Swealter hot weekend

 First off, time flies....I cannot believe that I missed making a blog post in June.

So here a quick catch up.....

I have been working from home since April 10th and loving it.

I wish we could make it a permanent thing, but twice now Management

have tried to bring all of us back into our building and then delayed 

it due to the Covid19 still increasing in our county.

As of now we are scheduled to go back into the building the end of August...we will see.

Here at home we are having a heat wave.

The girls are loving our new crop of first cutting hay.

It was just easier to put out a round bale for them to eat as 

much as they want.  I've not given any grain to the ewes or rams, just this hay.

Their body condition have really improved by allowing them

all the hay they want to eat.

Although they will not continue to get their hay this way.

It is easier to feed this way, but at this rate I will need approximately  

90 round bales for a years worth of hay....YIKES!

(right now about 50 ewes and their lambs are going through 

one round bale in four days!!)

We did get 43 round bales of first cutting and just made second 

cutting only getting 18 round bales. So we are a bit short 

right now and working to secure the extra hay we will need to see us through

May, 2021.

 Yes we are in a heat wave right now.  These pics. were taken about

7:30 am, already hot and humid and everyone is looking for shade.

 They've ate their pasture down, but I've got to let them out so they can

get out of the barn and into the shade of the trees, which is right where

they are heading.  Spending the day in the shade.

It really is surprising how much cooler it is under those trees.

 Saturday was our regular meeting day for our Spinning and Weaving Guild.

We canceled March and April's meetings with this virus going about.

But with much planning in how to be safe about it we have 

made a plan so that we can gather in small groups (wearing masks), keeping socially distant, 

at least six feet apart and outside, we have been fortunate that the weather 

has been wonderful in May and June for our gathering.

Not all members are comfortable coming, but that's ok.

For most it's the need to be social again.  We have all been 

cooped up since March and we do need to learn to live with this.

It's not going away anytime soon, all you can do is plan and 

try and be smart about the decisions you make. 

 Above is an adult ewe on the left and her ram lamb on the 

right.  He is bigger than her and he still sneaks a slurp 

of milk if she will stand for him....big baby!

We've had a nice group of lambs this year.

I've already sold all the crossbred lambs and ram 

lambs that I knew wouldn't have good horns.

These guys have already paid for my first and second cutting hay.

These are four white fleeces that I have that are just beautiful and fine.

I will be sending these out to Zeilinger's Woolen Mill to be made into combed top.

All of my fleeces that were coated have sold.

All I have left are those that were not coated.  These are really 

hard to hand process and get all the VM out.

So I will most likely combine fleeces to make the weight needed to 

send them out and have combed top made.

That's all for today and I will try to get another post out soon.