Friday

Well I am tired!

Here is a pic of some of the bucklings on the hill this week. There are 13 but not that many in the pic!



I have been going up ahead by myself to grain them and they keep a close eye on me- for when I try to sneak off to put the feeders down.

Only a few of them have names or nicknames from when my daughter, Willow, was helping out. The rest are known by their lineage, generally through the mother. The black in the front is Mary's Boy, who after an intense bout of nursing through a bad patch after weaning was named by P as "Joseph".

I can't tell which grey is in the front in the pic, we have "Alpaca head" (Nive's grey), "Tack Room baby" (Lilymore's grey) "Chubs" (Lois's grey) and lastly, "Sugreca's", who has no nickname yet.

Bonnie's boy, fluffy grey coat, blue eyes and white points, has been named, "Beau", by P.

My favorite is "Badger Boy" the black and white next to the building, out of Ursula.

The two browns, the far one, is Carmella's, the youngest of the bunch, not born until June. The one in the middle of the group is "Uureka's Boy" (I aggravate Boss when I call his Mom "Eureka" like the vaccuum-it is pronounced with the Scandinavian "UU". Well, maybe not Scandinavian, but we used to have a slew of "hj's..." pronounced "Yuh". Back to the buckling, I call him "Monarch Baby", after his sire, not after the dam so I don't have to sweat the "UU". :)

Besides, his father has always been the handsomest buck to me. I remember when I first met him, I thought he was so handsome, but he does not like to be touched. I have been working on him for four years now, soft and slow. We get along pretty well. I don't pet him and he doesn't horn me.

Boss is away right now, and I have taken the job of walking the bucks. Yesterday they hit the third field and the snowmobile trail and kept going and going and going. I couldn't cut them off and had no idea where we would end up. I have heard stories of them ending up the next town over once....and I thought it was to be repeated yesterday.

Desperate, I pulled my Pb&j out of my bag and started waving it. No stopping them. I did have a couple of apples in there, I should have tossed one into the group but didn't think of it.

Finally they stopped and I stopped so not to spook them and rolled a smoke. Then I discovered I didn't have a light and that did it-I snuck by them and chased them back up the trail.

When we finally reached the third field, R was there and I was surprised he had followed us that far, since he had never been back that far. Most of the bucks followed him, but poor old Monarch couldn't keep up so I stayed with him. I had heard coyotes yipping on the way in-and Monarch has a pathetic little cry when he gets left behind so I didn't want to leave him for coyote fodder.

Crossing the first field just the two of us, I imagined him as a little buckling racing and leaping along, now a senior hobbling along way behind. It nearly brought tears to my eyes. I reached into my bag and hauled out one of the wild apples and gave it to him.

Then I discovered he can't walk and eat an apple. So I took a couple of pics.

BLF Rayvon's Monarch