Farm Stand Open

Recently, I realized another one of my farming plans...at least a start of it. I opened my roadside Farm Stand at the end of the driveway. I'm selling Farm Fresh Eggs and I have a sign I painted and close by, I have a cooler, which I will refill daily. The cooler will be brought out in the morning and sit on a little table and be brought back inside in the evening around 7pm. Inside will contain ice packs, egg cartons and a small heart shaped tin for the customer to put their money in as payment. Its also called an honour stand and it makes sense for me to do, because I have a surplus of eggs, but I don't have enough to justify sitting out there selling them, nor to maintain steady customers with regular egg deliveries. I call it my drive-thru, self-serve Farm Stand. We are a society that increasingly likes things to be easy and quick. We are fitting a lot into our days and having to stop by and drive up to the farmer's house to get your weekly eggs may be a deterrent to some. But...if the eggs are right there, you drop in your money, grab your eggs and go on home. Nice and quick...no chatting necessary, no concern that you are disturbing the farmer or that he isn't home or you waste your time because the eggs are sold out. That's the idea, so at least it will be interesting to see if it works.

Of course, if you do want to drive up the driveway and chat with the farmer and see the chickens and meet the sheep and talk about anything that may come up, she will be pleased to do that too!

Ram-proofing

The troubles I had last year at breeding time with my rams fighting across the fence and at the fence with each other in the presence of the females, led to broken fences and ram lambs with broken front and hind limbs and general frustration from the farmer. I "installed" makeshift tarps with bungee cords and ties and wooden panels late last fall. This worked temporarily but the tarps wore out and shifted over the winter/spring. Another shepherd told me of putting up landscape fabric, so come gardening season, I was on the hunt for something suitable. After searching several stores, I found a brown-ish landscape fabric at Loews in Orleans called Landscape Pro from DuPont that has a 25 year warranty...and no, I don't work for either of them, I'm just sharing what worked for me. The roll was 4 ft high (roughly the same height as my page wire fence) and 100 ft long for nearly $50. I attached it to the gate and as far as the roll would go along the fence so that it more than covered the common fence line. I used a hole punch, making 4 holes in the shape of a square straddling the areas on the fence where I planned to attach it using a soft garden string. I attached it to the ewe side of the fence, top, bottom and middle on posts and in between posts to spread out the wind pressure.

It took a morning to install and it has been working well and staying in place for about a week now amid rain and wind storms. The rams generally have no clue I'm on the other side of the fence and are pleasantly surprised when I'm calling them to the fence for their daily hay ration. I'm hoping that it will last at least all winter.

Pictured here are the rams in their pasture with the covered up fence in the background with a view of the Sheep Barn behind it where the Girls are hidden from view. Farming is an occupation involving continual trouble shooting and problem solving. It can be frustrating but can be rewarding beyond the financial. One of the rewards is the satisfaction of figuring out how to deal with an unexpected problem and discovering good-ole-fashioned "Farmer's Ingenuity".

New Additions to Shetland Flock

This past weekend I welcomed 2 new additions to my Shetland Flock: Windwater Caramel and UnderTheSon Two Bars.

Caramel is my first Registered Shetland ewe. She is a 3 year old mioget, which is a very light modified brown colour. She has a Krunet on her head and white legs (Sokket), but may be Gulmoget patterned (I haven't flipped her yet to see if her belly is white). I bought her from Tammy, a Shetland breeder from Southern Ontario, who was taking a trip out east. We met at another Shetland breeder, Heidi to make the exchange. If it weren't for both of these ladies, Caramel would not be at my farm right now. Thanks to both of you so much for helping me get her here! Caramel was the picture of a doll when I first saw her. She was in the back of Tammy's truck in a large dog crate lying down on a bed of hay, contentedly munching without a care in the world. She was fairly quiet on the ride home in my vehicle, only startling Brianna & I twice with a loud Baaaa!!! when we came to a stop sign. As we drove up the driveway at home, my other girls were in the front pasture. She started Baaing loudly and repeatedly. Brianna wanted me to open the windows, because she was trying to say hello to her new flock. She has settled in quickly after being put in her place by Meg, my flock boss.


Two Bars came the next day through another Shetland breeder, Donna, who lives very close to my farm and Heidi again. They drove to Prince Edward County together to pick up several sheep from yet another, well-known Shetland breeder, Bill. They graciously brought home Two Bars for me along with their girls. Two Bars has fit in rather quickly with my 3 other rams (2 of which are intact) after a bit of head bashing. He quickly learned his place, and I found him the next morning sleeping peacefully next to Tommy, my wethered ram. I'm very pleased with him. He is a solid light moorit ram. What I can see of his fleece is making me very excited for next year's lambs. It is soft and very crimpy. He's 2 years old and seems able to hold his own among my other rams.

Soon Twist will go to his new home and Choy will have to go, one way or another, so this year's breeding season should go smoother than last years, with only 1 ram breeding the girls this year. That's the plan anyway!!!

Horns and Quills

It was a beautiful, sunny but cool breeze blowing kind of day. Perfect for cleaning out the sheep barn....again. I'm getting a new ewe tomorrow, Windwater Caramel and I wanted to clean out the pen which has the remaining girls & ewe lambs. One section was done a few weeks ago when I separated the ram lambs from their moms. As I did the morning chores, I finally noticed the big rams. They are in an adjoining pasture and I typically throw them a couple of flakes over the fence as part of my routine. Twist was covered with white spikey things on his head. I quickly realized that he had rammed a porcupine. Panic set in...what to do! I remembered that my neighbour Pam had removed several quills from her dog herself, so I called her, but unfortunately she wasn't home. Plan B...the internet. Remembering that Pam had mentioned just pulling them out with pliers and NOT cutting the back end, and having that confirmed by what I was reading online, I headed out with 4 different pairs of pliers to try out.


I tied him outside of his pasture in the backyard and gave him his own flake of hay. I held his horns (I love that the rams have "handles"...it makes handling them much easier) and closed on one quill as close to the skin as I could and pulled. I was pretty nervous and shaking, but out it came and rather easily. I did 5 on his nose and near his eyes, before he started to squirm. As he tossed his head, I got pricked by one of the quills. Apparently the back end of the quills is just as sharp. I gave him a break while I went to get a bandaid and a camera. I did 5 more but the wind was taking away the discarded quills from on top of the nearby chicken house. I then went to get a baggie and a helper. Brianna came out to help in her PJs and held the bag of quills close by so I could remove them and just drop them in. When all was done, I counted 64 quills. Overall, he was a really good boy considering his predicament. I'd never heard of this happening to a sheep. I wonder if anyone else has had this happen to their livestock.

I carried on cleaning out the sheep barn. It took me over 3 hours of hard, physical work. I laid down some lime and fresh straw overtop and set up the middle lambing pen to put Caramel in tomorrow night, so she can get used to the new flock without getting bossed around. She'll have her own water and hay and hopefully recover from her long drive.

It was a busy, productive and educational day!