and on this farm....

Its been a busy week around here on the farm.  We put up 1800 feet of fencing, installed three gates, deep cleaned the stalls, recieved 15 more chickens (chicks) and have been nursing the livestock guardian dog back to health. 

First we worked on the fence.  What I was hoping would only take a day or two took four.  Im ambitious when it comes to things I think we can do.  As I said the other day we set corner post on Saturday.  Got the truck stuck and had it pulled out on Sunday morning.  Sunday it rained all afternoon, so we rested.  Which I believe Sunday is a day of rest regardless, so that is what we did.  Monday we started bright and early.  Stretched fence.  Learned that we did need tension wire, went to get that and some sticks to twist it.  We bought 9 gage wire and that stuff is tough.  Stretched four corners and had to go buy some more wire.  We worked til dark and I was tired and hungry.  So we came in with two corners left.  I know I am  loosing a day in there somewhere, but we finished up on Wednesday afternoon, after a couple trips back and forth to the farm store. 

The southwest corner of our fence.  My son is out with our livestock guardian. We also have to move our clothes line pole but I wanted the fence inline with the stalls which are directly north of this corner.

We then let the animals out, they were quite impressed with the new surroundings.  Our horse especially, ran a bit and kicked up her heals.  Our smallest goat hasn't been with the herd much so he is needing to learn his place is with them and not us.  Hopefully he outgrows the "pet" phase.  He is our only billy, so I need him to be social with the ladies.

I deep cleaned the stalls yesterday and left it open all night to dry out, I hope.  I am currently waiting for the sun to come up so I can go out to check out how everyone did last night in there new surroundings.  Hopefully all faired well and no one found any weak spots in the fence.

We also got 15 new chickens that are supposed to be larger chickens than my last group.  Our neighbor ordered too many and offered us to buy some.  We got them at a great price so I brought them home yesterday.  They are three weeks old, so still in our brooder.  The temps are supposed to drop down again tomorrow, so I will have to see how they survive.  I think the neighbor might have been keeping them a bit warm because they are slow to feather out.  The picture below is what they are supposed to look like grown up.  We only got pullets (females), they are brown egg layers as well as meat chickens.  I like dual purpose animals.  Our chicks are not as small as the ones in pictures and have feathered out.  I plan on getting some more pictures around the farm today. 



Our livestock guardian has some hot spots on her legs that have gotten pretty bad.  We got her free and she seemed fine until the next day.  She had ear mites and fleas pretty bad.  So we started treating for the mites, which are still an issue.  Now with the hotspots I have her on an antibiotic and still working on her ears.  We are also giving her meds for the fleas.  Apparently the neighbor said the flea population is horrible around here.  Which we knew last year with our inside dog.