A Hospital Stay

I didn’t mean to leave on a cliff hanger. 

We picked Tessa up from the pound the day after I wrote the the last blog.  My son was complaining about not feeling well and I just kind of ignored it and told him to eat better because we were eating so much wonderful but bad for you foods from Christmas to New Years.  Finally the day after we picked Tessa up, I called Nurse Advice Line and asked if they felt we would be safe to wait until Monday to take him to the Dr.  They suggested we go to Urgent Care just to be safe, after a few minutes at Urgent Care we were sent to Children’s Hospital and stayed there for the next 5 days.  Teen Son was diagnosed with Acute Disseminated Encephalomyelitis or ADEM.  It is a rare, 7 kids in 1,000,000, auto immune issue that causes lesions on the spine and brain.  We were lucky and we caught it early many kids with ADEM show up at the hospital looking like they have had a stroke or partially paralyzed.  Teen Son was to get IV steroids for 5 days and then he would go home and slowly taper down the amount of steroids for the next 4 weeks.  Most children have a full recovery after 1 to 6 months we are blessed he has a disease with a high cure rate and blessed to live so close to Children’s Hospital.  Honestly when you are at Children’s Hospital and your child can walk and talk to you, you feel blessed. 

We came up with a routine: Darling Husband would meet the youngest 2 kids getting home from school and they would take care of the animals in the evening.  After Teen Son was given his last dosage of steroids I would go home and take care of the animals before school and get the youngest 2 kids to school.  Then I would go to the hospital and spend the rest of the day there. 

During this time Tessa was feeling neglected so she started jumping the fence it’s a 5 to 6 foot fence depending on where it is but I got a call from a neighbor who watched her jump telling me she could have cleared it if it was higher.  Then Luca started following Tessa, great now we have 2 escape artists!  

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.  

Dogs

When the dogs chase the sheep I put a dangle stick on them for a few minutes.  Tessa being a super smart dog realized if she holds the dangle stick in her mouth she can run as fast as she wants.  When Luca was bad and needed the dangle stick Tessa tried to help him.  We only needed to do this a few times with each dog and they have stopped chasing the sheep (mostly).

Tessa is a sweet, beautiful, gentle dog who is also very skittish at times.  She spent weeks running through the electric fence that holds the cattle in but one wet afternoon she got zapped and ran off.  We finished doing our chores and then went looking for her.  She was hiding behind rocks at the top of the property.  I gave her love and worked 30 minutes to get her to come about 100 feet down the property, for some reason she was fine walking with me along the fence but leaving the top of the property was terrifying.  Slowly we got her to walk back towards the house and the other dogs running around her trying to get her to play helped her get over her fear. 

The Livestock Guardian Dogs love to play with the house idiot, Dakota.  Every morning we let Dakota out for 15 minutes before we let the sheep out, then again at dusk after the sheep are put away Dakota is out running and playing with the LGD’s for about an hour.  One night as we were walking I noticed a large animal near the fence.  Tessa and Luca took off after the animal with Dakota chasing them.  Dakota out weighs Tessa by a good 10 pounds, but Tessa looked back and saw Dakota following the LGD’s and chased Dakota back to me where he would be safe.  Then she joined Luca chasing the coyote or dog away.  It is amazing to watch the Livestock Guardian Dogs work.  

We have worked socializing the dogs with friends who come over.  They have been fine with our neighbors dogs but they had not been around a small dog since we got Tessa and we were worried how they all would act.  Christmas morning my brother brought his Boston Terrior over and Tessa acted like the babysitter all day.  She never let him wander towards the sheep but she enjoyed playing tag with him.  

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.

Bullets

Monday morning we had a coyote in our tenants pasture watching me take care of the animals.  I called Teen Son, woke him up and asked him to get the gun.  He had some issues finding the gun he likes so ended up putting a few bullets in his pocket and one in his mouth.  We had communication issues so Teen Son ran around in the wrong pasture for a few minutes, the coyote got tired of watching me he jumped into our neighbors pasture.  Teen son finally saw it and was able to shoot at it and scare it but it wasn’t a gun he was used to so he missed. 

Monday afternoon Teen Son got really sick feeling no fever but weird feeling and an upset stomach.  He stayed home from school yesterday.  This morning he is feeling much better, back to his cheerful self.  Then he tells me he must have swallowed a bullet because it came out in his poop.  I will be calling the Dr as soon as they open.  

Fillet

Fillet last Christmas.

We picked up the meat from Fillet, the first Dexter Steer we have butchered.  This is the steer I was worried about not being properly neutered so we had him butchered before he would have hit maturity, he was smaller than I wanted him to be but I felt it was time.  I had sold 3 friends ¼ his meat each and have us keep.  A week before we were to pick up the beef one of our friends realized he didn’t have enough freezer space and backed out.  That shouldn’t have been a problem because we had turned friends down of Fillet’s beef.  Darling Husband forgot to check with the closest friend that we had turned down so as I was dividing up the beef Darling Husband was making phone calls.  I had planned on 75 pounds of beef going into our freezer not 150 so I didn’t want to keep extra.  One friend came and picked up her 75 pounds and I delivered another 75 to a friend and we loaded an ice chest with the rest hoping for the best.  Yay it sold! 

Here is the break down on Fillet: We sold 225 pounds of grass fed Dexter beef at $5 a pound we earned $1125.  Purchase price is $500 + $533 for butchering and processing = $1033.  We came out $90 ahead and have 75 pounds in our freezer, except we fed him twice a day ($50 about month + $25 a month for fodder) , wormed him every 6 months kept him in water, fixed the holes in the fence he caused, hired someone to feed him when we were gone.  So I paid a little over $1000 or $13 a pound for my 75 pounds.  

Once again I am not being a successful farmer dollar wise. 

Fillet last month - he is furthest from the truck.

BUT the rewards of knowing we are eating healthy beef who lived a pretty happy life are priceless. 

Teaching my children the lessons and values we are learning by raising our own beef – also priceless. 

Hopefully as we continue our adventure we will have fenced our last pasture, be able to grow more fodder, possibly increase our cost per pound, and have a better system.  We are planning to butcher Minion in the spring he should be much bigger than Fillet was.

We had a chuck steak that we were eager to eat and so I only marinated it for about 45 minutes and it was the best steak I have ever eaten!  

Stick boy was full of questions for the butcher.