catchall for hay, pastures, water stuff
No one believes me when I tell them our ewes are noisy eaters, much less that you can watch the hay level drop in the feeders when fully pregnant ewes are at the trough. Thanks to my dandy new video cam, I can now document our ill-mannered ladies. True, they are particularly eager eaters right […]
When I started this blog, it was my intention to write only about subjects on which Steve and I felt we had a basic grasp of the research or professional writing about the problem confronting us. This time, I am stumped and so is Steve, and we can rely only on our own observations of a number of our Soay sheep. […]
Everyone here at Saltmarsh Ranch, animals and shepherds alike, heaves a sigh of relief each spring when the sheep and their guardian llamas first move out of their winter hay feeding areas and onto pasture grass. To be sure, the sheep cannot help but gorge themselves, creating havoc with their excretory functions but putting huge smiles on their faces and ours. […]
I have such mixed feelings about Patterdale, our first and only bottle baby. She seemed so vulnerable when she first arrived and then as she started to grow in our breakfast nook, yattering away to be sure we knew she was there and needed milk — all the time. Both Steve and I had to resist the urge to smother […]
For those of us lucky enough to have grass pastures in summer, feeding hay twice a day through the winter in the cold and rain is an annual reminder that not everything related to sheep-raising is fun. In plain fact, it’s a nuisance having the animals’ dietary needs dictate our daily schedule. How to keep […]
For eleven months of the year, I watch with glee as our sheep search and destroy the wild Himalayan blackberry vines that are the curse of fields and streams here in Oregon and throughout the Pacific Northwest. Each year we are amazed at our animals’ ability to forestall the re-infestation of our fenced pastures. Nary has […]