Special Note from the Flock’s Council of Elders: As a reader of The Ewe Turn, you may have noticed recently that the blog was not available for a few days. Hopefully, the problems have been corrected. Unfortunately, Brie’s last post from November 6th was lost in the process of restoration. We have managed to revive it and it is now posted again below. Brie is in no way at fault and we apologize to her that this occurred.
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I have been trying mightily to post something to the blog. But we never seem to spend enough time in the barn that we can break into the grumpy shepherd’s computer. As you may have guessed, this is Brie reporting, after much too long of an absence.
I had good intentions in October. We had to deal with just the old shepherd. The nice lady was gone for two weeks. She took a vacation with her good friend (the one who Velveeta is always chummy with when she visits). They drove through Canada to Rhinebeck, New York where they attended the New York Sheep and Wool Festival. (That shows they have good taste!) Then they returned again via Toronto, Canada where they had a grand old time (or so they say!) With the nice lady gone we figured it would be a snap to sneak into the computer. The trouble was that we never had a day off in the barn! The old guy kept us out on pasture all that time every day. Even after the nice lady returned we still have spent nearly all of our waking hours on pasture. No, they were not punishing us. It is just that the weather has been so unseasonably warm.
None of us can think of a year when the entire flock has still been able to be out grazing this long. I asked Odetta and she does not remember this ever happening before. She is the oldest member of the flock and she has been here since 2003. Even when they used to let us out in small groups with the rams to breed, it has never been this late, even when it was just a few of us. It is not because the grumpy old shepherd has turned nice or soft. It is because of the weather!
So here we are a couple of weeks ago, in the pasture next next to the house, with all of the trees in beautiful fall color. This is the place they call the “Orchard Pasture”. (Why they call it that, I don’t know!)
We took these pictures at the time hoping to share them with our readers. I am sorry it took so long. Usually by the time these pictures were taken, the trees would have lost their leaves. We even got to see the nice birch tree next to where the shepherds spend most of their time.
At the time we were also grazing near the road. Needless to say we did stop a lot of traffic, since there were many tourists out looking at the fall colors. I am guessing that our pictures showed up all over the place on social media sites like Facebook. After all we are all pretty cute, if I may say so myself. (That’s my good buddy, Winona, in the foreground.)
It’s now November. We finished grazing the “Orchard” some time ago. We have worked our way through the pasture east of the barn of the barn, next to the road. (That’s the “Road Pasture”…original name what?!) Now we are grazing Pasture #1. We should finish it up today (November 5th). This is what it looked like a couple of weeks ago.
This is before we were able to graze it, so there was still lots there to eat. Now we are working our way south. At this rate soon we will be in Pasture #2. It is just around the corner, to the left, in the picture below.
Sadly, almost all of the leaves have now fallen off the trees and therefore it is not nearly as pretty. Just to bring everything up to date, here is what it is like this afternoon at the south end of #1.
We keep waiting for the temperatures to turn cold enough that the grass will freeze and stop growing. When that happens the water lines will also freeze up. It that does not occur pretty soon we will not have much pasture left to graze anyway, since the grass is not growing much now. If that happens it will mean that meals will have to start in the barn and that winter is on its way. Maybe by then I will at least be able to get back to you sooner. Thank you for your time. Respectfully submitted,
Brie