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Mina is no longer The Big Puppy in your household! Oh no!
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Oct 16, 2020 16:43
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Mizuti posted:Mina is no longer The Big Puppy in your household! Oh no! Scout is A Baby, Mina is The Baby They enjoy running around at top speed together while Mina makes rabid bear noises. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blfmVfCCAg4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxXvYHAGT9Q
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Oct 16, 2020 17:40
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Mina is a good big sister 
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Oct 16, 2020 17:43
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Instant Jellyfish posted:Jaffa was also enamored until I kicked her out of the barn. Roo was very sad until he turned his attention to Cupcake. He then obsessed about her until I kicked her out of the barn this morning. Apparently he's a serial monogamist so I'm just going to have to remove ewes after he's bred them so he moves on to the next one. What a dramatic and sensitive young man. 
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Oct 17, 2020 02:42
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Instant Jellyfish posted:Jaffa was also enamored until I kicked her out of the barn. Roo was very sad until he turned his attention to Cupcake. He then obsessed about her until I kicked her out of the barn this morning. Apparently he's a serial monogamist so I'm just going to have to remove ewes after he's bred them so he moves on to the next one. YeahTubaMike posted:What a dramatic and sensitive young man. There's gonna be some real heartbreak in the paddock later when they ALL come over at the same time expecting Roo to be their one-and-only...  .
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Oct 17, 2020 02:56
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He’s up to 3 out of 5 but it might be too late for the last two. All the Jacobs are done and I can’t tell if Bialy missed a couple of his or just ran out of paint. The fine wools are always such a pain  At least Mr. Roo is cute and easy to handle but it would be nice if he could just do his job! 5 ewes in 2 days is a lot of pressure for a baby ram, but the Jacob ram lamb was just as young, a third of his size and still got his 5ewes covered. 
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Oct 17, 2020 22:43
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YeahTubaMike posted:What a dramatic and sensitive young man. The Sorrows of Young Wether? obviously if he was a wether, OP wouldn't have borrowed him...
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Oct 19, 2020 14:51
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Mid-winter update. Everyone who is going to be bred has been bred and we should have lambs starting March 9th. Two starter flocks have gone to their new homes. Irish, Mimosa, Hellebore, Sicily, and Katelyn went to a cute young family nearby and Cassia, Cora, Peach and Iris were bred here then went to a retired military dude in PA to have a bunch of lovely lambs for him in April. I got asked to take in a bred ewe from a jacob person dispersing their flock but they haven't gotten back to me saying I would so I may be prevented from making the bad decision to bring home a bunch of new ewes. I do have a number of people wanting starter flocks or lambs in the spring so hopefully, my girls are feeling fecund this year. The sad news is that we've had a lot of losses of our old girls. First was Angela the angora goat. She was 13 and just sort of went down and didn't get up again a few months back. Not unexpected, she had been sort of fading for a while.   [Prism aka Moose (13), Page (10), and Jazz (15) were all penned separately to get some extra tlc and after getting a little extra grain and a bale of second cut hay they all got very sick. Moose and Page the cormos both got rumen acidosis and despite treatment passed fairly quickly. Sheep are basically walking stomachs so when they have stomach problems it's a big deal. They just didn't have the reserves to fight. They were my first cormos and they died the same day so wherever sheep go they went together. Moose   Page   Jazz also got sick but instead of acidosis she bloated. It wasn't frothy bloat but free gas bloat where her rumen just blew up like a balloon and she couldn't expel the gas enough to decrease it. After trying a bunch of other treatments I ended up needing to poke a needle into her stomach to let the gas out that way. This helped her a lot and she was looking almost back to normal after a day or so but then quickly started going downhill again with more bloating and then a fever. Once she stopped eating I knew we were pretty much through but that stubborn old girl kept fighting for a week before she couldn't fight anymore. Mina stayed with her the whole time she was sick so Jazz never had to be alone. I've lost enough animals over the 10 years I've been doing this that I'm pretty pragmatic about things but losing Jazz was really hard. She was one in a million, the very first sheep to step foot on my farm, and I shed a lot of tears for that old lady.   I still have 4 of her children, 2 of her grandchildren, 7 of her great-grandchildren and there will be a gaggle of great-great-grandchildren born this year so her spirit lives on in all the sheep that scream at me whenever they see me walking towards the barn. Hopefully, that's enough loss for this year. I've gone from 7 animals over 10 (not including Major who will live forever and I refuse to hear otherwise) to 3 so the rest of the oldies need to just hang in there.
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Dec 16, 2020 22:38
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RIP all those wonderful ladies. You're a good person for taking care of these sheep and doing everything you can for them. Although the news is sad I appreciate the update.  I hope the rest of your critters make it through the winter in good health, even if they complain a lot.
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Dec 17, 2020 07:31
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Oh no, not Jazz! She seemed like a sweet old lady and it's sad to hear she's gone . Is 15 an impressive age for a sheep?
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Dec 17, 2020 07:53
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Sorry for the losses. What a set of tragedies. Hearing your two cormos left together was heart-wrenching.
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Dec 17, 2020 08:07
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Glory to Italia!
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Thanks friends  The average lifespan for sheep is 10-12 years, although jacob ewes can sometimes make it to 20. 15.5 was a good long run, although it's never enough really.
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Dec 17, 2020 16:57
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Sorry about the old girls. Hang in there.
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Dec 17, 2020 17:48
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Sounds like Mina was working overtime to comfort Jazz. Good dog.
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Dec 17, 2020 22:44
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Mizuti posted:Sounds like Mina was working overtime to comfort Jazz. Good dog. Mina is the best girl ever and I don't know what I'd do without her    She's also a very good big sister.   Scout is...Scout 
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Dec 17, 2020 23:59
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Oh, I'm sorry about your sheep. It's always hard losing an animal.
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Dec 18, 2020 00:33
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Goodbye, Jazz. You were a Very Good Ewe.
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Dec 18, 2020 02:19
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How are the ladies doing with their pregnant selves?
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Jan 29, 2021 19:08
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So far so good! We've got 5.5 weeks left so I have been surreptitiously groping udders every evening and it seems like almost everyone is starting to bag up. I'll start shearing and doing all my pre-lambing maintenance the second week of February so I will have a better idea then. Everything goes so quickly that last month! I recently picked up a new lilac ewe, Woodrose, who is Ashe's half sister. They have the same sire, Moose Mtn Lyle, pictured here.  I met Woodrose at AGM in 2019 and thought she was gorgeous. She was being delivered to her new owner and I commented on how fantastic she was. I also saw her beat the pants off of everyone at SAFF 2019 and mentioned again how much I loved her. This winter her owner was downsizing and messaged me asking if I wanted her. I shouldn't have bought her but I loaded up Scout and drove 5 hours each way to pick her up.   She's wild but completely halter trained so if you can catch her to put a halter on she'll walk along better than most dogs. She's penned up right now learning that I bring cookies and I'm sure she'll come around. SAFF 2019 was the last time she was sheared so she's first on my list to do and we'll see how big she actually is under all that. She was exposed to two different rams before I got her and is definitely preggo. If she lambs in March with the other ewes the sire is a son of one of my rams they bought from another Ohio breeder who used Hawthorn for a year. That could be fun because they'll be Jazz great, great grandbabies and linebred on my first ram, Dennis. Kingsfold Juniper, potential baby daddy 1  If she lambs in April, which is what they think she'll do based on when they think they saw her in heat, the sire is a gorgeous lilac so all the lambs would also be lilac. He's related to a bunch of sheep I like but don't have a lot of in my lines so I'm hoping he's the daddy and she gives me a lovely 4 horned lilac ram so I don't have to go shopping this year. Butternut Salvation, potential baby daddy2  The rest of us are all just muddling along! It has been a pretty mild winter besides a few days here and there of heavy snow. I'm considering breeding for January lambs this coming year if this is the way winters are going to be now. 
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Jan 29, 2021 21:27
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Oh wow. Butternut Salvation is *gorgeous*. Really well put together and he's a lilac to boot? 
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Jan 29, 2021 23:53
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Oh! The other exciting sheep news is that I'm now the director for my region in the Jacob Sheep Breeders Association. If you're in the midwest and interested in registered jacob sheep I'm now officially the person to talk to. There are only 25-30 registered breeders in my region so it's not that impressive but I appreciate being elected anyway. I'm one of the youngest people on the board, despite being in my 30s, so I've had to explain to everyone what the difference between a Facebook page and a Facebook group is, and how an Instagram hashtag isn't an Instagram account. Finding a volunteer social media manager for the association is my first order of business. Edit: A breeder I know just had this pure white jacob born (jacobs are black with white spots so current theory is that she just has one giant spot covering her whole body) and they just look so weird without spots. 
Instant Jellyfish fucked around with this message at 00:49 on Jan 30, 2021 |
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Jan 30, 2021 00:15
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Instant Jellyfish posted:Oh! The other exciting sheep news is that I'm now the director for my region in the Jacob Sheep Breeders Association. If you're in the midwest and interested in registered jacob sheep I'm now officially the person to talk to. This is great news and a beautiful lamb!
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Jan 30, 2021 02:03
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Instant Jellyfish posted:Oh! The other exciting sheep news is that I'm now the director for my region in the Jacob Sheep Breeders Association. If you're in the midwest and interested in registered jacob sheep I'm now officially the person to talk to. Congratulations! That's awesome! I know it's a little ways to go but I hope everyone safely delivers some healthy little lambs. I am sure with a great amount of supervision from the dogs everything will be fine.
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Jan 31, 2021 05:32
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Today we said goodbye to a one in a million sheep. While Twofer's horns were impressive, what was really special about him was his personality. He once stepped between me and a charging ram, taking the hit so I wouldn't get hurt. He found a missing goat kid and baaed until I checked where he was showing me. He patiently participated in many shearing demonstrations and showed people how awesome jacob sheep are. His picture has been used in magazines and on websites and at presentations (mostly without me knowing). I will miss hearing his deep operatic baa greeting me whenever I go into the boy's pasture and the weight of his head against my chest as I pet him.  
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Feb 21, 2021 23:13
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Feb 22, 2021 00:29
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Twofer was amazing. What a lovely boy. I'm so sorry for your loss.
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Feb 22, 2021 00:38
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Can you speak to his offspring and/or what took him from us? Twofer was a legend, to be sure.
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Feb 22, 2021 00:50
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ILL Machina posted:Can you speak to his offspring and/or what took him from us? Twofer was a legend, to be sure. He was a wether (neutered male) so no offspring from him, but he has two sisters and a half sister left, as well as nieces and nephews (and great nieces/nephews etc). He was from a set of triplets, the very first lambs born on my farm, and his brother Roman was put down at another farm last year but his triplet sister Johnnie is still around, although retired after her own set of triplets a few years back messed up her udder. His older half-sister Juniper is also retired but his younger full sister is enormous and will lamb probably on the 9th or 10th next month. Two got sick a few weeks back, the warmer winters have been tough on everyone, especially all my old friends. I kept putting out fires of symptoms but couldn't get to whatever the base problem was. He finally was giving up the fight and instead of letting him struggle any longer, I put him down. Farming is good at teaching you how emotionally difficult but physically easy death is. We're all so tenuously tethered to this world.
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Feb 22, 2021 01:02
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Two was a very good boy and I am very glad he went quietly at home with someone who loved him, as all good sheep deserve.
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Feb 22, 2021 01:09
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I'm so sorry.
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Feb 22, 2021 02:20
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Twofer sounds like he was a real sweet boy and I'm glad he got to at least pass peacefully .
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Feb 22, 2021 02:29
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What a man. Twofer has always been a favorite -- such majesty in those horns! Will you keep his pelt or any other mementos?
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Feb 22, 2021 05:44
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Thanks for taking care of good boy Twofer, especially up through the end. I'm so sorry.
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Feb 22, 2021 09:42
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I hereby proclaim Twofer the Official Sheep Of Pet Island in tribute.
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Feb 22, 2021 17:44
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my cat is norris posted:What a man. Twofer has always been a favorite -- such majesty in those horns! He had been sick so the wool was broken and wouldn't make a usable pelt, even if I had been up to skinning him after putting him down. I took some wool to make a cord and I'll take his eartag (he was number 0002 of course) to make a charm for it. I do have his brother's pelt. Roman's owner gifted it to me after having to put him down, they kept the skull for themselves. I like skulls but I don't know if I could handle having my bud hanging on my wall.
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Feb 22, 2021 17:47
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I've been following your threads since you first started posting about your farming journey. Twofer was an awesome guy for sure. I'm so sorry.
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Feb 22, 2021 20:46
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Instant Jellyfish posted:He had been sick so the wool was broken and wouldn't make a usable pelt, even if I had been up to skinning him after putting him down. I took some wool to make a cord and I'll take his eartag (he was number 0002 of course) to make a charm for it. I do have his brother's pelt. Roman's owner gifted it to me after having to put him down, they kept the skull for themselves. Perhaps you could have one or more of his horns turned into a Shofar, he did have some beautiful horns after all
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Feb 22, 2021 23:00
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maybe y'all could stop suggesting she dissect her good pal
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Feb 23, 2021 00:08
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Life is hard on the farm and IJ has trained us to find beauty and keep memories close despite the often macabre functionalism of ranching. Two is still beautiful and useful despite his passing. I think they were just trying to suggest a fitting commemoration to avoid the feeling of discarding that beauty and wanting to keep Two's memory close by. Maybe IJ could speak to their thoughts better, that's just my take. ILL Machina fucked around with this message at 00:53 on Feb 23, 2021 |
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Feb 23, 2021 00:43
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Fluffy Bunnies posted:maybe y'all could stop Hey sorry just seeing in your previous posts that you're an owner, too. Sorry if what I said was insensitive, I'm not as close as you guys are.
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Feb 23, 2021 04:29
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