Work is piling up

Well, the chores around the farm are not doing themselves.  We just got back from four days of camping and had a blast.  Truly enjoyed ourselves for the first time in a long time, very relaxing weekend.  I got to beat on people with sticks and pointy objects.  Of course, no one did anything on the farm while we were gone.  No little brownie doing all the chores while we were out having fun.  We did come back with eight bales of straw (archery and combat props) for the sheep to bed down this winter.  I really want an even ton of straw.  I figured I would put the call out on Craigslist for a ton of straw in the area.  I need to start concentrating on purchasing hay for the winter.  I want to lay in 10 ton of hay.  I think we will only need around 6-7 ton but just to be safe we are going to buy some extra.  The nice part about having a dark covered barn is the hay does stay together and safe from the elements.  We just make sure and feed the oldest hay first.

The sheep don't like being locked up in the ram pasture, so I opened the side gate into the orchard today.  I am hoping the five holes I plugged in the orchard solved my escape problem (five separate holes plugged).  I am not real hopeful, but the only way to figure it out is to let them back into the orchard.  I tied the gate high so the horses could not get out but the sheep could push their way in to the orchard.  I am crossing my fingers for luck.

Going to have to get back on to the fencing starting this week.  Plus, I need to look at the old sheep shed and clean out an area for the tractor and the horses this winter if needed.   I am not sure I can get the fencing  completed and the horse lean to done before the weather turns.  It is the goal, I am just not sure how realistic of an endeavor it is.

The back creek is still running.  It is a little weird as the water table has lowered to the point were the water comes out near the chicken coop.  Above that level the back creek is totally dry. So it counts as having water, since the sheep and chickens can still use it to get their daily water dose.