Good Food is Everybody's Business
Running a farm and raising fifty or more sheep, a handful of beef cattle, and two horses is not a job for the faint of heart. And Melissa Lines is NOT Little Bo Peep. It was a farm visit when she was 4 years old that convinced Melissa that she wanted to work with animals, but it took decades – and a corporate career – to bring her to the point where she could actually make it happen.
Now, with 7 sheep… Missy, the dog… Cricket, the cat… Mickey, the canary… and the now pregnant Matushka… our menagerie was about to expand by leaps and bounds!
Spring 1966, we have 7 sheep: Mama and Sure to Go, their 4 lambs, and the old ram, Hercules. We need another fence, or possibly two, built. And thanks to the “fencing fund,” we can do it!
The morning after Mama’s lambs were born we arose early and went to check on our sheep. We found we were not so lucky after all. Mama had decided that she only had one lamb, and had totally rejected the little male. When he came near her, she bunted him away. He, of course, kept trying to nurse each time his sister nursed, but Mama would whirl and butt him with her head.
Now, I was going to have to learn to do tail docking, and possibly castrating. I had made a prior decision not to use some of the cruder methods of removing these appendages.
Early April, and we were on “pins and needles” awaiting the birth of our first lambs. Even Jerry had joined the ‘expectant’ group, but we did not really know what to ‘expect’ from our two ewes. We had no background information on them, other than that Mama was the “old ewe”, and came to us with only one lamb.
Our menagerie was down to only one dog and a canary, after our beloved old fox terrier, Zip, was run over in the summer. That was a very sad day for us. We had had her for over 15 years, and she had traveled with us all the years that Jerry was welding on water towers.
In her last installment, our Minnesotan shepherdess, Lea McEvilly, with no idea how to build a fence and shorter than most of the posts, simply did it! This time we learn what winters in Minnesota mean for farmers; a good root cellar makes all the difference!
