Giving thanks for the tools and truck lights that enabled us to finish placing our breeding groups together on Wednesday. A quick summary of the day –

::: winds averaging 22 mph all. day. long.

::: taking down old fence, putting up new paddock fencing, making lanes for moving sheep

::: finished trimming hooves and crutching

::: drenched all the adults with a mixture of garlic powder and molasses (will devote an entire post to this sometime soon); attempting to sort breeding groups as we go

::: it is now almost 5 p.m. getting dark and beginning to rain, still windy 🙁

::: going over to the other side of the pasture, we find the rams and put the breeding harnesses on using the truck lights to see – warning, this is not for the faint of heart

::: take Saul, on halter, back across the pasture, retrieve his girls and head down the hill to his assigned paddock… get everybody down the hill using a flashlight, through the gate.. unfortunately when we try to shut the gate the girls take off back up the hill at a trot

::: finally catch one of the girls and manage to get her through the gate to keep Saul company overnight

::: head back up the hill, adjust lanes to move Liam’s group up to his paddock

::: go to Liam’s paddock and there are two sheep not one standing at the gate, this is not good

::: get halters on both and discover that Hercules has broken through a tubular, wire-filled gate

::: fix the gate with a rubber mallet and tools shown above; put up another temporary electric fence to protect the gate from another jail-break

::: back to the barn then back up the hill bringing up Liam’s group

::: bring out Aragorn’s group into the barn pasture

::: move Poseidon’s group to the nursery area awaiting his recovery from last Sunday’s injury

::: take down most of the lane fencing after finally locating Saul’s runaways, get them into a pen in the barn

::: it is still raining, still windy… give up until morning light… thankful that we are finished… almost