Winter Snow Thunder Storm

Poor Jaggie, all covered in snow.

This storm moved in the afternoon of Thursday, February 26, 2009. It came around 12:30 pm and we got one inch of snow the first half an hour. With this storm came lightning and thunder. This is not very common and tells what intensity this storm came in at. I can only imagine what kind of thunderstorm this would have been in the summer.

He was covered this much within a half an hour.

This is the view out our front window at about 12:45 pm when it had just started snowing.

This is same shot maybe half an hour later. I couldn't see past the gate.

The birds were hungry and wanting to stock up on their food.

This is a shot off the back of our house when the snow first started.

This is a shot off the back of the house about 30 - 45 minutes later.

Chores and vaccinating

Well, I vaccinated all of the sheep this afternoon. I needed to get the ewes done in preparation of them lambing. Cash did a very good job of holding them in place so that I could catch and vaccinate each one. I am learning that I need to let him help me with some of the chores as someone will some day need to take over for Jag. Perish the thought. But Jag did turn 9 in October.

Jag then helped me vaccinate the yearlings. They would not come near me in the corner of the fence so we ended up putting them in the building and I used a hog panel as kind of a squeeze gate. Once I was done with them I realized that Lucky has a cloudy eye. I now need to separate her tomorrow and isolate her. I will need to get some AB to give her to help clear it up. Good thing I'll be by a Fleet Farm tomorrow.

So, the ewes are all set to start lambing the beginning of April. Now we just wait to see what they have.

Lamb Chili Recipe

Spicy Lamb Chili

1 pound ground lamb
1 medium red onion
2 cloves garlic
2 large red peppers (I also have used orange or yellow pepper)
*Brown all of this in a skillet

2 tsp chili powder
2 tsp ground cumin
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp black pepper

3 - 8 oz cans tomato sauce
2 - 15 oz cans dark red kidney beans
15 oz can diced tomatoes
1 can chicken broth
2 - 4 oz cans green chilies (I have just used another can of diced tomatoes)

While browning the meat mixture, put all of the other ingredients into the crock pot and then add the meat.

Let cook at low for four hours or until warm.

I also will dice up some celery when I have it and add it. When I don't have any garlic cloves I will substitute 1/2 tsp garlic powder.

Ah, what a good couple of afternoons

It was so nice the past couple of afternoons to be able to get out and work the dogs. If only I didn't still have to put on so many clothes. ;o) That is getting better. I mink oiled all of my leather boots and if my Red Wings weren't soaking in their mink oil I could have worn them out there working dogs. That is how little of snow we have!! Woo hoo. But it will be short lived as we are supposed to get some snow tomorrow and tomorrow night, but only 1 - 2 inches.

Anyways, I digressed and got off subject. Cash did so nice yesterday with flanking out nicely on his outruns. As he got tired he started to come in tighter. I worked on his come by out run some more today and had to flip my hat a time or two to keep him out. I also worked on calling him around on off balance flanks. He needs those exercises so that he will take flanks on his drive.

Corbie was tight on her outruns/flanks yesterday and was not giving very well to me. So today I took my whip out with me so that I could make some noise and it seemed to help. I will need to do that more to keep her consistent. I also pulled her back onto the field to work on the off balance flanks too, which she did very well.

Ah, it feels so good to be able to get out and work dogs.

Jag did very well yesterday on taking all of his whistles and flanking nicely on his driving. Today, well, he decided a couple of times that maybe he did not need to listen to me, which he found out is not a good thing.

Oh, I almost forgot, both Corbie and Cash are picking up on their down whistles very nicely. When they are correct, they take their whistles. When they are too tight, nope we don't hear the whistle. What's that, oh she could not have meant for me to lay down now. Yes, I do mean it guys.

Weird weather

Boy is this weird weather. First off the month of January our temperatures were well below normal. Now so far for the start of February our temperatures are above normal. It has been in the 40's for 2 - 3 days now and things are melting. It has been raining, sprinkling off and on today. It looks more like March than February right now. Except that we do have some huge patches of ice in our driveway. Right now there is too much ice on the north side of our barn to work dogs. The creek is running so I don't know if I could even get some of the sheep up to the old farm house field. :o(

I just spent the morning setting up a different area for the yearlings as they were chewing the bark off of our trees in the barn yard. I had to set up hog panels so that couldn't reach any of the trees in the old duck area. I also had to rearrange some of the stuff in our red storage building so that I could set up an area for them to get out of the elements.

I also moved the hay that was left in the one stall into other spots so that I could move the ram and his friend, Supper, a wether, into a dry stall. Then I dug up a bunch of wet sheep poop from the main walk way in the barn so that hopefully the water will drain a little better.

All in all it has been a busy morning. When Steve gets home we will still need to move the feeders for the yearlings and then I can call it a day. Well, after finishing evening chores and such.