I'm Back

 

I have just gotten back to the farm after a month in the US. I had a great time reconnecting with old friends but I was back and it was time to shoulder the burden and tackle the sheep once again.

The past two days I have spent babysitting my totally adorable younger grandchild, Naavah. So I haven’t been able to hike the paddocks for my up close and personal inspection of the stock. I was only able to get furtive glimpses from the roadway (those darn sheep remember me and run over the hill as soon as they hear me coming). So today I was child free and determined to count heads.

While I was gone, another lamb had been born, bringing our total to 16. Focus on that number, it becomes important later on. From the road I was only able to count 15, no matter how often I tried. So up over the hill I went. By scouring my pathetic short term memory bank, I was able to remember that we had 2 black ewes, 1 ram, and 7 white ewes. Add to that the twins, a white lamb and 2 black lambs for a total of 15. The newest addition looks to be about a week old and another white one was born in the past two days (I think) bringing the total to 16. Still at 16 since one of the ewes is missing.

I was afraid she had drowned in the creek, or was caught on wire. But no! After a long search, through water, thickets, wet grass and all the usual sheep and steer poo, I found that she had gone off by herself to give birth to yet another white lamb. The Stone Tree Farm total is now 18. Not bad. We have had a total of 9 live births, 1 death, so 8 of our 9 ewes are fertile. And so is RAMbo. I congratulated him on my way out to the road. He just lifted a weary head and gazed at me. His work was done and he was plumb tuckered out.

Everything else is going well here. The raised veggie beds are thriving with abundant weeds (my next major task). The house is almost completely painted and the equipment to make a true garden, i.e., posts, netting, etc. has arrived. And then there are the seedlings. Dan planted some of them but I have two flats of tomatoes and no clue as to where they can go. Perhaps pots on the patio with netting over them. I’ll run it by command central and see.

Right now I am sitting back revelling in Spring (it’s a chilly Fall back home) and contemplating setting out flats of cherry tomatoes. Oh well, no need to be hasty. Until the garden is finished there is no place for them anyhow. I think I’ll take a leaf out of RAMbo’s book and just keep on doing nothing.