Open Barn

(photo by our friend Steve Scherbinski)

Yesterday we hosted an open barn and it was wonderful. Many of our friends attended and hopefully had a great time. It was rather hot and muggy, but thankfully not raining! The animals held up relatively well with all the activity. My mom came from Iowa and made three gallons of homemade icecream-blueberry, chocolate and blackberry. The blackberries were harvested right here on our farm. We are planning to host this event again next year in September.
As for updates on the animals...they are doing well. I discovered that we have herding goats and am quite impressed with Juliette's ability to round up the alpacas. The incident happened a few days ago when Taima and I had grained the animals. We were not able to put them out because we were having someone build outdoor shelters in their paddocks. We finished up morning chores and left to do some errands. When I returned home, Juliette was bleating at me from the moment I pulled into the driveway. I looked down to the barn and saw that the mommies and babies were quietly munching on grass around the barn. However, they should have been in barn and not wandering around. Juliette was clear about this situation and very upset.
I went down to the barn and opened a gate to a side paddock. The goats ran along beside me. As I began to encourage the alpacas to enter the open gate, Juliette started to run towards the herd and as she apporached Nightengale she lowered her head as if to butt her and skidded to a halt. Of course Nightengale turned and fled. Juliette, realizing her tactics were successful, tried it again and then again. In the end, she managed to usher all of the herd through the gate and into the paddock! I was so proud of her. Needless to say, she received a little treat.