The vet cometh

11:12 PM, 19 March 2010
Temperature: 41 F, calm and clear

Today was quite a busy day. In the morning we separated the ewes with their lambs which had not yet been inspected from the other sheep so that the vet could easily inspect the lambs. We found that the little lambs are all too quick to try to climb through any mesh fencing which is at all wide, so to create a visual barrier we reinforced the miniature temporary enclosure with bracing rods at the corners, and then laid tarpaulins over the mesh fencing so that it looked like solid walls. That was a great success.

The vet and her assistant came, and did rabies and distemper shots for all our barn cats, since the vet who originally supposedly did them couldn't find their paperwork. Fair enough, but we want to be absolutely sure that our cats are protected, so we had it done again.

The inspection of the lambs went well, with the vet showing us how to inspect for joint problems, how to sex lambs, how to properly check for cleft palate (which can result in all sorts of nasty problems down the line), how to do a subcutaneous injection (which a farmer did a couple of times, for practice) of selenium supplement. The selenium is to make sure our lambs don't die of white muscle disease. The vet also gave some very interesting consulting on wethering and culling, among other things pointing out that it is wise to give lambs tetanus shots when they are banded for wethering, and also that it's much easier to get the banding right after they're a few months old, rather than extremely young.

While working with the lambs, it became clear to us that it would be wise to have some kind of temporary marker or paint. When dealing with a flock which can look confusingly similar (such as can be the case with twin lambs) it is a good way of being sure which animals have received attention. As it was we filled the gap with some red vinyl tape which we had on hand, but this was, while sufficient, not ideal.

We shifted the pasture with the 29 ewes a little to give them some fresh forage. We will shift it more, later. A small douglas fir which was cut down and left in the pasture for them has been substantially browsed, without apparent ill effects. It is certainly lighter to drag around, now.

There is a large section of land by now which has been fairly well grazed down. Fresh grass is visible sprouting from it, so it will recover as pasture quite soon. We did some sowing of our intended cover crops, but the actual seed quantity from our first purchase was disappointingly small. We shall have to obtain bulk quantities, and possibly one of those hand cranked seed spreaders so as to do a good job seeding the land.

Where the seed fell should nonetheless be good, between rotting straw and dung, and good moist earth.

Tomorrow we plant more trees, and if opportunity presents itself, we purchase a crusher and press so that we can do small manual batches of fermentation while we wait for the big harvests.