Getting Along

It’s been a long time, but I’ve decided I need to get out of my own little world and join up with some blog linkups again.  I miss seeing other people around the world.  Today, I’m joining Tom the Backroads Traveller for the Weekend Roundup.  This week’s items are: Starts with D, dark and a favorite.

Some of the critters are getting along with each other and the winter weather better than others.  The ones in the Love Shack are actually getting along with each other.  I still worry about my old girls in there, but so far they are hanging in there.  Harley has really become one of my favorites.  She’s such a character.

Harley waiting for her meds in peanut butter

Athena, Cinnamon’s only daughter (a doe), was reallly being picked on in the greenhouse, so I let her out. I did manage to check her udder, and I think she’s bred.  I guess if she isn’t I don’t really care.

Athena

Luckily, she settled right back into the main herd with no problems.

Athena, Annie, Daisy (Caroline in the back)

The one who was doing most of the picking on her is Caroline.  Brat.  She might look sweet, but she’s got a naughty side to her.  Here’s she’s enjoying the sunshine instead of staying in the dark greenhouse (ironic, huh, but we had to take the windows out since they were collapsing).

Caroline

I am worried about Penny and Litha and Flower, but they are hanging in for now.  I’m not sure how they’ll do if we keep having these crazy temperature swings.

Penny

Blaze is really starting to look close to having her oopsie babies, so I’m planning on moving her into the garage this weekend.  I think Mary will be a couple of weeks after her, but I’ll keep checking them closely.

Blaze

Hilda and Xerxes are happy with each other, but I don’t know what I was thinking putting those two chickens together.

Xerxes and Hilda (don’t lick Hilda! You’ll get your tongue stuck!)

Every time I go in there, they look like I’m going to kill them.  They run away.

Xerxes is not quite so bad when he’s with Fionn, who is as calm and sweet as a buck can be.

The geese act like it’s a perfect spring day.  I swear they have rubber feet.

Gander jerks standing; nice girls sitting

They do like the hay I put out there for them though.  You’d think the ganders would quit being so nasty when I do nice things for them.

But no.  They still nip at me.  Jerks.

Edit: I tried visiting other blogs, but blogger eats my comments and they disappear.  Sorry.  Guess I won’t get back into linking up again.

Chores When It’s Really Cold

The really cold (but not quite stupid cold) weather we are having right now adds another level of challenging to doing chores.   Part of that is because the animals went from pretty mild temperatures to really cold temperatures.  They have to have time to adjust, and they didn’t get that.  Even Odie is acting a bit cold.

Odie

I worry about Wanda with her fur not completely grown back.  The greenhouse is a bit warmer for her than the main barn.  (The hazy look is my breath steaming.)

Wanda and Aphrodite (and Athena’s body)

Caroline is her typical brat.  Not even the cold can change that.  You’ll notice Anubis on the shelf below her because Zeus is still kind of pushy.

Caroline (Anubis below and Zeus’s back)

I’m glad it did this over a weekend when I was home to check everyone more frequently.  I’m also giving them an extra feeding of hay.  This would be easier if we hadn’t had the ice that froze my door down.  At least I can open the top and throw my bale of hay out and then climb over.  It’s just another level of fun.  Although, I have gotten it chipped away so I can open it enough for me to sneak through now.

Moose

This extra feeding helps me check on everyone.  If someone is not getting up to eat or is just standing there shivering and not eating, they need to be moved.

Cupid and Cutie

That’s why Stormy got moved to the garage on Saturday.  She was lying in the barn shivering, refused to get up and wouldn’t eat when I put hay right in front of her.  She’s doing much better now.

Stormy

Sunday, Dolly joined them.  I have a couple more old ladies and the young kids that I’m keeping a close eye on.

Antigone and Dolly (Pistol across the front)

The front door to my garage is also frozen shut, so I have to carry hay through the milk/soap rooms, or I can climb the fence and go through the buck room.

Xerxes and Hilda (the door that will open between them)

Poor Xerxes still is the biggest chicken on the farm, but he’s also hoping I bring him lots of grain.

I’ve also been breaking the ice off my cattle tank.

Penny

The heater is working, but it is warm and the steam freezes, and it just keeps freezing until it’s completely iced over.

Luckily, the cold is supposed to break tomorrow, and I can put my old ladies back out of the garage.  Of course, with the warmer temperatures comes the threat of more rain, ice, and snow.

Where to Make June Babies?

With old ladies in need of care, I had to rethink where I was going to put everyone for making June babies.  I’ve already decided it’s been a crazy enough breeding year that I’m not even going to mess with any of last March’s girls.  They’ll get to grow another year before they are put in with a buck.

Moira and Venus

Remember, Zeus has to be in the Greenhouse because he won’t stay anywhere else.

Zeus

I had planned on using Anubis to help make the perfect kid, but Zeus already bred everyone I was going to put with him, so I’ve decided on a different path to the perfect kid.  I don’t really even need to use him now.

Anubis

I decided to put the two of them in the greenhouse with the two remaining girls that I need to be with Zeus, Caroline and Aphrodite.  I’m not keeping kids from them, so it doesn’t matter which one breeds them.

Zeus and Aphrodite

That just leaves Xerxes and Fionn.  Xerxes is the biggest chicken on the farm, and he panics at everything, so he is staying in the buck room.

Xerxes

I was going to put Fionn in the Love Shack, but I have old ladies there.  I decided to move my old ladies from the north pen.  All I had to do was open the gate while I was feeding everyone in the barnyard.  Penny and Bonnie should be okay to join the rest of the herd with just a bit of head butting.  But seriously, they have to butt heads.

Annie, Penny, and Bonnie (back)

I worry about Harley with her back injury, so I decided to put her with Maggie and Cookie in the Love Shack.  We’ll see how that goes.  Again, it just took a bit of food to bribe Harley (and Cookie) into following me.  Chiffon and Marge got carried over to the pen when they were done eating sweet feed in the milk room.

Chiffon, Marge, Cookie, and Harley

Fionn and Joani are up north.  Joani was actually pretty easy. It was that bribing her with corn that worked like a charm.  Ironically, Fionn is the easiest one to move.  I just put a collar on him and led him around.  The only time he didn’t want to come was when he saw the other goats still licking the food pans, but I promised him food when he went in with Joani, and he was happy. He’s such a good boy!

Fionn and Joani

Of all the girls left to be bred, Hilda is the only one I really cared about which buck she was with because I have to have her for making the perfect kid.  She’s my only Minnie descendent on the farm now.  She’s also a crazy brat.

Hilda

I had to bribe her with a peanut to get close enough to grab a horn.  Then we wrestled for a few minutes before I got my collar on her as a safety precaution (I’ve lost her before leading her by the horn, and then there’s no bribing her after that).  She fought, drug her feet, stepped on my feet and was a general brat the whole time I was dragging her across the barnyard.

Hera reenacting the peanut bribe because Hilda would not do it.

Finally, I got her in the buck room, and she and Xerxes are together.  Does she look happy about it?

Let me out!

When it’s time for Antigone to come into heat, I’ll put her in there for a day or two and then let her back in with her maa.

Pistol and Antigone

I swear, this year’s breeding has just been chaos.