It's that time of year again!  Time to start thinking about preparing for spring lambs!  Are you excited?  I sure am!!!!!
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Here are a few tips for making sure your girls and guys are in tip-top-shape for baby making. 

• Minerals -Make sure you have a mineral mix specifically designed for sheep available at all times.  I cannot stress this enough!  There is nothing in their diet that is more important than a proper mineral balance when going into rut.

• Vitamins -If you are breeding and milking  a dairy breed, especially in climates with cloud cover much of the year or where ewes are housed,  it is likely that your ewes will need a week-long vitamin boost with A/D before breeding. Milk production depletes this mineral overtime and can reduce productivity greatly.   August is a great time to do this!  Give 2 CCs of A/D every other day for a week.  Consider giving a 2 CC vitamin B complex to increase appetite as well.  You can not overdose this, excess will be flushed out in the urine.  Alternatively, cod liver oil can be given to naturally replenish A/D.  I find this method to be healthier and likely absorbs much better than the chemically engineered vitamins, although the cost will be higher.  Most sheep will eat it mixed into grain, the picky ones may be drenched instead,  
• Sel/E, BO/SE  -Although we already touched on minerals, this mineral is particularly important and especially scarce in cooler/rainy climates like ours.  A good time to give this mineral-boosting vaccine is immediately after the week-long vitamin regimen.  By giving this, you will ensure that your ewes are completely replenished and none of your lambs will be born with WMD (white Muscle Disease) which is a sel/e deficiency, and one of the leading causes of death at or near birth, right alongside hypothermia.  Trust me, it's worth calling your vet and ordering a bottle of BO/SE (bo-say) to have on hand for your flock. 
• Forage/Feed  -Alfalfa and orchard grass is the best choice of hay for this period Aug-Oct.  Lush pasture, if you have it, is even better!  Supplement with alfalfa even when on pasture.  (I love the Chaffhaye bagged product, easy to throw in the back of a passenger vehicle without mess and highly digestible, and my favorite...no waste.  Sheep will not much of the baled dry alfalfa stems.)  Grain can also be given, a high quality barley/oat/pea mixture is best, but in limited quantities unless your ewes are underweight.  If you believe your ewes are overweight, do not give grain.  In general, you want your ewes to be on the thin side by the end of July (after a year of milking steadily, they should be!) and on a steadily increasing diet from mid August to the beginning of Oct.  That is, if lambs are normally born between early Jan and late Feb.  If you are planning for March lambs, delay the schedule by a month.  As a (very general) rule of thumb, most ewes will naturally begin to ovulate for Jan-Feb lambs, and yearling ewes for March-April lambs.  HERE is a lambing table schedule if you are not sure, or are planning to turn the ram in at a certain time for lambing during a certain time period.   
• Deworming ​-It's very important to make sure your ewes are not beginning a pregnancy with a parasite load.  I highly recommend getting a fecal sample done by your veterinarian and deworming at least a couple weeks before putting the ram in with the ewes. Some chemical  dewormer is not safe for pregnant ewes.  There are also many natural alternative worming schedules that can be safely given during and before pregnancy, and I have had great success with these, used in combination with rotational grazing.  
• ACV Apple Cider Vinegar is a great supplement to add to water before breeding.  According to old wives tales, this will cause a higher percent ewe lamb than ram lamb births.  I'm not sure if it does.  But in any event, it aids digestion and the sheep seem to love it.  I use about a cup to 10 gallons. 
• Marking harness -Now is a great time to get a marking crayon on your ram, so that you will have definite dates for lambing.  And don't forget about your ram's nutrition right now as well!  Pretty soon he will be girl crazy and may even forget to eat.  It is very important to have him at his best in the weeks leading up to breeding.

*If you've done all these things, congratulations!  You're getting your 2021 lambing season off to an excellent start! 

I have been so excited to share this, I can hardly stand it!  We've jumped on one of the latest bar-soap fads...yep...DISH SOAP.  Bar dish soap.  I know it sounds weird, but hear me out.  Bar soap is more environmentally friendly than liquid, both for the way it is made, what it is made with, and how it is packaged.  Bar soap boasts no harmful preservatives or expensive plastic bottle packaging.  Also, you have to figure that much of your bottled dish soap is actually water.  That means, you are wasting $$ paying for water to wash your dishes, and you will struggle to use a limited amount because it squeezes quickly and easily from a bottle.  Yep, that's clever marketing right there. 

Bar dish soap is sounding much better already, isn't it?!

But wait, there's more!  Ours isn't any 'ol bar dish soap...it's FELTED with naturally antimicrobial wool..  You are now free to toss the yucky bacteria-growing sponge sitting on your sink because THIS soap comes with a built-in washcloth that will never allow bacterial growth and can even continue to be used as a scrubby once the bar soap has been completely used up.  

This, folks, is FELTED BAR DISH SOAP with Orange Essential Oil and it's da bomb.
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But wait, there's...just kidding, I'll stop lol

 Now you have sparkly dishes, softer hands, saved money, promoted a family business, and saved the world all with less than an Andrew Jackson.  

Whew, July, where did you go?  It feels a bit like nothing has happened, and yet everything has changed in the blink of an eye.  We drilled for water and came up dry (literally) and the new (old) baler we bought for this year's hay harvest caught fire and is now being completely rebuilt.  Small challenges, it seems, to the affairs of the world right now.  But surely, disappointing!  We hoped to have the farm ready to move in on this summer, but it looks like it will be another year at least.  Usually, I am at peace with this, but I do struggle with the feeling that time is being wasted...wasted in trips back and fourth from home to farm and farm to home, wasted in loss of life and vegetable produce since we are not there 24/7 to "police" the sheep and keep them out of our garden (HAHAHA...SNIFFLE) or keep chickens safe from predators.  Money wasted renting.  Money wasted in burned fuel.  Etc. Etc.  It's hard, because the farm is where my heart is.
Or is it?
Sometimes small scale farming can be a really difficult job to see any success in.  Really long days,  (like, 5:30 AM to 9:30 PM most days) and a lot of physically challenging work.  As a family we love it, are good at it, and thrive on it.  But I can also be very good at putting my nose to the grindstone and plugging along, trying to ignore little feelings of frustration with how little progress we seem to make with our little piece of heaven in the hills, until it all bubbles out in tears one day.  But then, I am so thankful for God's gentle reminders that my heart is His...and therefore I would be remis to put my treasure and trust in two of the three English noun categories (you know, places and things, lol) 

​As much as we may want or think we need something RIGHT NOW, it is humbling and comforting to be directed, and see doors open and shut.  And I hope that with every new development, my heart will stay focused.  I REALLY don't want to be remembered for my hard work, where I lived, how much, or how little I had.  I want to be unmentionable, in that way.  Because honestly, everything good has been given to me by a loving and caring Father.  Not because I deserve it or earned it, but because He is so, so good, and loves to give his children good gifts in his perfect timing.  Sometimes it's hard to understand why things happen the way they do, but in the end, I know there is a reason and a plan!  Matt 6:19-21