How We Easily Mow the Yard (with Sheep)

You guys coming? Come on, Josiah. Come on. Get out of bed. You taking Mama's health smoothie she made? Good boy. Happy day, everyone. Taking me a little bit to wake up. You gonna drink this today?

Mm-hmm.

He doesn't always drink it. I hope you guys are having a Great day. I'm having a strangely good day physically.

Today I get to buy something.

He had a rough start, but today is his third day in a row to stay with me, and that means he can get those— is it still the dinosaur eggs? Okay, we're staying focused. That's good. I say it's strange that I feel well because I jumped off my strict carnivore diet wagon over the weekend and I didn't crash. My feet actually feel great. Feet is the main symptom. They just get really sore and hurtful, but they're doing good. As for the moat, the waterproofing, I think they're coming back tomorrow. Tomorrow is a Labor Day. We'll see if they work, but the contractor was saying as soon as Tuesday-ish. Feeling in this hole?

Can you touch that?

What?

The black stuff.

I think so.

Car.

Let's not go that way. Let's go down that way. I realize this Tuesday talk means nothing to you guys because these vlogs are behind. They're actually vlog— they're 2 business days behind. What, are you touching it? Yeah, I need to get in the habit of saying Yesterday, like for example, we're gonna have this dirt fill in the day after tomorrow. I think it's like a tar. I've been saying I wish this project were a little more sexy and we were doing something cool. Well, we are now doing something cool. How about a root cellar right here? We've always had the idea to put a root cellar here. We can come from underneath our house and walk right into it. This is the north side. Oh my, what is that?

Box turtles.

Oh, is it dead? Yeah. Huh.

I found it when I was collecting the eggs yesterday.

If you feed them, they'll come in, but they're doing a good job tilling the garden. They're doing a good job here.

What are we doing today, Papa?

We're gonna keep training this new milk cow to milking. And then we're going to move the sheep to mow Grandma's yard, and we're going to set up paddocks for them in the future because Grandma and Big Daddy want to start moving them. How's your rabbit?

Good.

No problems?

No.

You didn't finish your smoothie, bro.

Because I didn't want to finish. I wanted to get my toy.

Finish. Oh, I get it. Okay. You got to stay with me. Okay, well, take a minute. What are you about to do?

I'm just trying to get things that we need for our, um, apple cider vinegar and our sea gold to put on there, to put on the cows' feed.

All right, what do you want to use for today?

We're going to use this.

Okay, but you're going to get a plastic one?

I'm going to get a plastic one that's like this.

They make those in plastic?

Mm-hmm.

That's game changer. Okay, well, I'll take that and get away. Do you want to wait? Do you want me to wait on you?

Where are you going? Out there?

Yes. Okay, today's gonna be interesting milking. We've got a new cow. She got in the stanchion first day, a little slower the second day. Boys did it third day, said she wouldn't go in. She's on to us, I'm afraid, and we're moving in the opposite direction of training, so it's going to be interesting. What is he doing on the mower? One, it's super wet. And two, we're supposed to be doing chores. Like chore chores, like feed the animal chores. We don't mow in the morning. I mean, it's a good problem to have. Kids eager to mow. We gotta let it dry up. We gotta get the animals fed, all that stuff. Let's go, it's starting to drizzle and I hear the cows bellowing.

It's supposed to rain all day today. It is?

Well, that puts a damper on our project.

From 10 to 12, it seems like there might not be any rain.

But then after that, an hour and a half. Yeah, this time let's leave Honey over. Okay, Honey and Flossie stay. Yeah, she's bellowing there. Probably need a little bit bigger of a paddock, but that's good, she's hungry. That means she'll come to alfalfa. Come on. Since Honey has been hesitant about going into the stanchion, I thought Well, let's not move her over first thing because then she'd just get full, won't be hungry for alfalfa. So we're going to keep her over here because I don't think she'll bother Flossie, although she could. She's so timid, she'll kind of stay away. And maybe she will. She's really pacing the fence wanting to go over there. That's a good thing she's getting into the motions. Let's try to put a pan down for Flossie and see if she stays her difference. No, no, no, wrong way. Sorry, back out. Okay, she's coming. All right, that's what I was afraid of. That's why I moved her over. If we had a collar, we could scoop it out, put it in right here, and then tie her to the pole, then get her in the stanchion. When's our collars coming? I don't know.

I ordered them as soon as you asked me to. I ordered them that day.

Okay, Flossie. I think Flossie knows she's about to be cold because she's, she's like, I'll just give you 2 gallons of milk. And you've been doing that every day, honey, for the last couple of days.

I wonder if it's because this calf is so vigorous.

Plus he's getting a little older, a little ornery, a little, and she's not, she's not open, but that would be the 3 strikes. The 3 O's: open, ornery, and old. So she's lost the teat. She's just— she's gonna start going downhill, so we're gonna end that before it gets bad. Did you guys notice in the time lapse how Honey lined up behind Flossie? That's what she's used to. How was it? Somebody's not been around cows. Warden her off.

Well, it's a little scary.

How much did the staff help you? It helped me a lot.

She responds well to it. I just had to go like this and she would back up.

In your mind, do you feel like she's a bear and she's gonna attack you?

No, I know it's gonna be an accident if she hurts me.

Not a big blumbering pacifist?

She's not— yeah, she's not mean or anything. She just wants— she's just hungry.

She's hangry out here bellowing. Here, let's put it on her and you guys can hear her bellow. That's the little calf. Yeah, okay, let's get across there and we'll get her in. The good news is she's gonna do whatever we want. Now she's a little hungry. I'm a little hungry. Do whatever they want. Jonah, Josiah, you can get the calf. Boys are gonna bring the calves in down low. I should have done that before I put her over, but oh well. All right, you guys stand right here. You'll be able to see it all from here, I think. So far so good. Now she's actually eating in there too. Remember the other day? Until now she hadn't eaten once she got in there. Let's get her used to a warm cloth. I think they— do they use warm wet cloth?

I do.

At our father's farm. That was major progress. I'm very happy about that. Josiah, you couldn't get her in yesterday. What happened when you tried?

She would just stick her nose in and then she would leave.

We're gonna get her doing this, what, a couple more times, and then we'll separate the calf? You know, it could be— wait till we— wait till we get the collar, then we'll separate the calf. If we separate the calf at night like we do the others, we'll get milk in the morning. But look at these teats, guys. Holy smokes, I cannot wait to milk them. I'll be able to grab those with my whole hand. There's something, aren't they? I better eat to her heart's content. We want this to be associated with good things. What are we gonna call that guy? He's gigantic. Diggin'? I was thinking Hercules or— oh, he makes this a lot easier because he milks her all the way out, right? Takes a lot of pressure off of us. We don't have to just jump in and just start milking, making it happen. And it's good because I don't think she would have stood well for us until today. Honey is like the best name for a cow because you're already calling them. Babe could have been good. Let's go, babe. Hey, babe. Darling, dear— these could have been all good names for cows. This could be a very tricky move because we're going down and up, and the skids have potential of going to come mega in here. We might have to get the tractor. Let's hope not. Well, I wouldn't mind getting the tractor. Tractor work's always fun, but it would be easier if you just pull it side by side. Lest you think I'm dramatic, look at that chunk it took out. But we made it just fine. Hopefully tomorrow we'll be able to start— pull it out. Cause it's on this bank. It's a little bit of an uphill.

I think it'll do it though.

Thanks, Lily.

Good job.

One more. Thank you. Who's this, Beck? She's our best one, by the way. Gives tame babies, they stay healthy, she recovers quickly. Her offspring is the one we're keeping for future breeding.

I hope she gives a girl. She's giving boys.

We lost one of Dixie's for— I don't know, reason, some sort of bloat. But we're looking for stock that either doesn't eat that or can and survives and thrives. So we're taking note of that. Belle has had— in how many years have we been— 2 years breeding? Yeah, this will be breeding 3. Uh, she's been the best. But imagine a farm for our grandkids of generations upon generations of sheep that have learned to thrive here on this land. That's going to be my gift to my children. Thank you, Mom. Curing bacon. I'm going to sneak in here and get rid of any of this extra liquid. Been keeping this in the fridge so I see it like I just did, flipping it every day, getting liquid off. If I need to. The plan is everyone putting the sheep in Grandma's lawn. She was wondering if we should mow it, and then she's like, oh wait, let's put the sheep in there. One person bring the mower. We're gonna— might need the string trimmer. We're gonna need nets. You get your ice cup. What are you gonna do that one when go. Well, it's raining, but we have to get those sheep moved.

At 1:30 it might be less rain. At 4 PM it's gonna be—

okay, well, that's too late. So why don't we just get them moved and we won't do any outdoor project? But we do gotta get— they're out of— they're out of vegetation. I mean, we could give them hay.

Yeah, today, today and tomorrow it's supposed to rain. Oh dear, it's supposed to pouring like every day. Maybe we shouldn't go camping.

We're gonna go camping this weekend.

We can camp.

We can go camping. Let's get wet. We'll get wet, she said. Let's take Sally down, get the minerals out, put the fences in. Come out here, Jonah. We had a turkey casualty last night, or some turkey casualties. Do you think that turkey's got out?

The net was all messed up.

Oh, the net was messed up?

Yeah.

What does that mean? It was—

somebody— something went through it.

Oh, it wasn't on.

Was it on?

A wire was disconnected. I didn't know it.

So the fence wasn't on. We are one week away from butchering, so we're gonna put in a little extra precaution. How many got killed? Three. Winnie, where was you at?

Well, they dropped their— they dropped their turkeys. I think she chased them.

Where are the turkeys?

There's one there and then one here and then one there.

So they're kind of spread out?

Yeah, in a line though.

Okay. Did you— did you save the day? Did you run them off or did you totally miss the beat? It's like she knows. Are you ashamed? Do you know what I'm saying?

Huh?

You weren't roaming? Save our turkeys.

It's okay, you're a rescue girl.

I know she don't know English. You speaking energy? You know the energy vibe I'm giving off? Disappointment. So we're coming up with two precautions: a bigger fence plus making sure it's on, right?

Well, there were two out yesterday.

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. If they got out, we can't help them out of the fence. And Winnie, I guess you're just staying in here in the dry.

I don't blame you, girl.

Guarding the grain. Maybe she'll keep the rats from the grain. They all look like that? Yeah, sides ripped out.

Yep, and the head's gone.

Oh, the heads were gone. This is here.

Oh yeah, that—

well, uh, head's gone, that's raccoon. Yeah, sides ripped out is probably a coyote. Another one in the field. Is that how it was?

Yeah.

Okay, interesting.

And it was all in a line.

That's probably a coyote attack. Jonah, is that how the fence was, mangled like this? Looks like we have 10 left because we're so close. We're putting up this sheep net, bigger net, make sure they're staying because we don't know for sure what did this Did they get out and then get got? Did something go through? So the big net will keep them from for sure getting out.

One of them got hurt.

You got to make sure you turn it on too. Somebody got hurt. Okay, somebody else got attacked. Guys, this rain's getting worse. I'm gonna have to park you and then we'll have to go POV style GoPro. Let's discard the turkeys. We got a trail cam. How about right here? Yeah, can you turn the trail cam that way? All right, we'll see what's after them. They have totally eat themselves out of a paddock, haven't they? Did amazing. That's what it looked like. That's what it is now. Hey, look, at least they're hanging out. Yeah, they were still in separate plots. Let me show you what we're gonna do real quick. It is raining. What can I do to cover you guys? Then we'll do POV. Oh, here. Okay, got this bucket over y'all's head. We've got Premier One sheep net. We've got our sheep. We've decided we're going to leave them over here in a lane because we do have some sheep in there that are not trained to alfalfa. We're going to put up a sheep net in this yard and they're going to have it, I don't know, a day or two, no more than a week. Got to move them at least every week. And then we're going to move them down the hill and then around behind the house, and we can come back down to where they were going. We're just going to get to work, guys. It's getting miserable out here. POV from here on. All right, hope you guys can stand the rain a little bit. I want you to stand close here and see this. They're here. We're gonna pull up that whole side. Our sheep, the one that are familiar with us, are gonna run right over. It's the new sheep that are gonna be the wild card. Keep calling them, Mom. That's, that's, that's when a tame sheep comes in. Lead the way, buddy. Jonah's bringing up the rear a little bit. Oh look, it's all one. Look at them, they're fun. No wonder Grandma wants them in her front yard. Some happy sheep. Listen, park the mower. You don't need no stinking mower. And you got sheep. Let me review the system, show you how easy it is. First, you need sheep. Okay, we got 5 or 10. We like the St. Croix. It's a humid, hardy breed. Good thing because it's been like raining every day. You got to get them inside of an electric net. We like Premier One. This is the shortest one they have. I believe it's like 32 inches. And we mowed a little strip around just so there's So these little electric lines— the bottom line isn't electric, but this line is. And if that touches the ground, it will ground out and it won't work anymore. We're seeing how many sheep we have, we're seeing the amount of space, we're seeing how tall the grass is, and we're guesstimating. These sheep can be in here from 1 day up to a week. You want— definitely want to move them after a week, whether they finished it or not. If there's still vegetation left, there won't We'll be moving them, my guess is in 2 or 3 days. We set it up so that we could go that way next and then go through the woods and then back up around. So we're not just thinking about the day's paddock but next, and that way we don't have to go through a lane like we did today. We just move one paddock over. We'll just set up the next paddock, move them over, pick this up, and that'll become the next paddock. We came right up as close as we could to Grandma's raised beds. We'll need to come in and string trim after the sheep because, uh, well, they can't get in here. And that's probably a good thing. They'd probably eat that. They'd get into this, eat those. Another thing is this water. We just got a— I don't know, this is your regular pail you could probably get at Tractor Supply. I'm not sure why that's leaking, but we have this auto shut-off here. They drink out of it. Oh, this— that's working. Shutoff is working, so something here is leaking. That's better. Okay, I did something tightening it up. Lastly, we got a little plug-in energizer. We've got a little drop cord going back to it. Big fan of plug-in energizers, just more reliable, more power for your buck. We've got it covered with a barrel, and Grandma's got a bucket on it with some holes to get the, the grounding wire through to the grounding rod, and then the electric wire through to the the fence. That keeps the Energizer protected from the elements. We got a little ramshaw in here for them. Little Redmond— this is certainly needed, at least Redmond salt. We got this salt rock, let me hang on this. Those are handy when it's difficult to get like this ABC 16-part mineral program up here. Get that mower out of here!

We did it!

Oh, Beck, you excited?

Very.

We've got a whiteboard. You know what this is, kids?

My organization.

A list of all the projects we need to do so that when you guys are bored, we just go to the board and we write it on and erase it as we go.

Rinse the potatoes, put them on there.

Supper time. I have to admit, I crashed this afternoon. Took an amazing nap. What happened? Why didn't you join me, babe?

I tried. I got woken up so many times I just gave up.

Yeah, next time let your mama take a nap. How's the fair coming?

Good.

You got the submissions ready?

Um, almost. I have some— Grandma's picking up some stuff. In town to finish it, then we'll be done.

You like that steak? We made no progress towards camping except deciding we're gonna, so we have 3 days to get ready. That's gonna be the key to a good roadside camping is being prepared and not waiting till the last day. But is it worth it? Look, he's shoving it in. He really is. He didn't eat for a little while there.

He's what we call the reluctant eater.

Oh yeah, he's getting to be a lot less reluctant. I can't keep up with him now. There you go.

Uh-oh, it's coming back out.

Spoke too soon. I'm proud of you, buddy. You stayed with me for 3 days. Yeah. Was that hard?

Yeah.

Yeah, but you did it. Is Is that the dinosaur eggs pulled up right there? You still want the dinosaur eggs? No, we're not animals. Okay. All right, you want me to pull the trigger on it?

Yeah.

Okay, boom! What? All right, man, it's on its way.

When is it coming?

It'll be here in 2 days. Thank you so much for joining us. We love and appreciate you all. I hope you join us in the next video for many more adventures.