Ram on the loose.

Evan and I went out to do chores this morning and Evan yells out from the deck, "Hey, one of the sheep is out!"

"No, couldn't be.", I thought. I walked over to the chicken coop side of the barn and sure enough there was our new white ram munching on grass across the fence from one of our buck goats. My only thought was that he was trying to reach the falling acorns and after finding himself on the wrong side of the electric fence had no desire to go back through the fence to rejoin the ewes.

Evan, McKayla and I tried to get him to go through one of the open gates but he was too skittish and confused to oblige. He didn't seem like he was interested in wondering too far away from the pasture with the ewes so I just left him alone and continued on with chores. After the chores were done I offered him an open gate again but he didn't go through.

Finally, after being out all day, I went back out at dusk to try again. Just me this time... no kids to get him all flighty. He was agitated and pacing the fence so he wanted to return to the pasture. I opened the gate and stepped away to give him room. He took a few cautious steps forward and then made a mad dash through the gate and across the pasture to his ewes... who had quite forgotten about him by now.

A quick sniff of all three ewes and he settled right in to grazing.

Yard clean up time.

I managed to get outside this afternoon while Taylor was napping and got about half the lawn mowed and got a good bit of the yard cleaned up and set out by the road for the morning trash pick up.

I love these cooler days we are having and enjoy spending time outside.

Inside, I got a batch of yogurt going for the kids (strawberry).

Last milking of the year.

Today will be the last day that I milk our Dexter cow, Cherry Blossom. She has been giving less and less milk the last few weeks and this morning I only got about 2 cups. I expect her next calf to come in December sometime so I want to dry her off for a few months anyway.

I will miss the fresh milk but it will only be for a few months. After the calf is born I will start up again.

Was surprised this morning to discover three ducklings in the chicken run with one of my dark rippled ducks. I knew she was sitting on eggs in the barn but I thought she had a few more weeks to go. All three are brown frosted over yellow. Not sure what color they will turn out to be. Evan helped me herd them up and put them and mom into one of the brooder pens in the coop. It is getting too cool this time of year for the little ones with no heat lamp.

I moved Fiore, one of our female alpacas, out to the far pasture to keep our stud male Novio company. She wasn't too happy about leaving her pasture mates behind but the lush grass in Novio's pasture seemed to make up for the lose.

Since our neighbors moved away last month we have been meaning to go over and move the two electrical spools and dog house they left behind (we got permission, plus they are actually on our property anyway). The dog house we moved out to the far pasture too. I hope to get that pasture goat proof soon to put our bucks into. The dog house will be shelter for the bucks. The smaller spool will also be used as a goat play structure.

Weight check.

I weighed the two little doelings this morning. Miss Olive weighed in at 16 3/4lbs and Miss Cheddar at 17 3/4lbs.

Cheddar is still having diarrhea issues. Otherwise she seems fine. Both doelings are eating some goat pellets, grazing grass, nibbling on hay and drinking water. I think it is just stress induced and I as long as she acts fine and continues to eat and drink I am going to let it run its course.

New goats.

A local and fellow blogger, M., is going through a major life change that is moving her family to my home state of Maine. M. has three Nigerian Dwarf goats that she will not be able to take with her. She emailed me this week to see if I was interested in taking them in.

So, this morning Taylor and I drove the hour south to their home to meet up with her husband and pick up the goats. There was a mature buck, Milky Way, who is a chocolate with white...


And two six month old doelings, Miss Olive, who is a buckskin with blue eyes...


and Miss Cheddar, who is gold with white...


The little doelings are tiny. They are only about half the size of our doeling, Emily, that is only a month older. They are also smaller then our buckling Jeepster that is two months younger then them.

Miss Cheddar in front of Emily.

Cheddar had some diarrhea in the crate on the way home, most likely due to stress but I will be keeping my eye on her.

Clone troopers, bounty hunters and Vader oh my!

Took the kids to an event at the Science Museum today. There were lots of Star Wars characters walking around: Clone troopers, Boba Fett, Darth Vader, R2D2, Princess Leah and more! We had lots of fun!