Herding

We're getting a little rain today, which is a blessing. They were saying on the news that we aren't in an official drought, but agriculturally speaking, we are. The grass that we have here is just about fried up. I bought some hay for the sheep the other day at the feedstore, and will go get a bunch from the lady that bought my friends' Jonny and Barb's place in Waverly. I'll store it in the stall that's in the barn. Now that I have a pickup truck instead of an SUV, I can haul a bunch at a time. Of course her hay is half the price of the feedstore. Too many hands to be paid when you have to buy it at a "store". She has lots of last year's hay for quite cheap, which will be fine while they still have grass and aren't bred or heavily nursing.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I ordered the comb for the shears, so I hope that does the trick and I can get them sheared. It's pushing being quite late. I should have had it done around the first of the month... I'm deworming them right now, as they aren't very many dark red road maps in their eyelids. I was told the best way was to do 3 days of Valbazen and then 3 of Levasole, then wait 10 days, look at them again and repeat if needed. Today is day 3. There is one nursing ewe that I know will be thin when I shear them, but the rest are in good body condition. Once I've done the 6 days of deworming I may start to pull that ewe and the 2 lambs out and give them some sweet feed. I plan to rebreed the same group of ewes in Oct., so I want to make sure they are all in good condition before I do that. If she is still not wonderful looking in Oct., I won't breed her. I'd rather she get caught up. I'm hoping I can afford to buy 4 Cheviot ewe lambs from a friend, so I have 6 young and unbred sheep to work this winter. With the hours I'm pulling in at work, I think I can swing it.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I worked till 5am rather than 3am this morning. The kids and I got all the trash picked up, re-bagged and all the barrels taken to the dump before the rain. We went 2 bags over the barrels being full, and even with the barrels and the bags in a portion of an unused kennel, they still managed to pull apart the bags (from the other side of the kennel panel) and strew plastic trash all over. We can't go one bag over the barrels being full between the dogs and the cats. So that's all cleaned up and the barrels are empty again. I told the kids to make sure and tell me when it's the last bag that fits into the last barrel. Dump runs are my duty I guess. Ben never goes.

I didn't get to work Kit or Gwen the other day. Being that the temp has been 97-99, without any heat index, it's just not doable! With the cold front that came in this afternoon, maybe I can quick play with them tonight before work. I just called work and there is no truck. I told Rodney I stayed 2 hours over this morning, and could I come in at 8 instead of 6 since there's no truck. That was fine. I would go over 40 hours if I went in at 6. I'd rather GO IN 2 hours later than come home 2 hours early. The over-40 is nice, but so is 8pm!

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'm entering a small trial the 19-20th of July, so I'm looking forward to that. I look at these trials as more training than trialing. Ella is excited to run Mary Jane both days. I'm also planning on running both days at the trial in August instead of just one day. That's the beauty of a paycheck! I just pull some money from my checks, buy a money order and send in my entry. No need to run it by Ben first and hope we can afford my "habit". If I can't afford to trial now that I'm working, than I'll quit- what's the point? I'm not going to work 80 hours a paycheck and NOT trial! It's what I enjoy doing and I'm not going to work 5 days a week, and then not go! At a trial last summer where I was exhausting the last of runs for weekend, I made a decision. As I sat on the bumper of an F250 with my dog under my feet in the shade of the truck, I decided "this is what I want to do". I want to sit on the bumper of truck, in the middle of field with my dog at my side, watch these awesome dogs do what their bred to and be surrounded by people with the same train of thought. Plain and simple. My long term goal is to be able to just that on my own piece of land. I love everything about herding. I love the dogs, I love the stock, I love being around people that have so much in common, I love "roughing" it when the weather is such that "normal" people are tucked in their houses, I love the competitive part of it, and I love the sportsmanship that most of the people involved show. I love herding!