Category: Animals

We have three guard llamas on our farm. Their ages range from roughly 10-20 years old. While we are on a waiting list for Finn sheep and patiently biding our time. We decided we needed to be thinking about a younger guard for our soon-to-be-sheep-flock.

We were originally thinking we would just buy a male and geld him like we did the first time we needed a guard. However, we saw this guy we knew he was too beautiful to geld.

So we ended up driving 4 hours away for a starter flock of females to begin breeding our own guards and pets.

We ended up with two registered females and a rescued mama and baby. It was a package deal, so they could all stay together and we absolutely love them. The two younger, registered females need a lot of work, but the older mama is incredibly sweet. She just needs a lot of special nutrition to get her healthy again.

One of our original llamas, Sylvia, has fallen pretty hard for the new guy.

Willie Nelson isn’t sure about the new arrivals yet.

We hope to have registered and non-registered llamas for sale in the future. The coyote population has gotten really dense here, so as we listen to the howls surrounding our farm at night, we feel completely satisfied with our decision and comfort in knowing our farm is heavily guarded.

We have been shearing our own sheep for a few years now. We use old-fashioned hand shears and a stanchion. It’s a rather time consuming process, but the sheep aren’t stressed because they are handled gently throughout the process.

One down…15 to go!

We store our wool in cardboard barrels in hopes of learning to utilize it this fall. We hope to learn to clean, card, spin and felt the wool from our farm.

I sheared the one above by myself, but usually we both take an end. It goes a lot faster!

We have been so fortunate to sell some sheep off of our farm.  We have sold Dorper ewes, Dorper/Romanov ewe lambs, and a Romanov ram.  We have also sold some Texel/Romanov cross ewe lambs.

Sorting day.

Our sheep are fairly tame and easy to work with (minus a few flighty Romanovs).  The Texels just have a really calm temperment.

Some of the girls are looking skinny due to just being “dried off.”  They are on poor feed for a few days to try to get their milk production stopped.  Some of their lambs have been sold, so we sorted those ewes off to protect the health of the ewes and prevent mastitis or hard bag.

The remaining lambs on the other hand are across the fence from their mamas eating corn and alfalfa.  Life just isn’t fair sometimes.

After a hard morning of sorting sheep everyone on the farm was tuckered.

We still have some really nice Texel ewes, Texel/Romanov ewe lambs, and Dorper/Romanov ewe lambs for sale if you are interested just email me or leave me a comment on this blog.

Have a wonderful day!

 Ruby and I took a trip to a nearby town to a dog groomer.  Now we are not used to seeking out groomers…never needed one with our other dogs.  So this was foreign to us.  We found a girl who was will to try trimmig up our sometimes nippy ewok, gremlin, guinea pig, whatever we refer to her as depending on the day…sometimes, Ruby!

This is our precious little girl before.  We decided she looks A LOT like Chewbacca here.

She was already terrified because I put her seatbelt harness on her.

This is her after.  Doesn’t even look like the same dog does it?  We took in a Brussels Griffon and got back a Chiuaua.

Don’t you think she loves it?

She went from a rough coat Brussels Griffon to a smooth coat in a matter of a few hours.

She even got a stars and stripes bandana after her haircut.  She was such a good little girl at the groomer’s while I hit up all the thrift stores in town and had a fun time doing some second-hand shopping by myself.

Randy sheared Dolly, Dad’s mama llama.  Dolly had baby Sidney not too long ago.

This was the little guys first time being handled.  We didn’t have a harness small enough for his little face, so we did the best we could with what we had on hand.

Randy’s Dad, Roger, and Stepmom, Brenda, with little Sidney

Sidney visiting his mama in the chute on a shearing break.

Dolly wanted to lay down rather than be sheared.

Sidney

All sheared and into the trailer to head home.  See you next year!

We have just placed an ad in the High Plains Journal to run thru the last part of May into June.  We are selling some of our 3-4 year old Texel ewes for $225, a 2 year old Romanov ram for $300, and our 2 year old Dorper ewes for $225.  Our flock has just gotten too big with both of us working.

Romanov/Texel ewe lamb.

**Not all of the ewe lambs are black.  We only have two black ewe lambs for sale and one black ram lamb.

The ewes are all nice and healthy with good udders.  They have done well for us, and we hate the thought of shipping them off to the sale barn and would love to see them sell off our farm and go on to another farm.

Texel ewe with Texel Romanov ram lamb.

We have about 7 Dorpers to sell and possibly as many as 20 Texel ewes to sell.  We could fix you up with a nice starter flock if you want to include our Romanov ram.  We will also have Texel/Romanov ewe lambs and Texel ram lambs for sale for $175 up until we take them to the sale sometime in July and August.

Dorper ewes very pregnant and taking it easy.

Leave a comment or email me if you are interested.  Thank you so much and have a wonderful day!