I enjoyed spotting this little opossum in the duck pen one early morning a while back. He looked half-grown, maybe this year’s baby. I wonder if he (and maybe his kin) are partly responsible for the extraordinary amount of duck food I’ve been buying lately? I’ll have to remember to shut the door on that pen at night (the ducks are sleeping in the other pen, just because they are in that habit now).
Opossums are such funny behaving animals. I only noticed him because the dogs did, and yet, he just ignored their poking and prodding. And he wasn’t too disturbed by me either. It’s no wonder they get hit by cars all the time, they seem to be rather oblivious to big things moving around them.
We had to move the sheep again midweek, more flooding forecasted. This time, it was different. The ewes marched up the hill calmly and smartly, and penned easily. The ram decided he didn’t want to. I ended up having to halter him and drag him the whole way. Uff da, he is heavy when he doesn’t want to walk! I imagine a few drivers-by found amusement to see me tugging him inch by inch, in the pouring-down rain.
And, the llama didn’t cooperate this time, she refused to come with. I ended up leaving her down there, during part of the danger time with the gate open so she could save herself if she needed to. I do believe llamas have retained enough wiliness that she’d probably be fine finding her own way up the hill if water started coming across the valley. I’m pretty sure sheep are not capable of that, however. I think if I work the dogs on her a little more, I can have her ready to move next time. She is just so new to the place, and very unsure of her safety.
I wrongly decided it would be ok to move the sheep back down after dark on Thursday night. It’s hard for me to be at home during daylight hours to do this, due to my work schedule and the short daylight we have right now. I think it would have worked fine, had Maggie not made a critical error. I retired her from working once the sheep were headed down the hill, as I figured they’d run down, and stop at the gate and wait. But, Maggie ignored my command and tried to cover them. I didn’t see her doing this in the dark. By herself, she caught up with them, split them, sent a couple sprinting down the driveway, and the rest into the drainage ditch!! By the time we arrived down there, the sheep had crawled out, but were stressed and wet. And it took us a few minutes to find the other two. The ram decided to be stubborn again, and was tangled in the blackberries, so we had to heave him out. But, in the end, we got them put away. And I know next time to bring a leash for my dog when I don’t want her to cover! 🙂
I’ve been trying to sell some things on craigslist and eBay, we have too much stuff from combining households. It feels good to clean out, somethings I’m just selling for the cost of shipping them, just to avoid throwing them away. So far, I’ve found takers for: some computer RAM, a PCMCIA LAN card, an old-fashioned 35mm film camera, a printer, a Dogloo, and a dog crate. There is much more to list, but I’m just doing a few at a time.
We’ve gotten three inquiries on the house sale, so that’s not too bad! Hopefully someone will fall in love with it.