New Faces On The Farm
We got back late Tuesday night from our trip to Canada. I’m trying to catch up on things here at home now, but not doing a very good job at it. I’ve got a bunch of pictures to sort through, and I do mean a BUNCH. Richard and I were both taking pictures, and there’s about 900 of them sitting in a couple of files, waiting my attention. Aye yi yi!
Yesterday morning when I went out to do chores, I noticed some new faces. Little chick faces. Peepers has a new chick (what’s with only ONE chick these days?), and another hen has SEVEN new chicks (that’s more like it!).
I took out my camera when I went to do chores this morning to get some baby pics. Peepers brought her little chick out from under the sheds where she nests.
It doesn’t take little chicks long to imitate their mama and try pecking at grain.
The other mama is a Buff Orpington hen:
The hen on the right is a Sicilian Buttercup, but she doesn’t have any chicks.
I love to watch mama hens with their chicks. They are soooooo uber protective. They fluff out their feathers to make themselves look really big and tough.
Once all the chickens have munched up all the scratch grain I’ve thrown out for the morning, Mama Hen takes her chicks out into the pastures to forage for more food.
They’ll come back in when I go out in the evening, cause my chickens just love me sooooooo much they always come running when they see me.
Okay, okay, so it’s just cupboard love. But I still enjoy seeing them come flocking towards me!
Guineas And Their Keets
We still have a few keets, but the numbers dropped drastically. One trio of guineas started out with 12 keets, but only have 3 survivors.
The ones still left seem to be doing well, but then, so did their siblings until they disappeared.
Another couple of guineas have 2 keets. They only started out with 4, so their ratio of survival is at least a little better. You can see the back-end of one of the keets trying to get under Mama Guinea.
Sometimes they stay out where they can soak up a little sunshine.
They soon learn to scratch around looking for food. Here are the two small keets getting some corn one morning.
The little keets are mighty cute, but the adult guineas are a little strange looking with their small head, and plump body.
Sometimes both the older and younger keet groups get close together when they’re both pecking around for a little corn.
That really doesn’t happen very often, however, because the adults are too territorial and fuss at each other. They don’t want any other adults or keets near THEIR keets.
The guineas may be a little goofy, but they do have the redeeming feature of munching up ticks!
Giving our Maremma, Neffie, A Hair Cut
Once a year I have to give our livestock guardian dog, Neffie, a haircut. This is not a fun event for either of us. Neffie, for her part, is not a “people dog”. Maremmas and other LGD breeds have been bred for centuries to be independent. They are often aloof, and bonded tightly to their charges. People are not needed for them to do their job.
Neffie carries this to the max. She does not like to be handled by humans. In fact, I would say the only real reason she can probably think of to have a human around is to put food in her bowl every night.
Nonetheless, she will tolerate me (and only me!) catching her and handling her. She really doesn’t want to be petted, so for the most part I let her keep her distance.
When I need to catch her though, sometimes that presents a problem. If she doesn’t want to be caught, it’s just about impossible to corner her. Fortunately, once she figures out I really want to get hold of her, she usually just sits tight and lets me come on.
Once I get a leash on her, I tie the lead to something with a good sturdy knot so she can’t bolt.
Talk about feeling lower than the proverbial snake’s belly!
Here’s this dog that trusts only me, and what do I do when she lets me catch her? Right off, I cut her. Oh man…. and she never flinched, growled, or nipped at me. The only reason I even knew it is because even the tiniest amount of blood shows up real quick against all that white. You can bet after that I was VERY careful to be sure my fingers were between her and the scissors. I’d rather cut me than her.
Fortunately, she didn’t seem to be upset, and we kept to the job at hand. Not that she liked the procedure, mind you, as you can see from this picture.
The Cave Geek (a.k.a. Youngest Son) was official photographer for the event. Of course, rather to my dismay, he also has the unfortunate tendency to like videos. I was hoping he wouldn’t figure out how to take them with my new camera, but no such luck.
I had trouble getting the mats under Neffie’s ears. There wasn’t a lot of space between the mat and her skin, and her ear kept flopping down in the way.
You can see by the aftermath we took a lot of hair off her.
. . . Oh, and in case you’re wondering, Neffie is short for “Queen Nephele”. If you’re not up on your Greek mythology, she was shepherdess for the ram with the Golden Fleece. It just seemed to fit.
A New Generation of Guineas
Friday The Farmer came in and told me he saw a guinea with one lone keet. I went out looking for it, and discovered there was not just one, but TWELVE little keets running around!
The only problem was getting a picture. The Mama and her helper had them out in the back pasture, and trying to see all those little keets in the taller grass was hard!
Actually, as little as they are when they first hatch out, the grass doesn’t have to be very tall to hide them. I know there was more than one keet in that picture, but I could only see the one.
You can see them a little better in this picture. . .
. . . But they still blend in a lot, and are nestled down in the grass.
A couple days later I got a chance for a better picture, when they were out in the llama pen.
As you can see, there are an even dozen.
Mama Guinea called to them, so they got all bunched up, then went traipsing off towards her.
Once they got there, she sat down and fluffed her feathers so they could all get underneath her.
Already, more than half of them had scooted under her.
It doesn’t take long until they all have disappeared, although the last one seemed to have a little trouble finding space.
All twelve managed to huddle under the Mama Guinea, however.
They’ll stay under there safe and sound until Mama decides it’s time to forage for food again!
Shearing Llamas
All spring I was dreading the thought of shearing day for the llamas. Last year at shearing time our lady llama was pregnant, which changed her whole personality. Where in previous years, she stood nice and quiet and let us shear her without any problem whatsoever, last year was entirely different.
Yes, she was a screaming, kicking, spitting demon! I put a little video of her misbehaving online, but it just doesn’t do justice to the continual fits she had while we tried to shear her. If you’ve never had a llama spit the contents of their stomach on you, well, you just can’t truly appreciate what a stinking, nasty mess it is.
Fortunately, this year she was no longer pregnant and was back to her normal, sweet self. Moral of the story? Do NOT, absolutely do NOT shear her again while she’s pregnant!
The Farmer did the most of the shearing.
Keira stool patiently while he worked away. It sure made things a lot easier, and most of the time Geek and I were just superfluous.
Samson was a little less than thrilled to be sheared, but for the most part he stood still. At least until we tried to shear his belly and hind legs. I think he figured we were getting too near his male equipment for comfort, ha!
Still, we got the job done. The worst part was trimming their toenails. Neither one of them liked that. Can’t say that I blame them, as we have yet to come up with a good method of doing it.
Here’s Samson after the deed was done. He’s a little ragged around the edges, but you can’t see it very well since he’s kushed down.
Llady Llama Keira turned out pretty well, however. Since we did her first, thinking to get the worst over with, she got to go out in the back pasture for the first time since she had her baby, while Samson had to stay penned up.
Keira with her sidekick, Neffie the Maremma.
I plan on waiting a while before letting the two llamas back together. I want to be sure Kiera has recuperated completely from having the stillborn cria, and besides, it’s better for a cria not be born in the heat of summer.
So Samson must continue to moan and groan about his bachelorhood for now.
This is one of his milder episodes.
So for now, the shearing is done for the year. But there’s one haircut left – Neffie. She won’t let anyone touch her but me, so some nice day we’re going to have get the job done.
THEN when I can say positively ALL the creatures are shorn for the year, ahhhh, that will be shear bliss.