On the surface, it looks good. But...

 

I really love this picture. All the green grass, sheep under the apple tree resting. Beautiful blue sky. Just looks so peaceful right?

Well, sometimes things can be deceiving.

I'll spare you the ugliness that's really here.

I was not able to have the sheep sheared before all the lambs came, like I had hoped to do. Because of my shearers dad not doing too well. And he has to work all the time. So it just hasn't happened yet.

But, as each ewe lambed, I had them in stalls and I would cut as much wool as I could around their rear ends and legs and around their udders. Thought I did a pretty good job.

But I started noticing Amarillo with a patch of wool that was pulled away from her left rear. And of course she is the crazy ewe, that did not get sheared back in September, so she was pretty wooly.  I tried to sneak up on her and spray wound spray on it.

Then yesterday, I was able to pull the wool a little more and almost freaked out at what I saw.

So I called my friend Ron to see if he could come and help me get her cleaned up and he brought LA 200 with him. I got the sheep back over across the driveway. Ron brought his daughter Bonnie and I had Kansas here. So I caught one of her lambs and gave him to Kansas to hold in the stall with the door, hoping she'd go in. But no, she was not going cooperate. So we finally got the other lamb. And I put a fence across so we could corral her in.

Anyway, after awhile, I was up by the gate and Amarillo came over to me, panting and scared. I petted her and put my arm around her neck, while holding Pippin. Ron came up and tied her back legs and we got her laid down.

Then I started cutting wool off. It was not as bad as I had thought. Got it all cleaned up and sprayed with wound spray, gave her a shot and some Ivermec too. Let her up and the lambs out.

Ron said it could have been where afterbirth had gotten stuck on the wool and she tried to pull it off. I thought maybe she had gotten caught on the wild rose bush we had cut down out in the field. I don't know.

I am so thankful for good friends. There are several people I can call when I need help and they come right over. I really don't know what I would do without them. My husband can only do so much. And Kansas is a great help. She held all the lambs while I banded their tails. And she will hold all the ram lambs so I can castrate them too. I told her this will be something she can tell the guys when they get too touchy or annoying!


This morning, there was some blood, so I sprayed her down some more. I'll give her another shot tomorrow.

I hope she'll be ok. And Matt the shearer, will be here next week to shear the sheep!!!!

Then I start the castrating of the ram lambs...