Bottle Feeding the Triplets

Having baby calves around is tough work, but all the kids rise to the occasion with great responsibility. They have all learned to hold and feed the calves, to capture them and get them back to their mother when feeding time is over. 

Since Raspberry had triplets, we need to help her by supplanting the babies, since it's unlikely that she would produce enough milk on her own to sustain them. The kids are learning to make the bottles, how to hold the calves and how to get them to latch onto the bottles. It's been an exciting experience for all! 

Sheering the Lambs

Today our kids got to learn how to sheer a sheep... or three! Our 4H Extension office sent three volunteers and the equipment to teach our kids how to do a rough sheer to help keep them cool and eating through the heat of the summer and prepare for their slick sheer just before the fair.

We set up on my front lawn... I can only imagine what my neighbors think! It took a bit to get going. Apparently one of the 4H Adult Volunteers had borrowed the sheers and put the blades on backwards. After some struggling, and a couple nips on the lambs, one of them figured it out, the switched the blades around and were off to the races! Smiley and BamBam were sheered first, the Adults started by showing the kids, then let them try their hand at it. T and TABS did very well, AJ wasn't having anything to do with it. I think the couple nips in the beginning did him in. SAS and RW collected the wool from Smiley and BamBam and later we will learn to clean and spin it. We didn't collect the wool from Blu because she is not a wool lamb, she is a meat lamb, so her wool was just discarded.

When they were done, Justen took a look at a nick on Smileys foreshank and decided that it likely needed stitches. That was not my cup of tea, so I offered up some super glue for skin and we used that to glue our little lamb back together again. I was actually pretty impressed with how well it held for her! We also sprayed her with a wound spray dressing and a fly spray to keep the flys off.

All in all, it was an eventful and educational day! We love our 4H community and our Extension Office! So many people willing to share their time and knowledge to help our kids learn and grow!

Weigh-in & Tagging

Today is the day that we find out how much our Piggies weigh! Believe it or not, but there is alot of excitement and anxiety that surrounds this day. Not quite as much as when you have a 222 lbs. piggy weighing in for a 220 lb. fair, but still alot!

Luckily for us, our little widgets (that's what I call them because I cannot come up with a better word suited for their level of mischief!) were on their best behavior! Our 4H Extension Office sent out a couple of volunteers and a scale for us to weigh and tag all of our market livestock. As soon as Justen brought the scale to the fence and we slid it open, the first little piggy, Spiderham, trotted right in. This would have been the easiest thing in the world, had ALL the others not immediately crowded around and fought to get on the scale too! We were fighting to keep the little piggies out, where normally they are fighting to get the piggies in!

With Spiderham (Clubby) in the scale, she was weighed and tagged. Our smallest little girl came in right at 85 lbs. a whopping 35 lbs. under where she should be right now to make weight for the fair. TABS babied her from birth, corrected her clubbed back feet, taught her to nurse from her mother, and protected her at the feed trough from her bigger siblings as much as she could... We knew we were going to have to be pushing her, so this wasn't too much of a surprise. Next in the scale was Lila, SAS' perfect piggy. She came in just slightly under weight at 100 lbs. but definitely doable. Ruthie, our little runty, was up next and surprised us all by out weighing Spiderham at 91 lbs.! Boris, our clubs only barrow, followed Ruthie at 98 lbs., there is a little work to do with him, but just as with Lila, I think they will make it just fine. Then came Bailey, she hesitated at getting on the scale just a little, but a couple marshmallows at the other end was all the convincing it took! On she came and off she went at a very comfortable 114 lbs. Last on the scale was Dot and, as expected, she tipped the scale at 118 lbs., and won the prize for our clubs largest pig! They should each be right around 120 lbs. to comfortably make weight at the fair. We have some work to do with these little piggies, but I have faith that we will be able to get them to weight by fair time.

Next up were the lambs, who were not as happy about the scale as the piglets were. The lambs were very content eating the grass and rose bushes at the barn. Poor SC, we'll need to replace those roses for her! But, staying true to character, our lambs were all a little under weight as well. Blu weighed first, and heaviest, at 65 lbs., but needing to be right around 100 lbs. right now, she was nearly 40 lbs. under. BamBam was very close to Blu at 63 lbs. and Smiley wasn't far behind at 60 lbs.

We will need to do some major push to get these animals to weight, but Justen gave the kids some great advice on working with them (although he said that we are "lightyears ahead on working with our animals") and pushing the weight. We will be starting the lambs on grain and keeping them out of the fields... no more grass for them! Just grain and hay! The piglets, since they can eat anything, will go to straight show pig feed and anything else with lots of protein and fat content that we can find for them. Justen even suggested milk replace, which we may try if we still are feeling a little skinny in a month or so.

All in all, we learned alot, got our livestock tagged for the fair, and were able to get an idea of how big they are and how big they need to be. We have work to do, but that has never been a problem for us! :) As always, Bring It!

We Have Ducklings!

One day, and I can't say for sure which day exact ally it was, we noticed that we hadn't seen OddBall, the duck, in awhile, so a search ensued, but to no avail. OddBall was still missing. A few days later a storm was rolling in and the kids went out, before school, to batten down the hatches, and get the animals into their pens ahead of the storm. In the hustle and bustle of the impending storm, we learned two things... First, we learned the location of our missing duck, OddBall. Second, we learned that OddBall was a GIRL! And she had a nest!  We were able to figure out that she was sitting on about a dozen or so eggs. 

As you can imagine, this was a rather surprising revelation for us! We were terribly worried about her and her nest of eggs during the storm, so when Dad got home, he built her a "duck blind" to protect her from the storm. Thankful so! The worst snowstorm of the entire year hit us on April 15th, but Momma OddBall was safe, sound, and dry through the night!

The duck blind protected her throughout the storm and through the next few weeks as she hatched her babies. 

This afternoon, as we got home from work and school, the kids dutifully ran out and checked on OddBall to find, to their utter delight, beautiful, perfectly smooth, white eggs replaced with adorable, fuzzy little ducklings! 

OddBall did a great job on her first clutch and hatched seven darling little ducklings! 

Welcome Blu

After the loss of our sweet Izzy, help and assistance came out of the woodwork to replace T's sweet girl. I cannot tell you how overwhelmed I was with the love, support and compassion that comes from the Ag. Community. One donor, who insisted on staying anonymous, found a beautiful lamb, not far from our farm, transferred the money into our 4H account and even called to make sure that we could go pick her up!

So, we loaded T & TABS into my car, and made the drive out to Henefer, where we met with the sheep farmer & her son. They introduced us to a beautiful lamb, whom T would later name Blu, for the deep blue color in her eyes. This wonderful farmer taught us everything she knew about raising lambs, answered all of our questions, and helped us load her into the back of my car. 

On the ride home, TABS & T had a lot of fun taking selfies with the new lamb, but they were hungry, since Leader HW and I had loaded them as soon as we got home, and left right away... without dinner. 

We decided to stop at McDonalds to grab a bite to eat. My only request... Keep The Lamb Quiet! The ordering process went something like this: 

Order Taker: Welcome to McDonalds. What can I get you? 

Me: I'd like an Oreo McFlurry and... BAAAAA! 

Car Occupants: HAHAHAHAHAHA

Me: SHHHH! 

Order Taker: Um... I'm sorry, what was that? 

Me: I'm sorry... An Oreo McFlurry, a chocolate shake...

BAAAAAAA!!

Me: A coke and 

BAAAAAA!!

Me: And a small

BAAAA!!

Me: fry. 

By the time we got to the window, my whole car was laughing to the point of tears, and the order taker immediately busted up laughing when he saw the lamb in the back of my car! It was a complete fiasco! 

But we are all glad to have our beautiful Blu home and ready to start working with her. She has a good nature and will be a great project for T. 

Piglet Mayhem

Who knew that six little piglets could be SO much trouble!?! Someone left the barn door unlatched and the little monsters pushed their way out of their stall and into the main barn where they tore apart feed bags, dumped over chick and duckling pens, strewed wood shavings everywhere, pooped all over everything, and just generally wreaked havoc all night long. This morning, they have been grounded to the outside pen while the kids got to work cleaning up the mess. 

It took all ten kids more than three hours to clean up the mayhem! From this point on, those six little piggy's will be sleeping outside! What little pills! 

We Have a Name!

Just a quick announcement to say.... We finally have settled on a name for our baby lamb. It didn't come with the trumpeting "Her name is!" it was more of a slow process of slipping up and calling her by name and eventually it just stuck. Our little baby girl will no longer be known as Possibly... Her name is officially Izzy!

Bottle Feeding Lambs

Our bottle babies are doing great! They have all settled in and love each other, and their kids, very much. Smiley and Possibly love their bottles, but BamBam never really took to the bottle, he has always loved drinking from a bowl.

Getting lambs this year was a little bit of a concern to me, as I know absolutely nothing about Sheep, but it's turning out to be a wonderful experience!

We have moved the lambs outside into the pen, now that the temperatures are staying above 40° at nights. They really seem to enjoy having the room to run and play. They are nibbling leaves off the tree branches, the ones that the goats haven't completely nibbled bare anyway, and munching grass. We are giving them hay and creep feed along with their milk and BamBam loves it, while Smiley and Possibly aren't so sure! 

They are learning to come when called and BamBam is learning to work on his harness. Smiley, is coming along nicely on her harness as well, but she seems to have learned that if she throws a fit and lies down, AJ will get her a branch to munch while she walks with him. This is one habit we'll need to break quickly! 

Our Newest Baby

Just when we thought we were done with bottlefeeding, we would like to introduce the newest little member of our 4H family. She doesn't have a name yet, so I'm calling her "possibly", because each time I ask T what he's going to name her his answer is always, "possibly Splotches, Izzy, or Iggy".

She's such a sweet natured little lady and has the most beautiful coloring. I think she will get along great with BamBam & Smiley and I'm sure that they will be super excited to get to stay on their milk for just a little longer! 

T was able to get this little bottlebaby at s great price from a farmer in Coleville, UT. He was very generous in making sure that T was able to afford this little girl and went overall the in's and out's of a bottle baby. T is super excited to get to working with his little girl. Isn't she just the cutest!?! We happily welcome her and her adorableness to our 4H Farm! 

Little Clubby - 24 Hours & Going Strong!

Clubby was born with, what the vet called, clubbed feet. Her little hooves curled under instead of out, so she was walking on her knuckles instead of flat footed. The vet suggested that she not be left with Miss Beatrice, because she can't get away and the risk of being rolled on and mushed were very high, so we brought our little clubby home last night. TABS has work with her a lot, giving her "Piggy PT". She would lay Clubby on her back so she would kick her feet, and she would rub Clubbys legs and help her stretch her hooves out correctly. She has Clubby walking now. She still walks on her tippy toes, but she's getting so much better and she's getting really quick at getting around.

She was not really impressed with being at home, she didn't care much for my little ankle bitters and she certainly didn't like being away from her brothers and sisters. She didn't like being alone in her crib and she would cry if we didn't hold her, but we didn't produce enough heat to keep her from shivering. Her temperature was dropping, and I was worried, so I wrapped her up in a little burp cloth and sat with her by the fireplace until she fell asleep. Then I laid her in the crib, on top of a warm rice pack, to sleep. 

She would sleep fine, until someone made a noise, then she would wake up and run around the crib crying. But she wasn't eating at all. I couldn't get her to take the bottle. After about 5 hours of no food, we gave up and snuck her back to the barn where she immediately latched on to Miss Bea and started suckling. We reluctantly left her overnight, said a little prayer, and hoped for the best. 

This morning, the report was that all twelve little munchkins made it happily through the night and were doing well. The best possible outcome! :) We will head over there shortly, to say good morning to our babies and Miss Bea, and clean out the barn.

Momma Pig Gets Her Name

Today was our weekly 4H meeting, so we were able to come together as a club and make some important decisions. Mainly, what will we name our Momma Pig? Now the kids had some very interesting ideas.

Here were the names that they had to choose from: 

• Beatrice
• Cerdo (Means Pig in Spanish)
• Dutchess
• Lily
• Lucy
• Margaret
• Momma Pig
• Sadie
• Spiderham
• Sweetie
• Zhu (Means Pig in Chinese (The Chinese were the first to domesticate pigs 6000 years ago))
• Zoe Zhu
• Zoie

Each member got to vote for three different names. Once the votes were all counted and absentee votes were in we had a tie! Two names had four votes each - Beatrice and Zoe Zhu

In the case of a tie, Leader SS held an emergency vote with the club members present each getting a single vote. With just five kids present, it got pretty tense when one young lady couldn't make up her mind and the other four were deadlocked in another tie. Things got pretty tense until that one young lady finally lifted her thumb up to indicate her vote. And our momma pig's name is….

"Beatrice"

Gaelic Meaning: 

Bringer of joy; blesses.

Piglets Coming Soon!

Wow! Things just keep getting better and better! SC picked up some totally rockin' things for Momma Pig from Tractor Supply in Perry yesterday! Momma Pig now has some super yummy new feed and sturdy feed and water pans. She is going to be one spoiled little piggy!

Momma was checked in on this afternoon by TABS and SS and she seemed happy and content, albeit slightly more and more uncomfortable with her growing belly and tightening underline. We filled her water, and food, gave her some more treats and scooped out the poop. We didn't stay long with her today, since RT and MC have a region wrestling match and we have chores out at the farm. AL is going to work on building a piglet crib tonight. It will give the piglets a place to get away from Momma Pig when she wants to lay down and we will put a heating pad in there to help draw them away from Momma, for safety. There will likely be between 10 and 15 babies. Much to do tonight in preparation for these many, many little bundles of joy!

Pregnant Pig - Day Two

And so it begins… The watching, the waiting, the worrying, and the work! As soon as school excused for the day, the texts and calls started. "Pig?" was the first text, and as simple as it was, I knew how much emotion was behind it. RB had sent it and it meant that he wanted to go see his pig. 4H has become such an important part of his life and all of our lives. These animals are our everything! They teach us so much and for the next 28 weeks we will live, sleep, and breathe these animals, they will consume our waking thoughts and our nightly dreams, we will do nothing before they are cared for, and we will want nothing but the best for them.

As soon as I picked them all up from school, we headed home and the kids quickly cleared my fridge of any leftover veggies and my breadbox of all rolls before heading to the W house, where they did the same. RB and I grabbed a couple 25lb. bags of cracked 9 Grain that we thought Momma Pig would really enjoy, AJ grabbed the wheelbarrow, SS and RV loaded up the treats and Smalls grabbed a shovel. We loaded it all into my car and headed for the barn.

TABS was already at the barn, her bus has a stop at the corner of the street, so she headed right over. She opened the gate for us and we quietly entered the barn. I must admit, I don't think I have ever seen this group of kids being so reverent and quiet, especially Smalls! They were so respectful of Momma Pig, just another testament to how important this is to them. We quickly cleaned out her farrowing stall, tried to get her to eat some treats (I don't think she has ever had treats before!) and filled her food and water buckets. The kids sat down in the straw to do their homework, but Momma Pig was far too curious about them to settle down and relax while they did their homework. She startled them a couple of times, tasted SS's jacket and rooted around in the straw nervously before I sent them all out of the stall.

Momma Pig Snuggles Down

She finally calmed down and snuggled into the straw. Lying down, you could see the piglets move in her tummy and standing up you can see her underline starting to firm up and fill with milk. She doesn't have much longer. We may have babies before we thought! We will continue to check her morning and night, make her as comfortable and relaxed as possible, and prepare as best we can. I think we might be in for the ride of our lives here! Wish us luck!

Welcome Momma Pig

What a weekend we have had! We built a farrowing barn, borrowed a horse trailer, researched pig reproduction, and picked up a Momma Sow, nearly ready to give birth!

Our Momma Sow

It wasn't as easy as it sounds. It all started when Leader SS contacted a farm out of Grantsville, UT on January 14th, where a wonderful farmer agreed to sell us one of his pregnant sows for $700. That got the ball rolling and the clock ticking. This sweet sow is due on January 25th and we have to get a farrowing (birthing) barn built, heat sources set up, and research done so we know what we are getting ourselves into, then we have to get her into her new home in enough time that she can get comfortable before she goes into labor. Over the next few days, we had a lot of work to do!

We started by collecting wood that people were throwing out. Then we used it to create a stall in SC's horse barn. We added a heat lamp and got some straw. We asked (begged) until we found a wonderful lady who was willing to loan us her three horse trailer, and we drove out and got it loaded up and drug home. Then came a little hitch. We had just finish the barn, got the trailer home and put the kids to bed when I got an email from the farmer. He was really worried about moving the sow this close to her due date, and he might have had a little sentimental attachment to her and he was wavering on selling her. Little SS was laying with me when I read the email and was reading over my shoulder. She immediately started shaking her head and little tears started. She had watched so many videos, done so much research, and worked so hard to make sure that she knew everything she needed to know to give this Momma the best chance at having a happy, healthy litter of piglets, and she wasn't at all ready to start looking at going back. She was all in! I sent out a text to the other adults, emailed the farmer letting him know that we were still interested and I would call him in the morning, and tried to sleep knowing that I needed to take care of it in the morning.

Morning came and I was exhausted! We all got up and got ready for the day, knowing that this was the day, today we would either meet our Momma Sow, or we would end the day empty handed. I called the farmer twice on my way to work, both times with no answer. I got to work and settled in, ready to start my day, come what may. Finally the farmer called me! We chatted and from what I understand, I think he was impressed at how much work our kids had done and how prepared we were. We were back on!

Then it was time. We loaded the kids, got in the truck and headed for the farm. It was a looonnnng drive! It took us nearly two and a half hours to get there, but when we did we were in for an amazing treat! The farmer showed us around and gave us a truly grand tour! We saw piglets from a week old to some born in November. He talked to us about how to care for the piglets, what to do for the Momma's, his breeding operation and how he tried to breed for good genetics, not just good show qualities. The pigs and piglets we saw were beautiful and I can see how his breeding techniques will build beautiful show pigs. I can't wait to see our babies!

Some of the piglets

Our Momma Sow loaded right into the trailer with very little prompting and settled in for a long ride home. Once we got there, all the kids came out to help coax her out of the trailer and into her stall. Once out of the trailer, her curiosity got the better of her and she wandered right in. She sniffed around her new place, munched on some food and water and rooted around in her straw before settling down for bed. We scratched her behind her ears, said goodnight and closed her in for the night. I think she is very happy in her new home. Now the countdown begins… 6 days and counting to piglets!