Heel low:
Remember when I said I would never get anything done with those cuties around? Tara, it's wonderful you are wise enough to take the time to enjoy what you've been blessed with. Cherish each day, and what it has in store.
It is not that I am not getting anything done with the lambs here...
Jul 18 - Lots of mowing of greenery
August now and slow down on the grow happens
Jul 19 - ditch mowing; moms babes and ewes
Even got time & energy to take advantage of some unexpected Manna from Heaven...
Ditch top got mowed and thought..."HEY...thar's some cut hay just waiting to be collected...and so we did!"
As of today, used it all up...so near a dozen days of feed 
I only gathered what was not noxious weedy
Time for maintenance too...we get Death Camas (horrid lethal plant...pretty but deadly!) and Locoweed...so I had time and energy to rid that too
Sheeps doing ditch maintenance
Death Camas - pretty and DEADLY!
In the shade, it can look a lot like sprigs of certain grasses and if the ground is soft and wet, the sheep can pull it out, not only eat the leaves and flowers but the bulb which resembles wild onions...is the most toxic part...blah!
Got time to weigh my blessings
I cannot believe how well the lambs are doing...especially Èden. Pretty much can guess her weight daily...how many days old...she is that many pounds!
That friend I telephoned that has 20 years in Dorpers (South African embryo transplants...she was on the cusp of the imports to Canada, eh), asked her what she thought about a 42 day old ewe lamb single weighing 42 pounds and she was thrilled. She said the breed is great at gaining...quick and to expect they do the slow down after about the 100 pound or so mark. Which is a rather premium meat marketing weight. Now she sold her lambs at 50 pounds because her market wanted that size. Great market for their hides...especially when Dorper was used as commercial makers...the colour like we have in Decor and Ditto make the finest lamb rugs and idealic colour patterns...pretty interesting.
She is just about to sell off the last of her sheep...her spouse retired and they want to holiday together. She is sad because she says her flock is right where she wanted them...easy to keep and all the traits she figured she loved. Sigh...oh well, don't that seem how it goes.
Anyway, gonna call a lady she sold some of her purebreds to that has moved from out East to AB... Might see if we meld and get a go at maybe some South African genetics if we can strike up a deal on ram lambs or? Hee hee...networking on sheeps. Sheep TV and all, eh.
Admiring Sheep TV...all the dogs want to watch is this channel -
hide the channel changer on me...
"NOPE...sheep TV is the bestest!"
I am totally going great guns through summerish things. The lambs are not a distraction that causes me any inconvenience (well planned for...like the summer of the girl pups, the swan import, or veggy gardenings or even potato plantings!--all summers where the year is planned and embraced!). I simply don't have lots of time (past robbing my sleep time!) to post here on
Pear-A-Dice. No hiccups because I do that EVERY summer--get too busy and the thread lags...said that right when I was asked to do this...summer has too much on the go to post too much about it. Can't do and talk about it too much eh. That means I trade off speaking and posting photos (which now is a nightmare with the BYC upgrade...totally HATE IT!
) with long intervals where I am out and about sucking in the fun stuff. Oh my...so much fun stuff!
I was sitting fish pond side last night...Rick had just hosed the girls (like Lacy's FAV thing in the whole wide world!!) and I had a pocket full of fresh peas to give them (Emmy prefers MEAT but Lacy LUVs the peas...musta been Lace's night, eh?)...sitting there knowing Rick has to get his mind set for Monday work week (big week, they are Calciuming one of their heavily used roads which may mean he does not have to fiddle with it so much...go do some road building and upgrading elsewhere...YAH!) and thought...this IS the Life. We had done a Loser Lap in the red Chev...just because and summer is the time for running Rick's vehicles--allows me to work on my Swamper's tan...the right arm hangs out the window getting tanned...not the left driver one!
Dragon fly (love DRAGONS!) rain chains...metal and will stand up to the hails!
Got some fresh bread for lunch, had a medium pizza in a city parking lot for lunch (Rick always teases..."wonder if the girls would like a taste of pizza?")...I found a snazzy coffee cup inspired welded wire container for the Man Porch (Rick had to admit, it slid right in with the rest of HIS decor...totally!) and stopped for ice cream in a lake side resort (whimsically labelled "
Redneck Burmuda" by a newspaper reporter...label stuck for us...hee hee). Ice cream...strawberry for the GIRLS...Em's favourite!
And Rick says it won't go with the decor...little he knows about decorating! 
Ran the dogs, stopped and gorged on Saskatoons (never SEEN so many berries as this year has blessed us with--red currants, raspberries, strawberries...oh my and the crop of crabapples and apples are going to be bountiful...the girls are already trying to harvest the GREEN ones because the branches are so full they are bent near the ground...silly girls...no patience!), checked on the lambs & tucked the ram away, fed dogs, fed us and retired to a bit of television and then grateful sleep. Run on dazes. Absolute the whole summer could run on like this and that feeling of glee and happiness, joys with peace...and reaping your hard work...this could go on forever and we'd never be full of it...full of thankfulness we get to enjoy this, but we also never want it EVER to stop. Ah...living the life...eyes wide open and pinch me...we're dreaming in the DREAM world...in reality.
Rick recounts how we had a vision of Caragana growing up so high it gave us privacy--allowed to lose yer nut and no harm done-wander around with no pants on but nobody SEES the horrible view! There are spruce trees that tower over the roofs of some of our buildings...these arrived here as those wimpy shippable seedlings; tiny twig of greenness.
So I got me A-Z packet of tattoo letters (at over $5 a letter if bought singlely and 26 set costing $57.75 for each letter @ $2.22) doing the bean counting means if you need more than a handful of letters, you are best getting a complete set. I do need extra "D's" though...tattoo prefix I own is DRPR and I like to have a double set of letters for my tattoo prefix. For the Jacobs i own the prefix JACB. Kinda kewl we went from three letters in a tattoo to four...name yer breed, eh?
And there is the hateful part...ten files and have to post again...grrr...
Doggone & Chicken UP!
Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada
and sucking up the joy & happiness that is my reality.
and I got Dorps because they were suppose to be full shedders...lovely tel conversation with a dog and Dorper friend that has had them for over 20 years yesterday. I am on the right track and people have let the ball drop...now for me to put it back in play...full shedding...working on it! 
way, way too much... 
I can't promise when I'll get back here...
