Milking

Afternoons have been warm and it's been so nice! It's a little muddy in the barnyard, but that is nice because the snow and ice have been melting.

Echo and Sadie love lounging around in the sunshine.

I thought you would like to see the milker in action so I took some videos this morning of what I do in the barn every morning.



Echo usually bangs on the door until I let her into the barn in the morning. She's ready for her breakfast, and she's ready to get milked.

I clean her off really well.
No one likes dirt in their milk!

I don't milk Echo by hand because it would take a long time, and it's easier to keep the milk clean if I use a milker.



The milker is attached to a vacuum pump. You probably have a vacuum at home that you use to clean dirt off the floor. This one is a little different because most vacuums can't get wet on the inside.

I really like our clear tank! I can see how much milk is inside.

When I'm all done milking, I let Echo out of the barn.

I also let Sadie out of her stall so she can spend the day with her mom. Echo loves to clean Sadie as soon as she gets outside. Sadie likes it, too.




I don't mind winter, even when it's cold and snowy. I don't mind the warm weather in the springtime either. I get to listen to the birds chirping while I'm working. I love that!

The chickens lay more eggs now that we have more daylight, too. The dogs are shedding their winter coats. And the goats are getting ready to have their babies!

It's so warm that we'll be shearing SideKick the sheep tonight. He'll be happy to have someone take off his winter coat before it gets hot outside!

Lots of changes happen in the spring! I'm pretty sure I can handle them all. How about you? Do you think you can do new things, too?

A Growling Cow, and Trimming Horns

Matt took JJ's stitches out on Saturday. She still has to wear a cone because she won't leave the scar alone yet. I think another week and it will be healed enough that she will leave it alone.

Echo hates the cone on JJ!

I'm sure you have heard a cow mooing. Have you heard a cow growl when they aren't happy?



When I first heard that sound I didn't know what it was. It sounded so odd, and I had never heard it before. Maybe Echo was sick again? Maybe she was hurt?

I ran out of the barn to check on her, and realized that she wasn't sick or hurt! She was just warning everyone that something was wrong with JJ. What a funny sound!

Last week we had a scare in the neighborhood. There was a cougar roaming around on our street, and the street to the west. One neighbor saw it on our street. And another one heard it! Yikes!

We made sure Echo and the other animals were locked in the barn to be safe.

No one has seen or heard the cougar in a few days. I'm still locking all the animals up at night just to be sure. A cougar can easily kill a goat or a calf. I'm sure the cougar is just hungry because it's winter, but I don't want to be the one that feeds it.

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Saturday we trimmed horns on SideKick, the sheep, and Teancum, the buck goat.

Echo banged off her horn a few months ago and I was so happy that I found it in the barnyard so I could let you see what it looks like.

Saanen goats have tenacious horns! Even when we remove them when they are 5 days old, they often still grow back as scurs (not full horns)

Teancum's horns were growing into the back of his head so it was time to trim them,



We use a wire saw to trim horns. It's pretty fast, and it isn't noisy like an electric saw. The animals don't like it when we grab their horns and trim them, but it doesn't hurt them. It's just annoying for a few minutes.

Horns grow just like your fingernails. Most people trim their nails when they get too long. We trim the horns on goats, sheep, and cows when they get too long, or when they start growing in a way that will cause problems.

This is Teancum's horn.

Teancum has shorter horns that aren't growing into the back of his head.

We don't trim sheep horns very often, but SideKick's horn was starting to curl around and grow into his face. His horn wasn't attached very well so once we started using the saw to trim it, it popped off.

You can see the place where we started sawing his horn.
No, SideKick wasn't hurt when his horn popped off.
No, he wasn't bleeding, either!

Echo's horn shell popped off last fall. I found it and I've been saving it because I thought it was interesting to look at.

It didn't bother her when it popped off. No bleeding, and no problems at all.

This is the side that the horn shell popped off.

The horn on the other side never attached to her skull so
it never grew. It moves a little bit because the skin around
the horn is what holds the horn in place.

When she was younger, neither of her horns were attached to her skull. When she was about 2 1/2 this one attached itself to her skull. I think the part that popped off was the part that wasn't attached when she was younger.

I don't think her horn will grow a shell again.
I think this was just one of those odd things that happen once in a while.
It's interesting to see the smooth area that used to fit on top of the attached part of the horn.

I hope you have a wonderful week learning more new things!

Lots of Snow and JJ Gets Stitches

What an eventful week!

We had a snow day. I hope you had fun staying home that day. I went to work at Nuttalls, which was open despite the snow. I don't mind driving in the snow because I grew up driving in the snow. It was fun to drive when there were hardly any other cars on the road.

I also love the snow because I can't hear the highway that is so close to our house. The snow quiets all the noise from cars and trucks and busses. Even the ambulance and fire truck seem quieter when there is snow on the ground.

I also like staying at home, snuggle up in a blanket by the fire and read a good book. But that isn't what happened on Monday.

Not only did we get a lot of snow, we had a lot of wind. 

Look at the snow drifts that the wind created around the barn.

Monday I was cleaning stalls and dragging manure through snow drifts.
It was hard work dragging the wheelbarrow through the snow. 

I also had to bring hay in from the barn through the drifts.

I had a great workout that day!

Some people like to go to the gym to workout. I like to go out to the barn.

The wind had been blowing so hard that night that we
also had snow inside the barn!

Sadie and Echo don't mind the snow.
Look how big Sadie is getting!
She is too big for her coat!

She doesn't mind.
She's a happy calf.

Are you wondering how her horns are healing?
They are doing just fine!
The scabs are about ready to pop off any day.
She'll be better than new because she'll
never grow horns.

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JJ got hurt this week.
We're not sure what happened.
We think she may have tried to squeeze through a gate and cut her leg.

Heather cleaned it all up and put some
ointment on it to help it heal.
The yellow is the ointment, not infection.

The vet wasn't open until the next day so Matt
took her to the vet for stitches.

She's getting antibiotics to fight off infection. It was a big wound, and she lives on a farm. There are lots of germs here. She is also getting some medication to help with the pain. I imagine a wound that big is very painful.

She's resting a lot.
We keep a cone on her because wounds also get itchy when they start to heal.
She'll chew out the stitches if we take the cone off.

No barn work for JJ for about 2 weeks. She is supposed to stay inside and heal.

No herding the cows or the goats. No chasing the chickens back into the pen.

Someone asked how many chickens we have on the farm. I took a video of the chickens coming out of the coop this morning. They haven't been too happy about all the snow lately. Much of the snow was melted in the chicken pen today so they happily came out looking for food!



How many chickens? Did you see the rooster? He was the 7th one out the door this morning.

I counted 20 chickens and 1 rooster.

Did you make it a great week last week? Guess what! Every day is a 'do over'! We get to try again every day.