Frozen

Other rejected post titles: Sneaux-pocalypse, Ice-mageddon (saw both of these on facebook this week)

  We are having an unusually cold winter here on the farm. Of course, I should say right now that what we are experiencing is nothing compared to what folks north of us have to deal with on a regular basis, but for us, even just dropping below freezing presents a whole new set of problems that we are not used to dealing with. Seriously, I don't know how you folks up north do it!

  This particular cold snap closed down roads and schools and both of our day jobs, but here on the farm, it wasn't nearly as eventful as a couple weeks ago when our temperatures dipped into the teens. We had two different pipes burst, one in the processing shed and the other in the poultry house.

  The spigot actually blew off the poultry house sink while we were at work that time causing water to rocket up to the ceiling of the building and cascade all over everything inside, including the closest rabbit pen with 7 baby bunnies. We were at work at the time and came home to a strange roaring sound coming from the building. We don't know how long the thing was jetting out water, but the ground all around the building was saturated and everything inide was soaked. Thank goodness none of the animals seemed worse for the wear, and nothing got wet that couldn't be dried.

   Since then, we have learned how to shut off the water to those out building and to run the pressure off the lines and hoses. This time our worse pipe related casualty was an old, old hose spigot that only the neighbors use. In all cases, Big Onion stepped up to the plate and was able to use his amazing ability to fix just about anything that's broken to set things right quite quickly.

Below are some pictures from our most recent freeze...

Goats in coats

 We've had some very chilly nights here on the farm recently.

 Here in South Louisiana when the temps drop below freezing and we get a good frost cover on the ground, it might as well be a snow storm for us.

  I finally prevailed over the Big Onion and put a coat on Gwen during some of the colder nights. Big Onion is of the opinion that if we put coats on the goats, they'll never grow proper winter coats to protect them from the cold (and he's probably right about this though I'll never admit it to him!).

   My poor little Gwen has a terrible cough though that we just cannot get rid of. We've been to the vet twice and tried antibiotics, herbs, homeopathics, and vitamins, but she just cannot shake it. The coughing comes and goes in fits and seems worse when she overexerts herself. Otherwise, she seems to be a happy, healthy goat. I'm just afraid that this is a manifestation of her CAE that will only get worse over time.

  With that in mind, I put my foot down and bundled my little girl up in one of the Sheltie's nice warm coats overnight. Goats are much deeper in body than dogs so it wasn't a perfect fit, but it got the job done. We also set up a couple nice cozy areas with a deep beds of hay so that all the goats could snuggle down for the night.

Happy Gwen hanging with her auntie Thea after a cozy night in her goat coat.