Sunday, December 09, 2007

Work on the barn gets done!

I noticed this morning while doing chores that end of our 6' woven wire fence had gotten mangled a bit. After feeding I walked out into the pasture to get a closer look. This part of the fence is kind of loose since it was the end of the roll but didn't quite reach where the next wooden post will be. In the future when we get more fencing we will be splicing them together, but for right now, the end of the roll is being staked with a T-post and then the electric fence begins. It was obvious that a deer had gotten tangled in the woven wire and struggled to get free. The spacing on the wire had been distorted and the fence was leaning out quite a bit. It will still hold our livestock for now so it is not at the top of our list for fixing today. It will be nice when we have 6' fencing all around the pasture so the deer can't get in at all.

Neil actually got a chance to work on the end wall of the barn today! He got about 2/3 of the wall framed in and sided. All that is left is framing around the 8' wide door and putting on the rest of the siding. Hopefully next weekend will see the completion of the barn siding project. We still need to build some doors and my office in the barn but I am happy to have the wind break this wall will provide the animals.

I brought more hay up from the semi-trailer today. While I was in there I counted the bales I had remaining. I have 31 bales left after taking today's load. That means I have only about 45 days left of hay at best. Come January I am going to have to find some more hay... probably about 50-75 bales at the very least.

This afternoon I also took the tractor out into the pasture and collected the down wood out in the tree stand. It made for a good load of wood on the tractor. I figure it will be a couple of days of cutting anyway. Oh, and Neil took a few minutes and sharpened the chainsaw chain for me. I did a test cut after the fact and it was like cutting through butter! That will make cutting wood so much faster.

Neil and I also got the 10x10 pop-up canopy set up over the catch pen for Eloise once she arrives. The transporter called this afternoon and said it would be later this evening that he would be delivering her.

10pm Update: Well, Eloise is here at last! Finally, all of our alpacas are here on the farm with us. She has a cute face but being a black alapca in the dark of night it was hard to get a good look at her. I threw some hay down for her along with some water and after a bit left her to settle down for the night. I can't wait to see her in daylight.

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