Whatever happened to . . . ?

Following my last post, someone asked about Trouper and Merlot, and I realized that there are probably a lot of stories with loose ends. So, to catch up --

Merlot is the gorgeous Shagya Arabian gelding whose owner deserted him here. He was supposed to be a pasture mate for Katherine's horse, but when Buddy died and I called Merlot's owner to tell her he was alone, she said she didn't want him any longer, "and if you're going to desert him, you can just put him down." Well, I wasn't going to do that, so Merlot is still here. He had lost some weight over the winter, but he is in great shape now. I can't even find his ribs. He has a bad case of arthritis in one of his hocks, which he's had forever, but otherwise he's doing great.

Midknight is the other horse that was here, and when I told his owner that Midknight could no longer stay here, he sold him. We thought the buyers might also take Merlot, but they decided against it.

Trouper was the dog that someone dumped on our road. He was pit bull, and he was injured badly. The pit bull rescues were full, and the mixed breed rescues wouldn't take him because they said some cities banned ownership of pit bulls, which created a variety of problems for them. He had a broken pelvis, which caused him to be incontinent, and without surgery that would have cost a few thousand dollars, there was really no hope that he would regain bladder control. As he began to get around better, he started chasing chickens, and he killed two geese. Then he and our livestock guardian had issues. I was able to break up the first fight myself. It took three of us to break up the second fight. After the third fight, Trouper was so badly injured it would have meant more vet bills, which we simply couldn't afford, especially for a dog that had so many things going against him, so we made the very hard decision to put him down. We still miss him, and I'm certain that there will be more pit bulls in my future, because he was a very sweet dog who simply had too many strikes against him.

Sterling the llama was having dental issues last winter, and they seem to have somehow resolved themselves. I'm wondering if the abscessed tooth fell out? Everything I learned about abscessed teeth in llamas sounded dreadful, and I'm glad that it cleared up without having to have a hole drilled through the bottom of his jaw, which is what they recommended at the U of I vet clinic.

The baby llama is a month old now, and we decided to name him Lance for two reasons. It looks like he's wearing biker shorts, so there's Lance Armstrong, and since he's going to be a guardian, naming him after Lancelot seemed like a good idea. I'm sorry I don't remember if it was a blog reader or a Facebook fan that came up with the name, but I love it! After I told a farm guest the baby's name one day, she thought it also worked because knights used lances!

If there's anything else that I need to update, just let me know!

Life and death decisions

About three weeks ago, I noticed that Sterling the llama was very underweight. It can be tricky with fiber animals, because their fiber covers up their body so well. I happened to pet him while he was eating, and that's the only reason I knew he was having a problem. I brought him into the barn so I could monitor his food intake and pooping. I treated him for parasites and coccidia since his poop was sometimes pasty. He didn't improve. And a few days ago, I realized he was hardly eating his hay. I did a little research and took him down to the University of Illinois vet hospital yesterday. We learned that he has an abscessed tooth, which will cost $600-800 to remove.

Apparently, you can't just pull a tooth in the back of a llama's mouth. There's an access problem because their head is too long. The vet would have to go through the bottom of his jaw bone and push the tooth out of its socket and into his mouth. He'd have a hole there forever and could dribble saliva and stuff.

Is it worth it to spend that much on a 16 year old llama? He'll never produce that much fiber in the rest of his life, and he's a gelding, so he's not producing babies. From a strictly financial point of view, the answer is no. But I hate making decisions like this.

While driving home yesterday and thinking about this, a Miley Cyrus song came on the radio and I recalled a recent conversation with my daughter. She said she quit liking the singer after she heard that her father got mad at her when she spent tens of thousands of dollars on clothes one month. Now she's on a budget and can only spend a few thousand dollars a month on clothes. Maybe Miley Cyrus could give up a couple shirts or pair of pants and pay for my vet bills?

Sterling isn't the only animal that needs expensive vet care. There is also Trouper, the dog that someone dumped out here, who was then hit by a car. His broken pelvis has healed to the point that he can run again, but he has some kind of serious nerve damage, because he is completely incontinent. He dribbles all the time, and when he lays down, he makes a puddle. He also has no awareness of where his right rear leg is. He stops walking with it completely stretched out behind him, and sometimes he sits down with it twisted behind him. I've spent nearly $300 on this dog already, and he has not even been neutered or vaccinated. I'm hesitant to spend another hundred dollars in an attempt to get a diagnosis of a problem that I can't afford to fix.

He can't live in the house because of the incontinence, and he can't live outside because our livestock guardian has attacked him both times he's come in contact with him, even though they should be separated by fencing. The LGD is finding a way to get out. He hasn't escaped from the pasture in at least six months, so I'm sure he's doing it now because he perceives a threat. It took three of us to pull them apart the last time. What if there's a fight when only one person is home? Living in our barn office is no life for a dog.

And then there is the horse that was deserted here by his owner. He's been here on free pasture board almost from the beginning, and a couple years ago, after my daughter's horse died at the age of 30, I emailed the owner and asked if she'd like to take Merlot somewhere else, because he was lonely without other equine companionship. She sent me a very rude email saying that she couldn't afford to do anything with him, and if I was going to desert him, I should just have him put down. That was a decision I didn't want to make. But now, he's losing weight. I'm sure he needs to have his teeth floated, but that's at least $130, if they find nothing wrong with his teeth. But what if there is something else causing him to lose weight? What if he has other health problems? I know he has arthritis in his hock, which is so severe that the muscles in that hip started to atrophy a couple years ago. He also has EPM, which is a neurological problem that makes it impossible for him to be ridden, so he's not here for any reason, other than his owner deserted him, and I haven't had the courage to put him down or send him somewhere. I've heard the horse rescues are full anyway -- probably like the pit bull rescue that I contacted when we found the injured dog. What financially-strapped, over-worked rescue wants to take on an animal that they know has expensive health issues and will probably be unadoptable?

And that ignores the two cats that were dumped out here last summer. I wanted to get them neutered so that they'd stay here, safe in our barn, rather than venturing out looking for a girlfriend and getting eaten by coyotes. I haven't been able to get them fixed because of Trouper's vet bills.

It would cost thousands of dollars to take care of the vet bills of all five of these animals, four of which I never asked for. They were someone else's problem -- someone who was cowardly and irresponsible. I could never desert an animal and pretend that all is well.

But I do not have thousands of dollars to deal with all these problems. I don't want to see the llama and horse waste away. I don't want to see Trouper get killed by the LGD or live a lonely life in our barn office. I'm sick of seeing intact male cats fighting, and I hope I never again find the remains of a cat that was eaten by a coyote.

But I'm not rich enough to deal with other people's problems -- people who are blissfully ignorant of the pain and suffering of their former pets.

It boils down to some very uncomfortable, painful decisions for me, decisions I never wanted to make.

Hay and horses and goats and sheep

It's amazing how every now and then something knocks me down, and after spending a few hours in bed, things look a lot clearer. Today it was a migraine. I got only three hours of sleep last night, and then I woke up with a migraine, which just got worse and worse until I finally surrendered around noon and went to bed. I couldn't sleep for a couple hours, so I just laid there thinking. One of the many things going through my head lately is how fast the animals are burning through the hay. The front of our barn was filled with 500 bales of hay in November, and we only have about 150 left, which is not enough to get us into April when the grass starts growing. I've left two phone messages for one hay man, and he hasn't called me back, which I'm thinking is bad news. I emailed another person, and she responded right away, saying that they didn't have any extra to sell.

When I look at how many animals we have and whether or not we need to sell or butcher any, I always think that it's not a problem to take care of one more and one more and one more and . . . And I seriously underestimated how much more hay would be eaten by the new additions to the farm this year: two cows, six sheep, and another llama. Then I remembered something that a speaker said at the conference earlier this month: to be sustainable, you need to be producing your livestock feed on your farm. Yeah, that was a goal initially, and I forgot about it somewhere along the line. Now I understand why people and businesses put their mission statement front and center, where they're looking at it every day.

So, here are some obvious observations and solutions. First, I need to say good bye to the two horses that are here. When we moved out here in 2002, we had more than enough to feed our livestock, so it seemed like the nice thing to do to take in a horse that needed a home. My daughter had a horse, and he would be happier with a pasture mate. So Merlot (pictured above) came to live with us. He has EPM and severe arthritis in his hock. He can't be ridden. His owner said she was only looking for free pasture board. She would take care of all the vet bills, farrier bills, and other upkeep above and beyond feeding. That lasted until she got divorced a few years ago, and she stopped paying his bills. And then when my daughter's horse died three years ago at the ripe old age of 30, Merlot was very upset. I emailed the owner to let her know that Buddy had died, and I asked if she'd like to move Merlot to another farm where he'd have an equine friend. Her response ranked right up there as one of the meanest emails I've ever received. She suggested that I have him put down if I was going to "abandon" him, and that was the last time I ever heard from her.

So, I really need to find a new home for Merlot. I'm hoping there is someone out there, who is at a place similar to where we were eight years ago -- plenty of pasture just sitting there waiting for someone to eat it. I also need to contact the other horse's owner. What other horse, you ask? Well, after Buddy died, and Merlot was unhappy, I allowed another person to bring his horse here for free pasture board. I guess I'm just hopelessly optimistic. I haven't heard from the guy in almost two years, so I hope he responds better than Merlot's owner. It will be sad to say good-bye to the horses, but I can't deny the fact that they're eating pasture and hay that my goats, sheep, cows, and llamas could be eating.

I have also wound up with nine unproductive goats, and their feed bill is certainly adding up, especially when three of them are la manchas. It's very frustrating that I find myself with five wethers. The first two were born here seven years ago, and I kept them simply because no one ever bought them. (One is pictured at right.) Then I decided to keep the mini mancha wether because I was going to train him to be a cart wether. I have recently come to the realization that training a goat to pull a cart is not something I will have time to do in the next few years. I must admit, I can't do everything! I also have a la mancha wether, who I bought as a buck, but after he kept jumping fences and getting in with my Nigerian does, I decided it was too risky to have a full-size buck on the farm, so I castrated him, thinking that I'd train him to pull a cart too.

The final wether is a great example of what happens when you hold an animal without a deposit. A therapeutic riding stable contacted me and told me they wanted a couple goats for their petting zoo, and asked if I could donate them. Sure, I said, enthusiastically. I decided Nick and another goat would go there, and in spite of many offers to buy him, I kept refusing to sell him, because he was going to be donated to charity. They kept saying they'd be ready to accept him in another month or two. He is now two years old! In case you're wondering, the ninth unproductive goat is Star, the first goat I ever bought, who is now 11 and enjoying a well-deserved retirement! It's time for me to sell the other eight. That would cut my goat herd by 25%.

And I really need to start selling sheep. I had wanted to keep my flock at around 20, but this year it has crept up to 25, and they eat 25% more than 20 sheep. Really, I think I should reduce it down to about a dozen sheep. That was a very nice number as I knew all their names and pedigrees. Now I'm out there trying to read ear tags and figure out who's who. The rams are still a quarter mile away from the ewes, so there will be no more accidental breedings this year.

I can't believe the numbers got away from me like this. I need to continue evaluating what we're doing and what animals are here, and see if there are any other ways I can reduce hay consumption. There is one more hay man I can call. If he doesn't have anything, then I'll probably be losing a lot more sleep in the coming weeks. This is not the ideal time of year for selling or butchering, but I'll have to start making some hard decisions.

Farm photo fun

Sarah, our apprentice, has taken a lot of very cool photos since arriving a couple weeks ago. I love this one! I wonder what Lizzie is saying? (Yeah, I know she's just chewing her cud, but it looks like she is saying something interesting.)

This picture of Jo seriously needs to have a thought bubble above it.

Katherine and Sarah have also had a great time taking pictures of each other.

I can't believe Katherine got into the creek -- she said the water was quite cold!


Sarah has been obsessed with horses most of her life and made fast friends with MidKnight. She's been riding for about 10 years and says he's the calmest horse she's ever known. Yes, she just hopped up on his back in the middle of the pasture.

Freaking out in the Twilight Zone

Life just keeps getting weirder. The faltering economy means different things to different people, and it's hard to comprehend what it means out here. After taking a couple of kittens off my neighbor's hands, I mentioned to the vet that people were dumping an awful lot of cats lately. She said that's because the county can't afford to keep them in the pound, so they won't take any from owners. So, owners are just dumping them out in the country. That was sad enough, but I heard something even sadder this weekend.

Apparently, not knowing what else to do with them, some people are castrating stray males themselves. I won't repeat the procedure here, because it was rather barbaric -- sounds like something from the Civil War era surgical books -- and I certainly don't want to give anyone else any ideas. The person who told me about it said that most of them survive.

Then today I received a letter from a couple of Shetland shepherds who can no longer care for their sheep and are looking to give them away to someone. They had photocopied their letter and just filled in my first name after "Dear" in the salutation of the letter, so the letter obviously went to a number of people with Shetlands.

A friend also called today and started telling me about people deserting horses in parks that allow riding. Since horses cost a small fortune to keep boarded, and no one is buying horses right now, some people take them to the parks to ride them, and then just leave them when no one is looking.

And to put icing on the cake today, I had a visit from a very suspicious man. He called last week and asked a lot of questions about taking care of goats, then he said he'd stop by sometime and asked me for directions. I told him to call whenever he was ready to head over, and I'd give him directions then. Well, today my phone rang, and he said he was outside looking at my sheep. I told him I'd be right outside, and he said that I didn't need to come out. He just didn't want me to worry if I looked out the window and saw someone with my animals. He was just going to head back down the road so he could look at my goats.

"No, just give me a minute, and I'll be right out!"

"Oh, no, I don't want to bother you. You don't need to come outside," he said in this sweet grandfatherly-sounding voice.

"Well, you won't know who you're looking at or what if I'm not out there to tell you."

"Oh, that's okay. I just want to see what they look like. I don't want to bother you."

And we went back and forth until Jonathan saw him pulling into the driveway, and I blurted out, "Don't get out of your car! I have a big dog, and he hates strangers, and I don't know where he is! Don't get out of your car until I get out there!" He stopped arguing at that point, and I went out to meet him. (I knew exactly where both my dogs were, by the way.)

He was short and a little overweight with a long white untrimmed beard and no teeth. I took him into the barn to see the babies, and he said that he just wanted to see what they looked like so he'd know what size crate he'd need to transport one. Then he starts sizing up the adults, even though I never said the adults were for sale. He pointed to Coco and asked, "Is that one pregnant?" I said yes. And he started talking about what a good home they'd have and how they'd be in "goat heaven." That was a phrase he kept repeating -- "goat heaven." I know it's a metaphor, but somehow it was making me really uncomfortable. After he left, I realized he didn't ask any questions that buyers normally ask -- not even prices! He never asked any of the goats' names or production history or anything. As he went to leave, he never said anything about getting back to me, calling me later, or buying a goat. But he did keep talking about what a good home they'd have and how happy the goats would be in "goat heaven."

Okay, so, I suppose this man could be completely devoid of any normal social skills, but it's hard for me to believe that anyone could be so clueless. I had to practically threaten the man with being mauled by my dog before he would let me come out into my yard to show him my animals!

I asked him how he found our place, and he said he just went to the gas station in town and asked, "Where's Old MacDonald's Farm?" and someone gave him directions. That seems really strange also, but I don't think my physical address is on the net anywhere.

Needless to say, the barn is locked tonight! I wish I had a way to lock up the sheep. I am freaked out though, knowing two goat breeders who've had goats stolen, and reading the Shetland shepherd's story about her neighbor's cow being shot with an arrow and butchered in the pasture. We should probably be looking at how we can put all the animals behind locked doors and gates. The world is getting increasingly weird and scary.

Flood!

It's hardly past 10 a.m., and we've already had quite a day on the farm. Margaret woke us up at 3 a.m. to let us know that Caboose kidded. She had triplets: two bucklings and a doeling. They're all healthy and nursing.

I wasn't able to fall back asleep because the sound of rain on the roof always worries me. Before heading off to bed, Margaret wisely advised me to either go to sleep or go outside and do something. Well, what can you do in the dark? But I understood her point. Staring at the ceiling or the insides of my eyelids isn't helpful at all. Finally after 6, I fell back asleep. It didn't seem like I was asleep for long when Mike got up, and I heard him mutter an expletive from the bathroom. "What's wrong?" I mumbled. "This is the worst I've ever seen it." I knew what he was talking about -- the rain had caused another flood. Without opening my eyes, I said, "Those hundred-year flood maps are bullshit," and I recalled the five or six other floods we'd had in five years and told myself to fall back asleep, knowing I couldn't stop the creek from rising.

It didn't seem like very long before the phone woke me up. Katherine said Mike was outside, so I got up and looked out my bedroom window to the east. The creek had risen a lot. Then I went to our bathroom and looked out the window to the south. The entire pasture behind the pond had become a lake. I ran to my daughters' bedroom and looked out the window to the west. Behind the chicken house, the lower pastures were filled with water, and the road past the walnut grove was flooded.

A few minutes later, Mike came inside to tell us that Merlot, the horse, was stranded behind the hayfield. He was in water almost up to his chest. Since the forecast is calling for rain for the next few days, we knew we had to get him out of there, or he would likely drown. Mike and Katherine volunteered. They took his halter and a lead rope. They walked as closely as possible to him without getting in the water, and Katherine called him. He started towards her, but as soon as the water hit his chest, he jumped back and started walking in circles. They had assumed that Mike would have to go after him, but they figured it was worth a shot to call him first.

Mike slowly walked into the water. He didn't think it was too bad, even when he was waist-deep in flood water. Then he was up to his neck in water, gasping and swimming. Apparently there was a drop off in the pasture. He went back to the higher ground, searching for another route that would allow him to walk through the water. On his third attempt, he finally found a path. When Mike made it to Merlot, he put the halter on him and tried to lead him through the water. As soon as the water would hit Merlot's chest, he would pull back. With some sweet talking, Mike finally persuaded the horse that he wasn't trying to lead him to his death, and Merlot came through the water. Katherine took Merlot to the barn, and Mike headed for the house.

When Mike walked in the door, soaking wet, I knew the only reason he didn't have blue lips with chattering teeth was due to the adrenaline that was pumping through his body, and that as soon as it dropped, he'd be freezing if we didn't have him in warm water and drinking warm liquids. It's one of those things you learn after your son falls through the ice on the pond and your daughters swim across a flooded creek to rescue goats. Adrenaline is amazing, but it's short acting.

Now we sit in the house watching the rain fall, watching the pastures turn into larger lakes, watching the water creep around the bottoms of more trees. At times like these, when things look so dreadful that I have an urge to let a string of expletives fly from my mouth, I think about the farmers who lived 100 years ago. They were even more helpless than we are today. At least we have a sump pump that keeps the basement from flooding. I guess that's about it, but it's something. We have no more power to control the creek than they did 100 years ago. The forecast calls for two more days of rain.