Ready for Snowmageddon

The -22 windchill Monday froze the condensation on my sunglasses. Continually wiping off the lenses was better than my eyes freezing, though, so the sunglasses stayed on during chores. I saw the sheep and their hay racks through a mosaic of ice crystals.

Tuesday stayed cold, then Wednesday provided a welcome warm-up that allowed Jeff and me to drain the previously frozen hoses, dump ice from the water tanks, and refill them. We put Daishin’s blanket on, bribing him with plenty of llama treats.

Thursday, I cleaned barn pens in preparation for moving animals around. Friday morning, below-freezing temperatures returned. I laid netting out to create an alley from the paddocks to the barn for easy animal movement.

There was just one problem: the ground in the barnyard was frozen solid. When I tried to stomp a post into the soil, it snapped and flew out of my hands. And when I first tried to create an opening in the Shetlands’ paddock, no amount of wiggling or pulling could free the posts from the ground.

Fortunately, when I walked around the paddock, testing out various end posts, I found a place where I could open the netting and move the Shetlands and goats out of their pasture.

The goats maaah’d and trotted over, Shetlands following. I returned to the barn for some corn, and when I opened the netting, shaking the bucket, the group followed me all the way to the barn.

After they’d eaten, I refilled the bucket. Mia and I piled into the RTV and drove to the Christmas tree patch. The Shropshires ran to the metal gates as soon as I drove up; they knew that when I arrived with the RTV, food appeared. I opened the gates wide, again shaking the bucket. “Come on, sheep!”

They followed me out of the gate, and we walked down the side of the Shetlands’ and goats’ paddock.

And then, the sheep discovered I’d forgotten something: I’d left the netting open.

As one, they veered right and galloped across the paddock toward the Christmas tree patch to the Shetlands’ hay rack. It was like watching kids find a new playground and bounce from the swings to the slide to the merry-go-round.

“Come on!” I shook the bucket, corn rattling. “Come on, sheep!” One or two trotted toward me, then looked back to see the rest of the flock staying around the hay rack. The peer pressure was too much. They both ran back to the group.

This wasn’t working. They associate food with the RTV, I thought. Will they follow the RTV?

I walked back to the RTV, still sitting by the Christmas tree patch, and drove it to the gap in the netting. No one followed. I tried shaking the bucket again. No response. Even sending Mia out didn’t work. The sheep stayed by the hay rack.

I felt like giving up as I walked back to the Kubota. It was too cold for all this back-and-forth. But as I lifted the corn bucket into the RTV bed, I noticed the old feed pan that I kept twine in after I cut it from hay bales.

The pan has handles. And I have twine.

Mia and I zoomed backward with the RTV to the hay rack. With a piece of twine, I connected the feed pan to the hitch ball, poured some of the corn into the pan, then bolted back to the Kubota as every Shropshire came running. I drove as fast as I dared, the sheep jostling for position and grabbing as many kernels as they could as the pan moved away from them.

With heads down, they trotted through the paddock’s opening and down the hill. We motored up the hill into the barnyard, where I burst out of the cab, cut the twine and dragged the pan through the gate to the barnyard, pouring the rest of the grain into the feed troughs. The Shropshires continued to eat heartily.

I returned to the first end posts I had tried to pull up, and started digging around one post. The digging helped: the post came out, and Daishin and the Shetland ram were lured to the barn with corn. With these final arrivals, everyone now lived together.

Saturday, as the sky turned whiter by the minute, we brought in the hay racks and all the feed troughs from the paddocks, and we unloaded feed. As the snow began to swirl, we returned home, minds at peace knowing everyone was sheltered in the barn.

Thanks for Reading!

We hope you’re staying warm in this winter storm!

What situations have you encountered where you thought one solution would work but you had to find another solution quickly? Let us know with a reply to this email. We’d love to hear from you!

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This Week on the Farm

It’s not just the ground and the water tanks that are frozen—Sugar Creek is so extremely low that it’s frozen solid. This was the scene from the Jackson Covered Bridge as we drove home Saturday afternoon, a completely different picture from previous years when winter rains rushed down the creek and nearly touched the foundations of the bridge.

As I write this Saturday night, snow falls, shining in the security light. I write a lot about preparing for winter, and the tasks that we do in stages. That prep really pays off at times like these.

Throughout the next couple of days, I’ll make some adjustments to our gate set-up to prepare for lambing, just in case the snow and cold encourage any ewe to lamb this week while I’m gone to the sheep convention. This cold is tough, but we’re glad this weather is happening now, before lambs are born.

Farm Shop

We’re preparing for lambing, and we’ll have breeding sheep available for sale this spring. Let us know that you’d like to see photos and information when the lambs arrive by replying to this email! You can also contact us through Facebook or Instagram.