Monday, June 20, 2016

Did I say I had fixed the fence?

It never fails, once an animal learns it can get out of the fence it is all they want to do.  It doesn't matter that there is plenty of feed the GRASS IS ALWAYS GREENER ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE FENCE!!  My nephew spent most of the day cleaning out the daylight basement of the old schoolhouse.  He found 6 snakes hiding in amongst the old wood piles.  The sheep also decided to sneak out of the pasture and head to town.  My mother-in-law and him chased them back into the schoolhouse pasture.  One jumped over the fence in the same place the deer are crossing the fence.  I got home from work late, changed clothes really quick and back into the pickup to go see if I could find the sheep hole.  I, of course, had to put Zeke back in the front yard because he had already found a way out of the front yard!  My patch the day before was not enough to keep him in the yard.  Teaching him to jump over, under, through and running up rock cribs to herd the sheep is haunting us when it comes to keeping him in the yard. 
We drove down to four corners and found out that the deer again have been jumping through the fence and squished it down in several places.  We fixed the hanging rock crib, tightened the wires along the top, drove in a couple of new metal posts, and straightened the fence along this short section.  It looked great.  I am confident it will work now.  As we headed back to the house I decided to go check on the hay fields to see if it is time to cut them for hay.  They look like they are ready, but I noticed these moving blobs on the back hillside, sheep where they should not be!  We had to drive back and go herd them back into the field.  They are crawling through the creek crossing again.  I attempted to straighten out the panels, but it needs one more panel to fill in the gap.  Mouse did better than Zeke.  Zeke got distracted by the deer and Mouse stayed on task.  Now Mouse didn't want to quit and Zeke would but I was able to finally call Mouse off after he pushed everyone into a tight ball. 

When we got to the house Mouse ran after the black and white kitty and started fighting with it.  He would not back off!  I ran at him screaming now and let go, he ignored me, as I rounded the corner of the shed he let go of the cat.  I grabbed him by the throat, rolled him onto his back and choked him for about ten seconds growling at him as I exerted some dominance behavior.  He caught on quick.  I made him sit in the yard while we finished up with the chickens.  He has been very good the rest of the evening.  I am always amazed at this breed to attempt to establish dominance.  As a puppy they are very aggressive. Mouse is so much better and more responsive than Zeke was at age 2, and he is only about 8 months old. 
I did spot the cows this morning and this evening.  They are where they belong and everyone is in the correct place.  I also saw four more little bucks on my way to work in the morning. 
Here is to tomorrow being boring.

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