Boys will be boys! | Foxfire Fiber & Designs

Do you remember the promise I made to myself last May, when lambing season rolled into its fifth week as I anxiously waited for Zuni's lambs to arrive? And how panicky I was because I was heading out to the New Hampshire Sheep & Wool Festival and still waiting on lambs? That was a self imposed problem. I had let Teaberry dally with the ewes way longer than the usual four weeks last fall. Since Zuni had not bred in the first cycle, her lambkins were way behind the rest of the kids.

Knowing that I can't put myself in that position next spring (too many irons in the fire!), we pulled cormo ram Teaberry and moorit ram Chai from the breeding flock last week and brought ALL the boys together under one roof in the carriage barn. Here they'll be barn mates all winter until we move them back to the top of the hill next spring.

Andy and Jacob helped me and Holly part an unwilling Teaberry from the girls. He did not make it easy, trying to dodge all us and charge right back into the breeding barn, as we tried to channel and out-maneuver him toward the carriage barn were his old buddies were waiting. Tea is such a good suitor. One night last week, Mike and I flipped on the "lamb cam" (renamed the "ram cam" during the breeding season) just to see what they were up to. And let me tell you, that boy doesn't get much rest! So I am guessing everyone in his group is settled.

Being a junior ram, Chai was much easier to extract from the group of black ewes. In fact Holly did this single handedly. He happily joined his friends Cinder and Latte, along with the other wethers.

Friday morning, Mike had penned Cilantro, Parsley and the other big boys in a catch pen at the top of the hill. We loaded them into the horse trailer and trucked them down.

The trick to reintroducing the boys to each other is to do it all at once. So many things are new and different, they don't know what to make of the situation. It helps quell any major head bashing. Crowding them in tight quarters also reduces the chance for them to do serious damage to each other until re-acquainted.

I was especially worried about the little rams, thinking they might be bullied. But it's interesting how the mature rams just ignore them. I suppose they're too small to be perceived as rivals. Instead, Cilantro and Teaberry have been gunning for each other. They are the only contentious pair in the group and everyone else just tries to stay out of their way.

Cilantro is the instigator, a bit unusual for a wether. Tea will be minding his own business at the feeder and Cilantro throws his ears back and takes a shot at him. Then they engage in shouldering and head butting, trying to out-muscle each other like a pair of teenagers. It goes on until they get sick of it and go back to eating. But they're always side by side, as if neither wants to let the other out of his sight.

We'll be able to enlarge their pen eventually, once the tussle dies down.

Cinder, still so sweet, is taking the whole thing rather well.

And on the other side of Reynolds Road, the girls dine al-fresco. That's Fern, the pretty Leicester ewe staring right at me.

Off to the barn.

***************************************************************************************