Monica and I went out this morning to tag all the other lambs. Everyone is ill here but me and she was only coughing a little bit. The babies all got mixed in with the main herd earlier in the week then the plague was at its peak. It is just easier to not have to carry water. We fed every one and then started trying to match babies to mothers. This process took quite a while as we had two babies that kept wandering all over the place and would not hang out with their mothers. One of them kept hanging out with the lead ewe. I am sure she was even feeding it occasionally but I knew she was not the mother. Monica did the catching and I tagged them. We are up to #28 on the boys and #37 on the girls. These numbers are not a reflection of how many sheep we have had as several have been retagged and some at the start never got tagged but it is close. I want to get Annmarie to put in a running total of all the sheep we have ever owned in our spreadsheet. I would also like to get a Percent Productivity out of each ewe averaged over lifetime and last 12 months. I think she has one of those already done.
We tagged 7 new lambs and retagged one teenager who managed to lose her tag without tearing out her ear. Zeke kept trying to sneak up on the sheep and I kept having to get him to go guard the door. Finally, he decided he could watch the door without creeping up on the sheep.
We had another teenager chicken die. Crazy thing went outside and refused to come back in and froze to death. These chickens were incredibly healthy as baby chicks but I think they sacrificied a large portion of their nonexistent IQ in the process. They seem even dumber than a normal chicken. I am hoping to get out and replace the chicken door motor this week. My chicken door guy sent me a new motor in the hopes that will fix the problem. I hope so.
The box elder bugs are out now that it is getting warmer outside. They are coming inside by the droves. I have renamed our vacuum cleaner the "Exterminator" and vacuum them up by the hundreds. I had to go out and get some more bug spray. Resprayed all the windows in the house and even pulled down a ceiling tile to get at the dead space to spray. It is working. I have vacuumed about 40% of what I was earlier. I found some fancy spray that I have to mix myself that lasts for months. I am going to have to coat the house in it in a few weeks when the temperature starts staying above freezing. I am going to buy the concentrate so I can afford to use it liberally. I may even have to spray the old house and wood shed to cut down on breeding locations for the bugs. The war is on!
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