Cycle of Life

This morning I was distracted and let the turkeys out while the House Ding Bat was out. 

He attacked 2  the turkeys and it looked like so much fun Oakley joined the chase and the dogs killed 2 Red Bourbon Turkeys.  

So my stupidity has killed a bird AND undone weeks of training on Oakley. 

To show that the cycle of life is never ending on the ranch this morning we had twins.

  I have been saying for weeks we could have lambs any day and that day finally came. 

Shelby had twins this morning.  

Growing Turkeys

The turkeys are growing so fast sometimes I think they look bigger every morning. 

We started with getting Luca used to the turkeys.  

Every morning and evening they go out so they can stretch their wings, run, and forage for food. 

When we got Oakley we started working with her right away to train her to not chase the turkeys. 

Unfortunately we had two wild chickens that I didn’t train Oakley with.  I thought I had trained her to turkeys she would accept the chickens…. 

1) Livestock Guardian Dogs are not supposed to be considered trustworthy until they are 2 years old 

2) I didn’t think about how Oakley would respond when the chicken started stealing the turkey’s food 

3) Livestock Guardian’s are supposed to be introduced to animals that are accepted on the property.  

We no longer have wild chickens.  Totally my fault! 

 Oakley is amazing with the turkeys. 

She will watch the turkeys run, flap wings, even chase her and she has not acted aggressive at all.

Teen Son will be selling 5 of the turkeys for Thanksgiving.  That will be a whole new adventure.

Introducing Oakley

We had been looking for a new dog.  I was hoping to find a Livestock Guardian Dog that was needing to be rehomed.  I still am not a puppy person and we have had luck adopting rescue dogs.  There are several wonderful rescue organizations that deal with Livestock Guardian Dogs.  I contacted them but unfortunately our situation is complicated (cats, poultry, other dogs, lots of company, kids) and the only dogs that fit our situation were a pair of adolescent male boys and I was afraid they would overwhelm Luca. 

Luca was being overworked on his own all night long.  I was tired of getting up with a high powered flashlight to help Luca convince the coyotes and stray dogs to stay further away from the fence.  I needed to get Luca help!  And just as I came to this realization I found a breeder of Anatolian Sheppard’s with puppies that were 4 months old. 

Yay!

Tiffany at blackbeautyfarmandkennels.com and I chose the new dog for us.  One Sunday afternoon Oakley arrived a sweet happy puppy! Oakley had spent 10 days in a truck transport and arrived with problems with her front legs.  

I called Tiffany and we spent hours contacting other breeders and looking up information on what had happened and the best way to treat her.  We decided to give it a few days then take her to our vet and see how things were healing if we needed to do anything else.  It took about 2 weeks for her legs to return to normal.  

Missing Tessa

Tessa was a wonderful dog.  

She was Luca’s leader, the two dogs worked together with her seeming to tell Luca what to do. 

Tessa had the energy to play with Dakota long enough to get him good and tired every morning and afternoon. 

She was the sheep’s alarm, if Tessa barked the sheep paid attention often moving closer to her for protection.  The cat’s enjoyed teasing her to the point that I warned the kids if one of our cats ended up dead I wouldn’t be mad at Tessa. 

 Tessa rarely let a human hand rest without her putting her head under it for a scratch.  She was the perfect loving watchful protective dog.  After Tessa died Stick Boy came to me in tears, “Now the only one I have to tell my secrets to is God”.  Tessa will always be missed.  

New Lambs

It has been busy.  Driving Son is still exhausted as he recovers from ADEM.  We will have a meeting with the school to help make sure his needs are being met.  So far our school has been amazing at helping him, but we are realizing his healing will probably take the rest of the school year. 

The house dingbat (also known as Dakota) ripped into one of the chicken coops and killed one of the baby chicks.  College Girl has been working with the 2 surviving chicks so they are super friendly.  It’s fun to be able to carry the chickens around.    

 

We bought 2 lambs for Driving Son to raise as his FFA project for the fair.  Tessa immediately decided they were her babies and we are now seeing the Livestock Guardian part of her temperament.  The first time Darling Husband drove the fork lift near the Lambs, Tessa was sleeping near them and they ran and jumped on her then stood behind her as the fork lift went by.  Tessa knows the forklift isn’t a threat if you are under a tree so she looked up and went right back to sleep.  We have not worked with the Lambs as much as we should and they are still very skittish with people, but if Tessa or Luca are near they feel safe and let you get near them.  We are doing an experiment with the Lambs: one of them is getting grain and free ranging daily, the other is getting fodder and also free ranging daily.  

We are keeping College Girl's chickens with the sheep.  

Tessa

Last night was a very noisy night, dogs and coyotes were going all night.  Today Tessa was not home when we got up.  I called and called her she didn’t come.  Teen Daughter saw Tessa at our neighbors trying to get under the shed.  I called her knowing she heard me but she wouldn’t leave the shed.  Teen Daughter went to get her and whatever was under the shed Tessa didn’t want Teen Daughter near.  Tessa walked teen daughter back to the gate, came in the gate got some love, and as soon as my back was turned Tessa jumped the fence again to go after whatever was under the shed. 

Tessa is now wearing a drag to keep her from jumping the fence.  

Preditors and Lost Dogs

Our turkey, Palm, showed signs of distress (panting, wings puffed out) one morning.  I was busy and didn’t pay a lot of attention but Oldest Daughter called me very upset at how sick Palm was.  I stopped by the local feed store to see if they had any advice.  He said it sounded like Palm had been scared by something and to see how he was in the morning.  If he was still sick in the morning then it would be time for some medicine.  Oldest Daughter was not happy with my wait and see approach and wanted me to bring Palm into the house but by the time I got home Palm was resting happily on her perch and I was not going to move her.  Palm was fine in the morning.

The next day someone left our gate open and Luca escaped.  I chose Luca’s breed because it isn’t known to be runners like some of the Livestock Guardian Breeds are.  Luca checks on me every 20 to 30 minutes and often is by my side when we are outside.  I was very worried about him.  We put up signs and notified animal control.  He showed up sometime the next morning.  We were so relieved.

Here is Luca sleeping after being gone all day.  Dakota is waiting for him to want to play.

The next night Darling Husband and I were snuggled on the couch watching Alaska: The Last Frontier’s show on predators.  I got up to put on my pajamas and we joked about how lucky we were to have such a small predator load.  By the time I got upstairs I was hearing funny barking.  I called Luca and Tessa, Luca came from running from around the bird’s area and Tessa who never barks was barking by the sheep.   I got Darling Husband and a flash light and together we went to see what had the dogs so riled up.  We found Tessa between the sheep and an opossum.  We opened the gate to try to chase it through but it just hissed at us then Darling Husband grabbed a hoe to try to give it a little push.  In case you are wondering – BAD Idea.  The opossum grabbed a hold of the hoe and hissed and gnashed his teeth at Darling Husband.  We were worried about what it would do if it succeeded in getting into the birds coop so Darling Husband got the gun and shot it. 

 

We had a few peaceful days until New Years Eve.  At midnight a lot of fireworks and guns were shot off in the area.  Tessa ran up to look in my bedroom checked on the cats in the crate by my bedroom door and then ran off.  I got up and checked on her and she seemed ok and I did not bring her into the house.  Partying in our neighborhood, guns, and fireworks went on until 3:am New Years Morning.  I did not check on Tessa after the midnight blasts.  When we got up Tessa was gone.  

Thanksgiving Break

Shrew on her last day.

Shrew picking a fight.

We bought a turkey The Shrew to replace our female turkeys that had been eaten by the coyotes.  The Shrew was a nasty mean bird who killed a baby turkey and would pluck the feathers off of any bird she could get near.  We decided to butcher her for Thanksgiving.  In the weeks leading up to butchering time I watched a lot of Youtube videos on how to butcher a turkey.  Finally the day arrived and Teen Son, his friend, and I got to work.  We hung the shrew upside down slit her throat and let her bleed out.  Plucked her and then cleaned out her insides.  It was not as bad as I worried it would be.  2 days later we cooked her for Thanksgiving – she was tough but delicious. 

The Shrew was a nasty bird and she was only 6 lbs it's a lot of work but not horrible.

Part of the Thanksgiving gathering.

 We went to a friends for Thanksgiving.  We had a wonderful time and stayed after dark and the sheep were still out.  When we got home we all went in different directions to find the sheep, feed the cattle, take care of the dogs, put the cats away, take care of the fodder.  We found the sheep near the top of the property and they were feeling full of piss and vinager jumping, skipping, and running.  The sheep ran down to the sheep pen then turned and charged the fence to the cow pasture.  The cows didn’t like the sheep running towards them so they charged the fence.  Our young heifer, April, didn’t stop in time.  

April eating happily after she recovered.

The spot where April got stuck.  The new silver is an old gate we "fixed" the hole in the fence with.

We have a telephone pole laying against the fence and she slipped over the pole and against the fence and ended up trapped on her side between the pole and the fence.  It was 9: and very dark, the wire cutters were not where we thought they were the other cattle were mooing and stomping around us.  I turned the flashlight on my phone and held it in my mouth and got the hay and fodder to the rest of the fodder while Darling Husband took the good flashlight to find some wire cutters, and Teen Son tried to keep April calm.  Finally we got the fence cut and April free.  She refused to eat and walked with a limp but she didn’t seem hurt otherwise. 

Getting the sheep used to Tessa.

Every day of Thanksgiving Break we worked with the dogs and sheep.  Our sheep love to run and dogs even Livestock Guardian Dogs love to chase.  Luca is a really young dog to be trusted with the sheep.  Tessa a young Anatolian Sheppard is intense.  She likes to follow them at a distance of 30 to 50 feet and they like to run so she kept them running.  Every day we would put Blackwell, Hotrod, and sometimes another sheep on leads and the Guardian Dogs on leashes and walk first one dog then the other.  After a couple hours we walked the sheep without the dog on a lead.  That worked great until we added 2 dogs.  When Thanksgiving Break ended we were able to allow both dogs and all the sheep to free range.  It is so nice when things work.

A silly Pielbuey

The sheep have anywhere on the property to go so why are they stealing the cattle's food?

Introducing Tessa

I had been trying to talk Darling Husband into getting a second older Livestock Guardian Dog but he really didn’t want 3 dogs.  After our episode a few weeks ago when Teen Son swallowed the bullet Darling Husband saw one LGD isn’t going to be enough.  I found an Anatolian Sheppard that a ranch a little over an hour away from us was getting rid of.  We were told Tessa was very skittish and to come to the ranch with a lot of time to get to know her before we left. 

We were told that Tessa was food agressive but we have not noticed it.

We arrived at the ranch and were greeted by several dogs and goats.  One of the dogs ran up to Stick Boy and sat with him licking his hands and face.  We met the owner of the ranch and asked her where Tessa was.  She pointed to the dog loving Stick Boy and College Girl.  We wandered around for a while and got to know Tessa.  Darling Husband fell in love and we brought her home.