Daisy..and random stuff.

I am trying to determine what color Daisy, "Sommarang Daisy" truly is. She was registered as a black and white flecket by her breeder. When I bought her as a lamb, she looked more like a dark moorit with consistent color all the way to the skin, although her face has always been much darker than her fleece.

This year she lightened quite a bit, which I attributed to age and bleaching from our extremely hot summer....until I parted her fleece to take a closer look.



This is what her fleece looks like today, almost a grey/brown color......charcoal/pewter??? She does have some modified colors in her pedigree. Any ideas? I should add that Daisy was bred to my Moorit flecket ram last fall and her resulting ram lamb Ace appeared to be black/white from birth....he has lightened a bit, but if he is a true black then Daisy can't be brown ( brown bred to brown=brown)...she looks brown toned to me! ?????



Random.

After weeks of suffocating heat and monsoon like precipitation, Our weather here has turned absolutely gorgeous. It was 78 degrees here today with very low humidity and it is expected to remain just as nice for the next week or so. It is amazing how much the weather can affect one's frame of mind....at least mine. Instead of simply doing chores, filling water, filling water, and, oh yeah, filling water, I have been able to spend some time enjoying all of things that make me love this place so much. Yesterday, I took my quarter horse, Jake, out for a ride without us both ending up in a puddle of sweat!















My next project is to get Morgan, (the little pony behind Jake) "started" now that the weather is getting cooler. Morgan is 3 now, I have done tons of ground work with her, but I should have started her under saddle this spring........my excuses?? Time and weather......plus, I have to gear myself up for it, she definitely has the "pony attitude", so she will be a challenge and I am not as young as I once was!

I had to post a picture of Jasmine, our Arabian, too. Jas technically is our beautiful daughter Nicole's horse, we have had her since she was two and Nicole was 11. Nicole is currently a very busy neurobiology major at the University of Iowa without much free time, so Jasmine has always lived with us....and we pay her vet bills....and farrier...and feed bills...but it's Nicole's horse...I'm not sure how that works.















The garden is winding down for the season. Remember my pumpkin plants that were taking over Eldridge? They finally succumbed to squash vine borers, (my fault, I don't spray anything) but I still got a respectable crop, all things considered.














Ande looks like he is busy getting ready for the Labor day weekend....I am not sure what that entails for a llama...but, whatever.

Here comes the rain again.

I haven't posted lately because, well, there is nothing interesting happening. I am reduced to talking (complaining) about the weather. I know that a lot of the country has been suffering through drought this summer....I would like to send them some rain...really. We have gotten an overabundance of rain and heat and it is really making me cranky. It has rained virtually every day for...I don't know how long. My tomatoes and cantaloupe are so engorged with moisture that they are trying to escape the confines of their skins and splitting apart.

Here we go again.



I must say the dark clouds did make a nice backdrop for my sunflowers, even though they are looking tattered by the daily deluge of rain and wicked wind. Hmmm...looking at that picture it just dawned on me how tall those plants are. The corn was about 9 feet when we measured last...boy, I am going to have to measure that guy................oh, we really need something exciting to happen around here!

What do you do when it is ridiculously hot?

.......Hang out by the pool with your friends, of course!

I just wanted to share pictures of Emma's little pool party with her friends......Hmmmm, I don't know WHY people always stare when the drive by our house.

The trouble with friendly sheep.

This is the problem with having Shetland Sheep. I have been wanting to post updates on some of the ram lambs because it is so interesting (at least to me) how quickly they change physically as well as how much their horn growth changes from week to week. In order to share that information I like to add photos (as you may have noticed my photography skills are much better than my very weak writing skills, so pictures make it easier to figure out what I am talking about), but trying to isolate and photograph one individual in a pasture of Shetland Sheep can be.....a bit of a challenge. They are like a classroom of first graders "pick me! pick me!". So, once again, lots of extreme eye/nose close ups.




I was able to finally get some pictures of my Gulmoget ram, so far he is looking REALLY nice.

Unfortunately, I can not take credit for this nice ram and his twin sister. Their dam, Thistle Keep Sagebrush Vole was already bred to Underhill Gulliver AI when I bought her from Thistle Keep Farm/Chaparral Shetlands.

I know, I don't need two pictures of his derriere, but he has got such a nice square rear and TINY tail, it is worth a second look, don't ya think?







I am keeping my fingers crossed that his horns continue to look good. I have to remind myself that he is a month younger than the other boys so his horns have not grown nearly as much.


I will try to give an update on one or two of the other boys tomorrow....IF the photo op arises.


Little cria " Ande" is doing well.......now. He gave us quite a scare over the weekend. Saturday evening when I went out to feed the sheep and check on the new little fluff butt, I noticed yellow runny stains on his rear legs, and he suddenly seemed very weak. He would get up and walk a few feet and then lay back down and then struggle to get up again. I know how quickly neonates of any species can deteriorate, and he was clearly in trouble. I also know my limitations and I am not nearly as familiar with llamadom as I am with my other creatures, so I called the vet right away ( farm call on a Saturday night = $$$$ ouch), she immediately started him on some meds for the pain and diarrhea and has me giving him Naxcel (antibiotic) injections twice a day, plus electrolytes and Pepto Bismol. Today he is MUCH better and we stopped the Pepto (yeah, no more Kool-aid mustache) and he seems to be having more normal stools. We are still giving injections and pushing the electrolytes, especially since we have had heat indexes of 100 degrees for the last couple of days and for the foreseeable future.

He is really a sweet boy, especially considering all he has been through in his short life, and all the needle poking and syringes of fluid he still comes up to us for scratches and hugs :).