently awaiting her kids.

Kit, a white color carrier and Barbara had their kids today. Kit had a white buck with a black spot, while Barbara had a buck and a doe.

Kit had hers early, so I was able to have Kyle get her in a pen and hold her, while I got the baby on her. Seems like the two have bonded and the baby is drinking, so that was an easy one.

Barbara was even easier. She did all of the work while I was teaching a landscape felting class. Her kids are huge and drinking off her with no help from me. She and Latte are keepers.

Photos of the above two will be posted tomorrow. I never made it out with the camera, but lots of visitors did get photos.