We had the sheep shorn over the long weekend in May ~ Jerry came by and had the 14 done in a little over an hour.  The sheep were so happy to be naked - and from the weight of the fleeces, I can understand why!  Buckwheat (the ram) gave us 14 lbs for his first clip. 
May 28 was alpaca shearing... Rob and his team from AGR Shearing showed up bright and early (in the new bus!) and by noon we had shorn 16 of ours ~ Michele and I had already shorn little Rudy and Phoenix when Jerry had come by, and Santana was still feeling the effects of being sick so we postponed his shearing until he was stronger.  Those 3 fewer animals gave us enough time to shear Leslie Comfort's 6 new females and still have lunch at 1215. The shearing bus left at 1:30 for another farm.
We were thrilled to have Peggy-Sue Deaven-Smiltnieks from the Peggy Sue Collection come and help out.  Her amazing company sources not only locally-produced fibre, but supports local processing and craftsmanship.  We are so excited to be part of her journey.  Her story can be found at www.peggysuecollection.com.

We've spent the weeks since sorting and classing the fibre (white is almost done) and creating more things for our farmer's market.  

We have been building Felt-Your-Own soap kits, which give you the opportunity to do a craft, while making something practical as well as pretty.   

We are also in the process of starting up our own Etsy Store!  I have to admit that it's hard to find the time to really take advantage of social media and all the amazing tools the internet has to offer when we're busy taking care of animals (not to mention mucking out the barn!) and making stuff, but we are progressing slowly.  It's exciting for us to imagine getting our awesome fibre out to people who are looking for raw materials for their own work, or finished products that echo their own beliefs in how we should live in this world.   

Thanksgiving Monday: The way that our barn is setup, there is one gate area where the boys and girls can see each other.  In order to minimize how frisky the boys get, we've been hanging blankets over the gate to block out the view.  We decided to do some arts & crafts, and to weave some fabric through the gated area to make the "curtain" more solid.  The other side of this gate doesn't have any fencing on it, it's simply bars.  We wove fabric through it, too, but it's a lot less structured. We'll see if it can withstand Dixie and the insistant boys!

Update on Tuesday:  Our good looking gate totally withstood the boys through the night.  But it lasted only 2 hours until Dixie chewed through the un-fenced portion and snuck out to be in the paddock.
Today, she had absolute full-moon fever!  Lately she has been breaking into the duck pen so she can check out the ducks and swans.  Then she hops onto a rock and hops out of the pen into the driveway.  A convenient way to escape the confines of the pasture!  We had fixed the vulnerable fence area which seemed to keep her out.  But today, when confronted with the newly shored up fence, Dixie jumped over another portion of the fence.  Back into the duck pen, back over the fence along the driveway and freedom! One of the boys caught her and put her back into the barn but didn't put her in the locked area - he just shut the barn door.  As soon as I opened up the barn door, she took off running.  And run she did - it was an excellent game, apparently.  She had 3 of us chasing her, and she managed to keep out of our clutches.  We were scared because she kept getting closer to the road, and showed no sign of listening or stopping.  Finally, I crouched down and called her - and wouldn't you know it she came galloping right up to me.  So once again she was tied up.
Sometimes we get discouraged - she seems to take a step forward and 2 steps back.  I try to remind myself that she is just 1, that she is a ruckus-y teenager almost.  She can be so GOOD and then the next day be back to chasing lambs and escaping the field.  
Slightly disheartened, we left her under the lean-to with the animals.  But then FULL MOON FEVER hit the house dogs!  Michele was letting them out of their run - and normally they would run right back into the kennel.   But today, not a couple of hours after Dixie's mad dash for freedom, all 3 of them took off running.  Running up towards the road!  Almost the exact route that Dixie took.  I wasn't there at the time, so I heard about it 2nd hand.  But the same guy that caught Dixie once also caught Duke the Great Dane.  Chaos all day - and then we realized that it will be a full moon tonight.  So there you have it.  Full moon fever makes dogs run for freedom. 

We had a local guy out to see if he could assess the coyote activity around the pasture.  He said there is definitely sign of them, and pointed out areas where gaps between the bottom of the fencing and the ground was large enough that a coyote could fit through.  Some of them we had known about, and some problem areas were new - hidden by the overgrown pasture behind ours.
So we spent 2 weeks filling in post holes and filling in the gaps, using manure and bedding.  In some areas, we used broken cinderblock and rocks, just to fill the gaps securely.   Of course as the manure composts, the levels will drop and we'll likely have to redo some areas.  But for now, there doesn't seem to any area where anything can slide under the fence.  Dixie and the animals have been out in the pasture with us, and this is Dixie, relaxing in the shade of the straw, helping!

Every year at our local fair, Michele volunteers to hatch the chicks for the educational "Old MacDonald's Farm" tent. This year was a disaster - we had a 4-hour power outage on the labour day weekend (some idiot drinking and driving smashed into a hydro pole causing a massive power outage) and then 1 week away from the fair, the thermostat on the incubator itself had a malfunction and the incubator got 2 degrees too hot.  The growing chicks could probably have coped with the power outage (they generate their own heat in the egg and so couldn't have gotten too cold right away) but the heat apparently is something growing chicks can't live through.  
As a result, none hatched.  Zero out of 200.  It was devastating.  
While the school kids were at their educational tour on Friday, we just put some day-old chicks into the incubator so it appeared as if they were hatching.  The hatching is a fundamental part of the "chicken life cycle" demonstration, and a part that all the kids enjoy.  
We had also brought Hudson, Beatrice and Little Man, so that the kids could also see some full grown (even if they are Bantams) and beautiful chickens!
On Thursday, the organizer for the educational day called to ask if I could lead the Sheep workshop - the gal that usually does that station got kicked by her horse and so couldn't make it.  I took in a fleece from the spring shearing, and had some other props to make the connection between the ewes and wool.  I was super nervous to begin, but once the classes start moving through (and there were 16 or so all day) all that nervousness goes away because you are just RUNNING.  The kids are noisy and excited and curious.  The odd trouble maker wanted to harass the animals, but overall they just wanted to touch the sheep and feed them!
We had 3 young ewes from a local sheep farmer (we didn't bring our own) that were actually quite friendly and sweet. One of them LOVED being pet so the kids got really lucky with her - she would just stand and take as much affection that they wanted to give out.
For the rest of the weekend, we worked at Michele's booth for the kennel, or we were back at Old MacDonald's Farm letting people hold the chicks - even adults love holding chicks!  It was an awesome weekend, just playing with chickens!

This photo does not do the reality justice - 2 ewes and 1 lamb got into the bantam coop! 
We came out to the paddock and Hudson and Beatrice were out of their coop.  This was a converted rabbit hutch that we used for Hudson, Beatrice and their son Little Man.  It was enclosed with chicken wire so that the chickens could run around outside of their coop, but so that the barn cats and alpacas couldn't get at them.
We'd noticed that at times the chicken fencing was pushed in - I thought it was from the alpacas trying to reach the grass on the other side of the fence behind the coop.  
But today that real cause was revealed - the ewes have been trying to get in to get the chicken's food.  
Today they crushed the enclosure, knocked the roof off the coop and somehow got themselves wedged in side so they could eat the food.  Then, of course, couldn't figure out how to get out.
Since the ewes are so skittish, as soon as we approached the coop (trying desperately to figure out how we were going to get these big ewes out of a space that is 2'x5'), the ewes totally freaked out and leaped out of the coop.  This freed up space for the lamb to get out through the door.
We packed the chickens back up, picked the coop up with the tractor and took it over to the main coop - we put the whole thing inside one of the runs so they have a bigger world, without getting picked on by the main flock roosters.
The ewes showed no sign of distress after their adventure, of course.

On Michele's flyball tournament weekends, I cover the kennel for her, as well as doing the barn.  This morning I clearly didn't lock the gate to the pasture properly after I put the boys in their paddock - the determined sheep managed to bust it open and were out in the fields faster than you could cry fresh grass.  The alpacas, of course, quickly followed.  Nothing would entice them back to the barn - not friendly calls and the shaking of a pail of pellets, not me trying to herd them up with arms outstretched and pitchfork waving.  
At Michele's recommendation I ran home to get Duke, my extremely senior Great Dane, to help me herd them up.  Duke has yet to learn to ignore the barn animals, so I spent the run back to the field explaining how gentle he had to be.  Yes, I talk to my dog, and it helped take my mind off the fact that the animals were in the field unprotected (and Elsie had been taken in broad daylight, so my fears aren't unfounded).  And he was AWESOME!  He moved out and stretched the leash as far as it could go so we converged on the sheep almost like experienced shepherds!  My concern was that we not spook the sheep, who were accustomed to the furtive darting of border collies and who were going to be getting a laid back guardian dog any day now - I didn't want them to have a fear of big dogs in their presence.   He was a natural - he was alert and intent without being vocal of pulling on the leash.  The sheep finally decided he was serious about them moving up to the barn, and they ran up.  The alpacas were easier to convince - perhaps they had watched the sheep and decided to follow suit.
It was a pretty great exercise, and a huge relief - plus I was only 10 minutes late opening the kennel!

We are getting a Great Pyrenees dog to guard the herd.  We had thought the new fencing was enough but clearly the coyotes can either climb or they got through some depression in the ground that we haven't found yet.  Most of the Alpaca owners that we know have guardian dogs (or llamas!) so we decided on a Great Pyrenees.  We visited a breeder, Val Toth of Glenire Acres Farms, who breeds working dogs (and shows them) and have selected Vicky.
Vicky is a 1 1/2 yr old who has been with the sheep on Val and Les' farm, so hopefully she will acclimatize to our herd quickly.  The alpacas have been around guardian dogs, so it'll just be a matter of getting the sheep used to the dog!
The "Pyrs", as Val calls them, are bred to protect the herd at all costs.  We're hoping that she is going to prevent any more heartbreaks.   We won't get her for a while, based on scheduling, so in the meantime the animals are staying in the paddock, much to their disgust.  

We have been trying to decide what to do about the males.  The barn isn't really set up to accomodate males and females - they live in too close proximity for either group to be completely relaxed. And we have 1 yearling male that has been living with the females as he hasn't gone through puberty yet.  Or so we thought.  

A freak storm hit us around 6 pm.  Thankfully, Michele was home to close up the barn and the coop - I was at work and had watched it coming up over the mountain towards us.  
It was a brutal storm in places and not having lived through a tornado, I haven't seen a more ominous sky.  By the time we were both home, the storm had passed for the most part with only a few pop-up cells going through.  The poor pullets were huddled under the coop - they hadn't known to go through the pop door instead of the man door.  Of course I had to lie in the mud pulling them out from under the coop and hand them to Michele to put inside the coop.  And of course some of them tried to take off.  Teenagers.
The sheep and alpacas were snug and calm, which was a relief.
But the next morning we could see the damage.  Our garden was tossed and ragged but most everything survived - only our sunflowers and raspberries seemed beaten.  But the corn crops in the area had taken a huge hit - there were pockets where giant circles of crop were just lying down on the ground, pushed over by the wind.
It seems horribly unfair that the crop farmers should get hit like this when the spring was so wet and after a year like last.  Before I knew farmers it was all an academic concern - " oh poor farmers, climate change must be really impacting them" - but now it seems so much harsher.  Now these are people that I see at community functions and at the fair.  These are the people that I buy produce from, whose family I know.  
They say that freak storms like this will only become more common as the effects of climate change become more pronounced.  Its bad enough for urban folks who have flooded basements and tree-damaged roofs.  But the rural folks have the floods and the tree damage but their livelihoods are also at risk.  And our food supply is most definitely at risk.   Just think about how much apples cost last year after the frost.

Dr. Sherry put Buckwheat to sleep today.  Last night and this morning I made sure he had lots of pellets and grain to eat, and then today I went to work.  Poor Michele had to help Dr. Sherry do it, and then she buried him at the back of the paddock. I thought that was nice - his spirit could still be running with his girls.