Monday, May 4, 2009

It's that time again...

Shearing season is upon us and we had great intentions to start this weekend. Unfortunately, we didn't set a gameplan and got too involved in other projects that needed to be done. Pastures needed cleaning, AlpacaNation pages needed updating, fences needed mending....now that the snow is gone and the weather is nice, we find so many projects that need our attention.

Rick fertilized our hay field some more yesterday with our own "home-made" alpaca fertilizer. He filled the spreader with a second load of composted manure and it turned out to be too much for the old spreader. The chain broke before he even got started so the manure had to be emptied manually - that's right, he started shoveling it! Poor guy did a lot on his own before he had to take a break.

After lunch, he went back out and I gave him a hand as well. Our older brother Terry came out soon after and the three of us unloaded the spreader out onto the hayfield. Now Rick will have to add fixing the chain on the manure spreader to his list of priorities.

The weather is going to be in the 60's over the next couple of days, with rain later on this week. We may try to shear a few alpacas in the evenings after Rick gets home from work. This afternoon I'll be setting up the shearing table and getting things ready to go. Rene' will come out and help with the shearing too.

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