All three ewes that were showing signs of worms last night were fine today so apparently the double dosing worked. The jaw swelling went down and they were acting fine. We had another heavy rain this morning and it was over cast until about 2PM so I left the flock in the barn lot and fed em about the last of my square bales from the loft that I have left from last years hay. I still have the 46 bales I got from the first cutting this year but I really would like to just put out a big round bale rather than feeding the squares already.
The hay guy never did show up of course.
We got a fourth wormer med coming in tomorrow named Penalite I think so I will have another rotation to try and drench these nasty worms away with. By late afternoon the sun had come out and dried the grass enough that I let the flock out into the West pasture for a few hours before grain feeding.
Finally got the farm truck back. A new starter I mentioned the other day and then four new ball joints later but she is driving a lot better I must say. So I am back in business once again. I can load all my tools and bee keeping stuff back into the tool box and start getting the disorganized mess the shop and out buildings have become straightened out.
With vet bills, maintenance costs, stock losses and such I know I am well in the red this year so far. In fact even though this has to be the heaviest lot of lambs we have produced yet I doubt I will make enough to off set the operating costs of the place especially since I have had to push honey production so far down the list. On the bright side though with the job running the way it is the overall costs are still not enough to cause any real financial stress. I kinda thought this was going to be the case this year which was why I decided to take the job when it was offered.
As long as I don't have any more high dollar expenses or breakdowns things should float pretty smoothly and I can look to going back into the the black next year. A lot of that depends on if I can get the sickle mower working properly though.If I need to shell out some bucks for a better mower then I might sink a bit further into the red.
Keep Prepping Everyone!!!!!!
Yea I saw your 150 over on Filthie's blog, looked a little rough but the girl was in fine shape.
ReplyDeleteNot a good year but you are learning and next year may be the critical one so look at it as education.
We are running close to red this year with vet bills, now the Billies are near slaughter weight that will help out a bit, less feed and some cash, next will be the lambs, next year will be better we will be running larger flocks, glad to hear there is some improvement with the ewes, long may it continue
ReplyDeleteGlad the ewes are doing better. Except for the year we logged a part of our land we tend to be in the red as far as the farming goes. Which is why we have other jobs.
ReplyDeleteYep, labor of love. My wife and I support the vestiges of a free range pig farm playing Appalachian music.
DeleteI reckon that's one good think about not getting much rain - it keeps the parasites down!
ReplyDeleteCopper supplementation to combat worms is much talked about amongst goat owners too. They mostly use Copasure boluses and seem to have good success. I understood that sheep are more sensitive to copper, however, so greater care must be taken to not poison them. I'm not very knowledgeable about sheep, however, so I don't know much about it.
We are hoping the abscense of livestock on this land has reduced the barber pole chances. {nothing but one horse since 2005, and never sheep} I am taking notes from your treatment though. I will ask the Amish sheep farmer we know about copper.
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