Busy season

It's the Busy Season.  Fair Season, Christmas Season, Mud Season, Lambing Season, Hay Season... And Busy Season.

The Busy Season is so chock full of work that it has to share its season with Haying.

There's no shortage of work these days, and the heat is becoming sweltering.  Every night feels like the beginnings of a glorious thunderstorm, and yet nothing comes.  Day after day of thermometer-busting heat and oppressive humidity.

Thank God everything is sheared, but there's more than enough work left to keep the critters cool...

Nicholas the alpaca being sheared for the first time EVER

Windows in the barn need to be opened to let the not-so-cool breeze through, and promptly closed again if it plans on raining.  Hay needs to be unloaded and stored, water buckets need to constantly be filled, and even more constantly be scrubbed; even sheared nearly naked the alpacas are hot and have discovered the pleasure of standing in the water.  At least the llamas only dunked their heads!

All our sheep have lambed, and some of the goats we bred early in the season, but we still have more left to pop.  Gray Baby in particular, my sweet old momma goat, is incredibly pregnant.  She mopes around as if the world is going to come to an end if the kids inside her don't give up their hold soon- and with the temperatures nearing 100 it very well might.

Love is both pregnant AND fat. And laying in silly spots to stay shaded. 

The farrier is in, regardless of the heat, and ponies we bought over the winter now have perfect feet so they can be taught what their job actually is.  I do my best to scrounge up friends' kids on days that I manage to be off from any other jobs, but sometimes the ponies are found walking in circles with bags of grain, or secured logs, or wet laundry on their backs to simulate the weight.  Better to throw off a bag of grain after six months of not working than a kid!

The old-hat ponies that don't need any training- or refresher courses- revel in the weekdays they have "off."  On any given day working in the barn it's far from unusual to look out the back of the barn and count half a dozen ponies (if not more!) sprawled out on their sides sleeping in the sunshine.  It's such a normal sight to me that the first time a "horse person" started screaming when they saw it I simply couldn't understand what all the fuss was about.  They're ponies.  Isn't it just what they do?

The ponies aren't the only ones being lazy during the Busy Season- llamas are just as bad, expecting people to do nothing but mist them with the hose, and not taking into account the barn that needs to be mucked out.  Goats flop about whining for extra hay just to make a mess with and lay in.  Sheep bleat constantly, expressing their displeasure in the music choices, it seems, or something else just as absurd.

In the hot weather none of the animals want to behave.  The ponies break through fences, the cows flip upside down in the hoof-trimming chute, and on days when she's supposed to go to work, the camel won't leave the barn.

In this picture, though, she obviously had left the barn

She then makes everyone run late, and not take into account that we're all quite busy enough without her stubborn attitude.

Pacas

Deep down inside, I'm a bleeding heart. I think, honestly, most of us are, to an extent. I know Ted is too. There's a reason his farm is such a hodge-podge of critters; from ponies kids have outgrown, to monkeys that have outlasted too many owners.

If there's one thing that makes my heart bleed, it's big eyes and an empty stomach.

Which would be how we ended up with two alpacas. Right before Christmas, dropped off at the auction, and, really, what were we supposed to do? No one else wanted them. No one else put up a half-assed bid like we did.

We have llamas because alpacas are useless... right? Glorified sheep. Twice the price and half as smart.

Someone asked me if I felt like I was "cheating" on our llamas by "harboring the enemy" and I don't. Not in the least. It's the bleeding heart in me. I may not love alpacas as much as I love my llamas, but I hate the idea of starving animals much more than I hate any breed.

It's a mother and son. She's about three or four years old, and he'll probably be one sometime this spring.

Her name is Carol. As in, "Christmas Carol," because she found a good home right before Christmas, and she just simply is a Carol. She's shy, of course, but absurdly trusting. Eats like a hoover vacuum, and has finally stopped letting the boy nurse. She is beautiful, in a snooty persian cat sort of way. Solid white fleece, clear blue eyes, and what looks like thick black eyeliner around both her eyes. If she were a teenage girl she'd be a heartbreaker.

She's not halter-broken at all. She doesn't mind me putting one on her, but has no idea what it's for. The walk from the yard into the barn the day we got them was the longest walk I think I've ever taken. She hasn't been trained for ANYTHING, and she has such a long way to go. She isn't a huge fan of coming out of her stall, and if it's anywhere near dinnertime you can find her laying down in the barn patiently waiting.

Nicholas (named after the famous Saint, of course) can't stand to be penned up. He whines constantly to get out, and buddies up to Ruby once he is. He's dwarfed by Emerald- his back is almost low enough to pass completely under Emerald's belly. He doesn't understand he's not really one of the herd yet.

He should have been sheared last summer, so his fleece is thicker than anything I've ever seen- or touched. I had to trim some of it away under his tail just so he could go to the bathroom without anything getting stuck in it. He looks so fat and chubby, but underneath the fur all you can feel is bones.

My bleeding heart just can't stand that...

Jack

I don't have any pictures of Jack when we first got him. This disappoints me, and is one of the few regrets I really have. I use it as a reminder to take pictures of EVERYTHING- beautiful or not.

Jack was ugly. Hideous. Disgusting. He was an emaciated excuse of a bull, standing barely at my hip, with horns and ears grown all akimbo. I laughed at him- which I don't think he remembers- and scoffed at Ted. "Why'd you go and pay money for the ugliest cow on the planet?"

It wasn't very much money.

Jack is nothing short of handsome.

Ted shrugged at my comment and told me to give him something to eat. He needed it.

It took a long time for Jack to grow into himself. Ted wanted to name him Fu- like Fu Manchu- from some song or another. I named him Jack.

Jack Sprat could eat no fat

His wife could eat no lean

And so together, hand-in-hand,

They licked the platter clean.

The girls all agreed, Jack stuck, and Kiki just kept getting fatter- and not with a baby. He was a dingy gray all over, and frightened of everything. The people he came from claimed he was in a field with some heifers, and insisted he bred them, but we doubt it. He was so thin we're sure his body naturally steered itself- looking for any nutrients it could. We love him anyway.

Jack doesn't moo. Ever. He huffs. If there's anything he feels warrants a moo, he headbutts and pushes on Kiki until she moos for him. He likes people on his level, and won't come up to an adult standing tall at the fence. His love for children is baffling, but they always seem to love him in return, regardless of the menacing horns and sneaky glint in his eyes.

I came back from vacation, and while my llama loves me, Jack was the only one who seemed to visibly miss me. Cleaning his stall, and he didn't want to run wild with Kiki and chase the llamas. He wanted to stand beside me, nuzzle me, and lick at me. Lick at my leg, lick my shoe, wait till I crouch down and lick his rough sandpaper tongue across my cheek.

When Jack finally gained enough weight to not be considered starving, he changed. He came out of his shell, he developed a personality. It took almost three years, but he noticed that he was getting two meals a day, without doubt. He bloomed from a washed-out gray to black and silver. His fur thickened and feels like crushed velvet. He loves having his hump rubbed, and behind his horns scratched.

He's the most handsome bull I've ever know.