February is flying by, and yet there isn't that much happening. How is that possible? Just the day to day stuff that doesn't seem that interesting for blog fodder, but then again, that's why I started this thing in the first place.
So here are bigger items from the last three weeks that have created enough buzz that they stick out in my mind.
The week of February 4th we got a new roof! You may recall the roof was damaged back at the end of June during the derecho storm. It never leaked thankfully, but we lost a lot of shingles. The insurance adjuster agreed it needed a total replacement, and we had been wanting to put on a metal roof. Since we had the insurance money to help, we were able to kick in the extra and we now have a beautiful standing-seam metal roof. Brian's mom's cousin (Does that make him a cousin once-removed? I can never keep those genealogy terms straight.) did the project and did an outstanding job. A crew of 4 guys did the project in 5 days. I think it looks fantastic, and we shouldn't have to worry about leaks or other roof issues for many years to come. The color is baked in, so there is no need to paint it every few years either.
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| The roof project during construction. |
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| The finished look. |
After the roof project we spent a couple of days hauling the ewes home from New Hope in preparation for lambing. It has been really nice to have everyone at home. Much less running. The girls are starting to get that round belly, waddle-when-you-walk look that is a good indicator of how busy March and April will be. We are expecting lambs from 81 ewes this spring, beginning around March 21. Shearing is scheduled for next Friday, and we'll get a better look at everyone then. But right now, the marks from breeding season say we could have 22, 22, and 29 ewes due in the first three weeks of the lambing season. Including 19 due on a single day (March 23). Wow.
So what are the ewes doing in these last few weeks?
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| One of the Dorper ewes, basking in the sun. |
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| A Dorset ewe ruminating. |
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| Two of our home-grown replacements, who are about 75% North Country Cheviot, having a standoff. |
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| Another Dorper, check out that belly! |
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| This is 145. She's a friendly Suffolk who was raised as a bottle lamb by our neighbor. She is a famous live Nativity star. This will be her first lambing. |
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| The boys get a few months off. This is our new Dorset and Suffolk rams, Duff and Heath, in the foreground and Bruce, a North Country Cheviot in the background. |
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| Sleeping in the sun. |
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| The Dorsets have cute faces with their short little ears and wooly necks. |
The weather has been a see-saw of warm and cold with temperature swings of 30 to 40 degrees nearly every day this month. We had a couple of days in the upper 60s, and the flowers are poking up all around. There are daffodils, tulips, hyacinths, and surprise lilies waking up, as well as new growth on some of the perennials. Sometime last week the first crocus opened up, but I didn't take a picture. They have been blooming since then, and yesterday I managed to get a photo.
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| Not the first bloom of the season, but the first one captured. |
And the last bit of news is that the chickens have also started to take note of the increasing day length and have started laying eggs more regularly. We got about 2 a day for most of the last two weeks, then Wednesday I got four, and yesterday there were 6. Including the first egg from the new pullets!
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| You recall we had a bunch of roosters in this last batch of chicks? Here's one of the Rhode Island Reds. They are quite striking, and I am amazed how much shinier the roosters are than the hens. |
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| Eggs! The pullet egg on the right is about half the size of a regular egg. |
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| I just love the color of Barred Rocks! |
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| Barred Rock rooster in the foreground, another Rhode Island Red in the back. |
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| These roosters are really big compared to the hens. |
Well, that's about it. The fall lambs are still not separated from their mamas, but they aren't really nursing that much anymore. The skid loader has arrived and we've been working on cleaning out the barn, but it is a slow go. We have a mountain of manure stacked up waiting for drier conditions so it can be spread on the pasture, and we still have half of the barn to finish cleaning. We need to place an order for a few more panels and make some modifications to the barn layout, and we're hoping to (finally) get the electric run and build the storage room before we start lambing. Actually, it would be great to have the electric in place before we shear, but that is not looking too promising.
