Barn kitties storm the castle

2 of my barn kitties (Atia & Titus) came in from the cold Tues evening. I tried to get them to stay at the barn when I fed them but when they showed up on the porch about dark covered in snow and the wind started blowing, it was all over for them being “barn” kitties! Jake is accepting it better than I expected – much better as a matter of fact. He is even playing a little bit and making chirpy noises instead of demon kitty sounds so I think this is going to work out.

I don’t know how cold it got Tues night but when I got up it was 5 and the wind chill was like -10. So now my worry is Lucius. He doesn’t come up to the house with Titus and Atia, seems to prefer the barn. He’s got plenty of places to snug down in the barn and he’s got his own hidey-hole in the log barn. But without his 2 cuddle-buddies for body heat I’m concerned he got too cold…

Man – what a cold day! Don’t know how he does it, but Lucius was toasty warm when he met me at the barn. He came running from the log barn. He must be part polar bear – he sure looks like one!

I reheated the snuggle safes and put them in the igloo with nice soft bedding – he wasn’t impressed. Enjoyed the warmed canned cat food muchly however, especially the part about not having to share with Atia and Titus.

Who, by the way, have not set foot outside the door today. Hey, this house living is niiiiicccce. Girl! Could you bring another bowl of kibbles over here please!?

Stupid alpaca boys were all cushed around the hay bunks – right out in the open with the wind and all. So I took a whole bale (via sled – that was fun!) down to their shed and parceled it out to the 4 corners with a big pile in the middle. Major munching and I haven’t seen them come out of the shed all day! I did put another bale into the 2 outside haybunks so in case they decide to go back out in the open, they’ll have something to eat. It is where they usually sleep at night.

Smart alpaca girls didn’t appear to have left their shed at all till I showed up dragging a bale for them. But, not so smart, they seem to think the closed part (the original shed) is just for potty. They are bunking down under the back lean-to which is still quite open to wind. It does have a fairly deep wasted hay pad for laying on. No one was shivering, not even Rodger, so I guess they are holding up OK.

I get such a kick out of Henry in the snow, what a knucklehead. Thinks he’s a canine snowplow I guess – puts his muzzle down under the snow… and then runs pushing the show up over his head. When he’s got a good pile, he likes to roll in it. Molly is much too busy for such playful nonsense. She’s busy tracking good smells (squirrels most likely) that always seem to dead end going up a tree. Whereupon the offending tree must be barked at long and loudly…

Snowing like crazy again. Sticking of course – never broke 20 Wednes. I’m totally OK with this, liking it in fact. Got my milk and bread and beer stocked up, plenty of good eggs (Joe got a double yolk!!) and butter. I don’t have anywhere I need to go and that’s a good thing…

Ruined as working barn kitties? I should say. Still won’t set foot outside. And oh my gosh are they having a big time. They have explored every square inch of this house. I didn’t have to show them where the litter boxes are, they found them. I didn’t have to show them where kitty food is, they found it. dog food, ditto. Bed… found it. Joe’s toes… found’em and got themselves whacked with his pillow. Strings that raise and lower the blinds in the bedroom – romping and stomping – major big fun at 4 am. As soon as it hits 30, I’m throwing their rampaging little butts out! Let’em burn off some energy! They’re so big I forget they are still only 6 mos old kittens.

We did get a another good amount of snow Wednes night but with the warm up coming it won’t last. The driveway iced over really bad, especially in that curve coming up to the house from the barn. The trash truck tried (which really surprised me!) but got stuck just after they made the curve. Had to back down to the barn lot to turn around and go back out the way they came. That was scary to watch! I kept thinking they were going to slide off and over into the creek. I bet the driver was crappin’ his Carhartts!! Joe still has the cans sitting out… thinks they’ll come back later today. Ha ha ha hah! yeah right, like next week! silly hubby.

Enjoy the snow while it lasts. Adore an alpaca, kiss the kitties, pat a pup, hug a hubby! Stay warm,
Starr

Shearing Crew Job Descriptions

I came up with these Job Descriptions and I actually give a 3×5 card to each person telling them what “position” they are starting in. A good shearing crew can be as few as 4 people (which is actually plenty) or as many as 7 people.

Shearer (well, that’s always me!)

• helps with body take down if we don’t have enough people
• Shears body, neck, legs.
• Everybody stands back until shearer calls you in!

Pit Boss

• keeps us in order, knows who’s next, and what they need such as: shots or cylence or fighting teeth and jots down any health related notes or comments for the alpaca’s records.
• Makes sure we know who is pregnant and how far along or how old they are or who they’re daddy is and all those questions that always come up!
• Makes sure Labels/insert cards and bags are ready and in place when shearing starts.
• Reminds us to get fiber samples, reminds us who needs to be taken off as a show fleece.
• Tells the fiber person what bag to put what fiber in.
• Makes sure bags are ready and in place when shearing starts. If people are switching “jobs” make sure everyone knows what their job is & when they’re to do it.
• Makes sure there isn’t too much hubbub and commotion esp. around the alpacas head & face during shearing.
• Watches over the alpaca for stress. Has notes about who needs extra towels for spitting or peeing, and takes notes about behavior for next year.

Can double as Head Man if we don’t have enough people

Head Man

• takes down the head,
• sits with the alpaca during shearing, helps with turning over and holds head for teeth trimming.
• Remembers to take the halter off and put it back on.
• finishes head – topknot or cheeks – with clippers or hand shears.
• Keeps fingers and alpacas ears out of the way of the shears!

Doubles as Pit Boss if we don’t have enough people.

Front Legs

• gets the front leg ropes on and pulls from the front legs,
• trims front toe nails, finishes lower legs with clipper or hand shears.
• gets next alpaca to be sheared from stall.

Can double as fiber person if we don’t have enough people

Rear Legs

• gets the leg ropes on and pulls from the rear legs,
• trims rear toe nails, finishes lower legs, butt and tail with clippers or hand shears.
• takes finished alpaca back to stall

Can double as shearer’s helper if we don’t have enough people

Fiber person

• Assists shearer in taking off the blanket, lifts fiber away as it’s cut and helps to make sure the blanket comes off in a single large piece
• reminds shearer to take fiber samples.
• makes sure all the fiber gets into the right bags as neatly as possible.
• Try not to get cut ends against cut ends as that makes skirting harder later.
• Sweeps up work area between alpacas to prevent contamination – color or grade – of the upcoming alpaca from the previous alpaca.

Doubles as Front Legs if we don’t have enough people.

Helper

• Assists with lifting and lowering alpaca’s body to the mat in take down.
• Otherwise, helps shearer avoid having to get up & down or crawl around on the mat.
• Helps shearer by handing things such as the oil can or by dipping and cleaning the shears etc.
• keeps shears or clippers clean and wipes off excess oil.

Can double as Rear Legs if we don’t have enough people.

We need to approach shearing as a well trained team; like a nascar pit crew (or maybe an operating room team??) with every person assigned to specific jobs that they do each and every time. It’s fun and good training to switch off jobs and I think that’s fine but the “job” itself needs to be the same every time for every single alpaca. Otherwise? It’s just a bunch of helpful people milling around with good intentions and no clue what they’re supposed to be doing.

That was fun

The class was really small.  7 “at risk” teens.  But they asked the same questions most grown ups do and were very polite and well behaved.  Credit to their teachers!

Preliminary Necropsy on Coco’s baby

Unfortunately they really don’t know why he died.

They found unusual reddened C3 and small intestine which looked like coccidia in an older animal but really couldn’t be that because he was only a few hours old.  They took cultures but it takes a longer amount of time to get those results back.

He did have a ventral septal (spelling??) defect, a very small hole between the 2 ventricles.  The concern there is it could be either congenital or genetic.  However, it was very small and should not have caused death.  To be safe until you can rule it out – have a vet listen very closely for murmur in future Batman offspring.  Offspring with a heart defect should not be used in breeding pool.  But, most animals with a hole this size would die with it, not because of it.

Lungs were normal.  that is definitely not the cause of his breathing problems.  No, they would have found it if a piece of the sack had been aspirated, blocked his airway.

Just that lactate was very high.  No, not likely from shivering.  They get calves in frequently that are so cold they can’t get a reading and they don’t have lactate that high.  (they said that night it was the highest they had ever seen – like 22 I think she said).  Closest they had ever seen this high was a dog that had died and been resuscitated.

being on Fescue so close to delivery could have played a part.  Associated with full term (long enough) but dysmature crias.  but this little guy was certainly not that dysmature, looked good, ears up, strong.  Just that breathing.

Personally… I think they should have started colostrum before they administered the plasma.  I think he died due to a reaction to the plasma either because the 2nd bag was too much volume or because the 2nd bag went in too fast.

Phoebe was bred to Batman about the same time as Coco.  I have both of them down as “due” the end of this month.  Unfortunately, Phoebe doesn’t look actually pregnant so I may not have another chance to see how a Batman baby does this year.  Besides Phoebe, I’m still waiting for Licia (bred to Triton) and Carolina and Ruby from Jennifer’s herd – probably bred to Jack but maybe SuperFino and of course we don’t know the dates they were bred..  Toots was declared not pregnant by both Ultrasound and Progesterone testing but she looks more pregnant than any of them!  If she is… the baby was sired by Triton.

So 4, maybe 5 more babies to come this year.  Hope it’s soon because the weather is turning cold.  First freeze warning tonight.

Hay’s in the Barn… Aaaaahhh

September 15th, 2007

It’s such a good feeling when you see all those bales piled up and ready to feed your animals when the cold and dark season comes. Smells good too.

But, oh the joy of getting it all neatly stacked there!

This year, as I mentioned before, we’ve had an awful drought and the local hay farms just haven’t been able to grow enough for everybody. So, this wonderful lady – a milk goat farm/Asheville PD detective named Yvonne- took the bull by the horns and coordinated several local farms to go in together and bring in a truck load of hay from out of state. Cool.

Bless her heart – it turned into the project from hell. The driver was late – very very late. We were supposed to meet the truck in a certain place (a shopping mall parking lot) on Thurs morning to unload the 18-wheeler. Oops. Yvonne called Thurs early and got the word out, he’s running late – it’ll be this afternoon. I think it was another call (or 4) that finally set the time at 6 pm.

By 6 pm Thurs night, it was a sight to behold! Pick up trucks with trailers and rented UHauls were lined up – goat farmers, sheep farmers and llama or alpaca farmers where gathered in cheerful chattering clumps. Yvonne brought homemade cookies and her 2 children entertained us with their playing and laughter. Nice Party! But, where’s the truck?

Cellphones – how did we ever live without them? With one call our well-organized plan falls apart. He’s still in Tennessee and his trailer brakes caught fire, he’s got to do something or other – anyhow, he’s going to be late. How late? That’s the million dollar question.

People are performing time study calculations – See, if he gets here by 9, it’ll take x number of hours to get the hay unloaded and restacked on the trucks and trailers, it’s going to take x number of hours to drive home, another x number of hours to unload and restack in the barn – plus it’s going to be DARK and bla bla bla. Some folks left immediately – I’ll have to come back in the morning when it’s light they say. Others were concerned about Livestock or children who had been left alone too long – gotta go, be back tomorrow they said. Some of us puttered and mumbled and agonized because – Larry says it’s going to rain tomorrow and he should know; he IS the meteorologist in charge of the NOAA National Weather Service Weather Forecast Office in Greenville-Spartanburg! What TIME will it rain Larry? Early, very early, he says.

So we dithered on the horns of true dilemna. Wait in the late and unload in the dark or come back tomorrow and do it in the rain? After much discussion – we decided to go home and come back.

Which we did and it did absolutely pour rain and we all got very very wet (except for moi who made a lovely trash bag hat cover!) but tarps kept the hay dry till we got it home and put up. So, it ended well.

Crazy Yvonne says she’ll get us another truckload next month! Yeeee haa!

& Oh by the way… for the record – I got 33 bales on the truck and 46 on the trailer!

Them’s Fightin’ Teeth!

September 10th, 2007

Erin and Susie came over today to help me and Linda trim Flash’s fighting teeth. I noticed the other day when he was spit-faced after rough-housing with Batman that they were too long to wait till shearing next spring. Now, Flash is a big strong and unruly boy so I felt I needed some help. As it turns out, we decided to slip him a little mickey and he was as good as gold! Got a little woozy and pretty much sat on my lap but nary a spit or buck while he was in the chute. Got his toenails trimmed and cut some cockleburs out of his topknot while we were at it.

Susie and Erin have the amazing Tooth-o-matic machine – which is a very cool tool indeed. So, we went ahead and trimmed Triton’s incisors while we were at it. No drugs for him though. He’s a nice calm fellow. And, his teeth really weren’t all that long anyway, just enough you could see them poking up through his lip split. Certainly nothing that would interphere with is eating – just a little cosmetic dentistry for Triton! He’s got some big dates coming up with the ladies this year so he needs to be looking good!

We also gave Val his shot and body lotion. I think his skin is starting to show improvement. I’m quite sure he is scratching less. Hopefully, he feels better although he does not enjoy those shots. 4 more weeks to go poor baby.

While we down there, I grabbed Batman and took out some of his cocklebur adornments as well. Not as many or as matted as Flash but he had a few. Ever wonder why it’s always Flash with cockleburs in his topknot??!!??

Linda and I did Charm School as well. All 4 little boys are walking fairly well on the lead now. We walked them around the ring, out the gate and into some grass above the girls pasture. I think we could have led them down to the barn – my goal for graduation! – but with Triton and Flash in there I was afraid it would be too much excitement for everyone so we’ll hold off until next week for that.

The out of state truckload of hay should be coming in on Wed or Thurs. I’m getting 150 bales. I may not need that much but better to have it than to be out begging in Feb or March. It’s about $300 per ton which is wicked high compared to usualy prices around here but apparently it’s not that bad compared to other parts of the country.

More Hay

September 9th, 2007

Well, sometimes you just have to laugh. I got 18 bales off Bob Sigmon’s little field. The bigger field just was too short to bother with. That’s $5.56 per bale and to be honest – it looks like mostly stems and straw.

I did hook up with a woman who was coordinating a truck load of Orchard and Timothy. I’m getting 150 bales (45# each) at $6.75. That’s a lot of money for hay!

But, I figure it’s just going to cost more as the winter goes along and demand increases, so I better be prepared and get my supply in the barn. Some of us GrassHoppers are still fiddling while the Ant toils. I’m trying to be an Ant!

Aesop Fable the Grasshopper and the Ant

Hay Woes

September 6th, 2007

Jim cut one small field but said the larger upper field just didn’t have enough growth to be worth doing. I bet I won’t get more than 15-20 bales from the little field although I’m sure hoping to get as many as 30.

I don’t know when Mr. Banks is planning to cut. I’m hoping to get 50 or so from him. But, I don’t think I’m going to be able to get any big number from Linda. Her fields are so bad, she’s worried she won’t produce enough for her own herd.

Looks like I’m going to have to go in with some other local farms and have it trucked it from out of state. I need about 150 bales to feel comfortable. I probably/hopefully have enough pasture to keep everyone over winter without supplemental hay but I don’t really feel that way when I see them shivering in the winter cold. I like to make sure they have enough proper forage to keep that rumen cooking – that’s what warms them up the best.

Oh Happy Day

September 4th, 2007

 

Warren Wilson College is back in session and the two young women who worked for me a few hours a week last year want to come back and do it again this year.

3 cheers for super pooper scoopers Virginia and Kristen!

I tell you – it really gets away from you quickly with this many alpacas.

I Let The New Moms Bakc Out to Pasture Today

And WHAT a ruckus ensued!!! The boys were so excited to see “new’ girls that they were all jumping each other – Triton was trying to mount Midnight and Amigo at the same time! Licia got so excited, she kushed by the fence (uh oh – Mary said she was pregnant!) and then Phoebe (also supposedly pregnant) mounted her and the boys went wild!!!!

The babies were bouncing all over the pasture and Toots was so beside herself with joy – she was bouncing with them. She just loves babies. Naturally, Mary says she is NOT pregnant.

I checked about an hour ago and everyone was in the shed – don’t ask me how they all fit in, but they did! I still want to make the girls shed larger but at least they can all get in there when they want to.

Now that the girls are out of sight, the boys have calmed down. Who says you need more space for males – look at this bunched up bunch of boys!

It was a big a chore getting the girls OUT of the barn. First off, Supresa and little Hunny would NOT come into the stall for catching so that took a bit to get sorted out with 1st Ivana and then Supresa having hissy fits over being separated from their babies. Then “sweet” Ruby had some thoughts about being caught and haltered. I think I stink! She got so vocal even Carolina was a bit unnerved. On the other hand – while she was loud and spitty, she walked very nicely on the lead and let me unhalter her with barely a grumble – progress? I was determined to get weights on everyone – which I did but I ended up forgetting to write down Supresa’s!