Good info to know...Wasp spray as protection

Thought this was interesting and might be of use.

A friend who is a receptionist in a church in a high risk area was concerned about someone coming into the office on Monday to rob them when they were counting the collection. She asked the local police department about using pepper spray and they recommended to her that she get a can of wasp spray instead.

The wasp spray, they told her, can shoot up to twenty feet away and is a lot more accurate, while with the pepper spray, they have to get too close to you and could overpower you. The wasp spray temporarily blinds an attacker until they get to the hospital for an antidote. She keeps a can on her desk in the office and it doesn't attract attention from people like a can of pepper spray would. She also keeps one nearby at home for home protection.

Bye, bye to Junior...

Here is a family portrait before we sold Junior... the white male llama on the left. Renee and Jeff McPeek came Sunday to pick him up to become a guardian for their new flock of Tunis sheep.

I know that they will enjoy him, he is such a curious guy who has the biggest, most expressive eyes!

What's new on the farm? Two more minis!

We acquired a gorgeous bay stallion, Easter Acres Bay Dragon, from our friends Priscilla and David Cox of Springtown, Texas. Priscilla's sister, Jan Easter of Easter Acres Miniature Horses had raised Dragon, who is sired by her Landry's Kajun Red and a mare we now own, Easter Acres Midnite Satin. Ironically, Bob has been using a photo of Dragon on his equine photography business cards (see previous post - Bob's New Venture back in March). We have always admired Dragon, and are proud to now own him. Priscilla exported Dragon to live with her in Great Britain a few years ago and he sired several miniature horses in the U.K. Luckily for us, when she and David moved back to the U.S. they brought him back with them. Along with Dragon, we also recieved NXS Dare Dreamer, they called her Goldie. Since we already have a Goldie... she will be called DeeDee. She will have a foal by Dragon next spring.

Our palomino mare, Locket was bred to him last year and we have a cute little filly we named Dragonfly.

She got to meet her "daddy" for the first time this weekend.

Less 4 more sheep... but a GOOD way this time!

The McPeek family of Clifton, TX came again on Sunday and picked out two ram lambs for 4-H. They had originally planned to take the twins that disappeared in the predator attacks over the last two weeks. They bought "Junior" a half brother, and "Tailor" the son of "Ralph" and "RickRack". We hated to see Tailor go since his mom was the one killed on Thursday. But we really didn't need to keep another ram.

Mr. McPeek had been so impressed by one of our rams, "Bart" on his first visit to the farm, that he asked to purchase him as well. They also bought Purdy, the twins' mother. So they are "in the Tunis business" now too!

We wish their son, Brazos, a very successful show career with the lambs!

Coyotes 5, Sheep 0

Now for some sad news... we have been having predator attacks on our sheep this past week. It started last weekend when I was in Florida to judge the Cotee River Cat Show. Bob called to say that when he counted the sheep we seemed to be missing 3 or 4.

He had walked the pasture but hoped that they had gotten into the neighbor's pasture and weren't ready to come home yet. Most noticably missing were the "twins," our youngest lambs. I had promised them to a young man who was going to show them in 4-H.

By the time I got home Sunday night, he still hadn't located them, so we planned to call around the neighborhood on Monday. Monday evening we took an inventory and realized that the twins' mom was in the flock and was very depressed and thin. Another young ram lamb was also missing. We assumed the worst and I wrote the dreaded email to the potential buyers.

Tuesday they called and offered to search some more since we still had not found any signs of "foul play". While we were at work, they came over and looked through the pasture again. This time they found one of our ewe lambs, mostly eaten. We had been penning the sheep up at night so we didn't know when she was actually killed.

Wednesday we stayed home and wormed all the sheep and tagged those that hadn't been for better identification. Thursday we turned them out during the day with all four llamas, hoping that would be enough protection. That evening we were missing another! Bob drove around the pasture and found one of our two year old ewes was partially eaten near our stock pond. Bob went into town to buy a shotgun and watched for the predators to return to the body. No luck, so far. We still don't know what is doing the killing during the day. We thought maybe a pack of dogs, but friends say mother coyotes teach their pups in the daytime so we are expecting they are the culprits.

We've since gathered that llamas don't work well together as sheep protectors. Only singles should be used. We have the sheep all locked in the pens at the barn now until we come up with a solution. We aren't even letting our mini filly out for fear they may be hungry enough to attack her.

We are open to any suggestions!

Photos from Jeff and Robin's Reception

Jeff and Robin had a house warming/ wedding reception August 8th. I am finally getting around to downloading the photos! It has been a busy month!

We had their invitation made into a poster at Sam's and had guest sign it.

Hay, hay, we need more hay...

With the lack of rains in our area, we are finding it hard to locate good quality coastal bermuda hay for the horses and sheep.

Our pastures have turned to dust and broomweeds so we know that we will need a lot of hay stored.

Bob was able to get a load of rounds brought in from east Texas. This was the first time we have ordered a semi truckload. Thankfully, I work for the manufacturer of material handling equipment. My boss let us move a new model out to the farm to lift the hay off the trailer. That is an MLT 735 model and it is specifically built to be an agricultural machine. It has a hay clamp attachment on it, but can also use a bucket, hay spear, silage facer, etc. to do work on dairy farms, feedlots and ranches. If anyone is interested I'd be glad to help you find a dealer in the U.S. (or world)!!!

It made things much easier, lifting two of the big round bales at a time.

Later that day while taking some scrap metal to the recyclers, we found a field of square bales, freshly baled.

Bob was able to get 62 bales on the trailer which we happened to have with us. It was a case of being in the right place at the right time. While we were there several other people stopped to inquire about the hay. There will be a shortage this year.

I am so proud of Bob, he is amazing, I call him my hero! Less than 3 months after his major surgery and now with his "semi-colon" he is out there in 102 degree temperature loading up hay. The Lord has been good to us!

We will need some more, but we feel much better with having this now stored.