donkey – Skyline Pastures

I Fought the Donkey and the Donkey Won

October 18, 2020

by charles.lafferty Getting Started with the Farm

Tanya vs farm animal… here we go again. Grab a blanket, get comfy, and enjoy the story.

I will preface this by saying that the donkey did not attack me. Jasper is a good donkey. He is very intelligent. He is also, so I learned yesterday, stubborn when he wants something. Jasper can be a bully.

Jasper has always been very docile. He is a great pet and loves to be near his people getting pet. There are times when he can be mouthy. He tries to grab things with his lips. Behind those lips are big ole donkey teeth so you must be careful in case he gets a little too excited.

We have the chicken tractors in Jasper’s pasture, and this has been working well. However, Jasper has been growing bolder as we go in and out of the pasture with feed and water for the chickens. Jasper likes chicken feed. He likes it a lot. Just recently while CJ was in the chicken tractor filling up waterers, Jasper snuck over to the trailer, lifted up the bucket full of chicken feed, set it on the ground, and proceeded to eat it all before CJ could stop him. Jasper now has a taste for chicken feed.

This is how things went down for me yesterday…

CJ is at work. Isn’t that how my stories all start? It is my job at lunch to check on the chickens and fill waterers. They typically do not need the feeders refilled until after CJ gets home. I load up the trailer with my water buckets and drive the mower/trailer out into the pasture. I take care of the waterers and notice that on this day, they do in fact need feed. I do have a bucket of feed, but its only enough to fill two tractors. I must go back for more. I will add here that Jasper stays away from me when I water, because I keep the mower running and the noise scares him. I am usually quick with my job whereas CJ has more to do so he takes longer. I finish up and drive back out of the pasture. Jasper does not come anywhere near me.

I grab more feed, but I only need a little bit, so I decide to walk it up. No need in driving the mower/trailer up there for just a couple of buckets. I need one bucket of feed and one bucket of grit. You must add grit to the chickens’ feed. I get to the gate and I see Jasper has moved closer to the chicken tractors. I second guess myself about walking up. It is a long way to the tractors, and I do not have the mower to keep him away from the feed. I decide that it is fine. This is Jasper. My sweet, docile, nice donkey. He will not be a problem. I walk to the chicken tractors.

All is well. I feed the chicks and emerge with one completely empty feed bucket and one bucket with just a tiny bit of dirt/grit. Jasper has arrived. I pet him for a little. I see him eying the buckets, so I hold them both up to him and let him see for himself that they are both empty. He confirms this and removes his head from the buckets. I start to walk off.

Now this is where things happen. I walk just a bit and Jasper trots up to me nudging the buckets. I tell him “Nothing in there buddy, I already showed you”, but I show him again anyway. He confirms yet again that they are indeed empty. I walk away again.

Jasper trots up and nudges the buckets. “Dude, there is nothing in there but dirt!”, I say sternly. He stands there offended while I walk away, again.

Here he comes again. I have made some distance this time and I notice Jasper is becoming more excited. He did not trot up to me. He ran. Jasper does not run often; he is a lazy donkey. This time, he is being mouthy. He is being very stubborn. I take note of his stubborn, excited behavior. Large, stubborn, excited, animals give me cause for concern after the cow attack. “Fine, you want the dirt? Here you can have the dirt bucket!” I place the dirt bucket on the ground. Jasper sticks his head in and examines the bucket. I walk quite a bit faster now.

Jasper does not like the bucket of dirt. This is unacceptable to him. I see him begin to run. Fine, I can run too. Jasper is a donkey. Jasper has four legs. I have two. At the end of those legs are big bulky Muck boots covered in a thick layer of chicken poop. Jasper accepts my running challenge and reminds me that while he may be miniature, he can still run like a big boy. He catches me quite easily. He wants my bucket. “Fine, you stubborn donkey, here, take the empty bucket”. I leave the bucket. I am now empty handed. I decide against running again but walk away quickly. No need to slip with my poop covered boots and get trampled by a donkey.

Jasper does not accept my offering. He refuses it quite quickly and comes up to me. Jasper is upset. Jasper wants a special treat, but I have nothing for him. Jasper is being an ass. He is very excited. He is tossing his head in frustration. He is huffing at me. He is being mouthy. Seeing as how I do not have any buckets for him to be mouthy with, he is nibbling at me. I do not like this. A frustrated, stubborn, mouthy, large, animal can be dangerous. I am out in the open. I do not have buckets to distract him with. If I try to pet him, he shakes his head and huffs at me more.

Ok, I go back for the buckets. I need the buckets. Jasper is with me the whole time being belligerent. I try being stern. I try being loud. This is all to no avail. I grab one bucket then two. I use them to kind of swing out, to shoo him away. This does not affect him in the least. Crap. How do I always manage to get myself into these situations? I do the only thing I can do.

I lock myself in the chicken tractor.

I figure he will mosey on after a few minutes, I can leave the buckets in the tractor, and he will not bother me on the way out. Wrong. Jasper does not leave. Jasper stands outside staring at me. He pushes on the wire (the only barrier between us). He huffs and shakes his head. Then, this incredibly intelligent animal grabs a rope attached to the tractor and starts jerking it! It is hanging right next to the door. It looks like part of the door. This donkey is TRYING TO OPEN THE DOOR! Yep, I am going to die.

I do have my phone with me (a big shout out to leggings with pockets). I call little CJ and tell him that I am stuck in a chicken tractor with an angry donkey trying to get at me. I ask him to bring some sweet feed from the barn and shake it down by the gate to distract Jasper while I escape. He does this but Jasper is to smart for this trick. Jasper does not budge. Jasper continues his antics. Little CJ dumps out some sweet feed and some chicken feed thinking that will help. Nope. Jasper has his eye on the prize. Crap. After a while I tell little CJ to give up and go inside, there is no use. I live in the chicken tractor now. I do the only thing left to do.

I call CJ at work.

“I need a little help here”

“What’s up”

“I am trapped in a chicken tractor and Jasper will not let me out”

Tanya in Tractor — Tanya is displeased with her location…

Laughter, I hear laughter.

“What?”

I explain the situation. CJ tells me to just be firm, show him the bucket, leave a bucket for him, etc.

“Yes, yes, I have tried all of these options. Do you not think that I considered all options available to me before locking myself in a stinking chicken tractor?”

“Tanya, I am a half hour away”

“Well, I am not going anywhere. I need you to come rescue me”

This is followed by more laughter, and his acceptance to come rescue me. I flip over a bucket and take a seat. This is what it has come too. Lord have mercy. My phone rings. It is my

Donkey looking into tractor — Jasper knows there is delicious chicken feed in there…

Aunt. I got nothing but time, so I sit and chat for a while. Jasper does not leave. He walks around the tractor, rubbing, testing areas, pulling on ropes occasionally, shaking his head at me. CJ calls again to check on me. “No, I haven’t made it out yet”, “Yes Jasper is still out there”, “Everything is fine, it’s fine, I’m just sitting on a bucket in a chicken tractor”.

After about an hour of sitting in the chicken tractor, I notice I do not see Jasper. I look out and he is down by the gate eating the chicken feed. I notice little CJ left the whole bag of sweet feed in the pasture. I call little CJ back out to grab it through the gate. That is too much for Jasper at one time. He comes out and retrieves the bag. He calls me. “Mom, book it! Jasper is distracted, go around the back of the tractor and sneak off”, “BOOK IT NOW, GO, GO”.

I unlatch the door and sneak around. I confirm that Jasper is happily eating and begin my escape. I do not run; I do not want to call attention to myself. Jasper starts to turn his head towards me and little CJ yells at him, “Hey Jasper, look at me, over here, don’t look there”. He shakes the feed to get his attention back. I love that kid. I continue walking and eventually make it to the side gate and I am out of the pasture. I am safe. I walk to the other gate and tell Jasper he was naughty. He continues eating without a care. He has what he wanted. He wins.

I have now been beaten by a cow, a rooster, and a donkey. I am seriously lacking in the farm-wife skill department. CJ arrives home moments later and laughs at me some more. I go in the house make myself a drink and contemplate my life choices.

Death on the Farm

October 2, 2020

by charles.lafferty Chickens Getting Started with the Farm

Last week was a hard week. We lost three animals in the same amount of days. So sad.

It all started on Tuesday night, when CJ went to put the egg laying chickens in the coop. We had been letting them free range around the yard for a while now and have had no issues. They loved wandering around the yard and making dust baths under the trees/bushes. They would follow you around if they thought you had treats. Occasionally the rooster would be a

little jerk and come at me, but I made sure to keep Tank near me to keep me safe from his shenanigans. Betsy the chicken, would get separated from the group often because she was not paying attention, or the other chickens would wander away. It was a little funny because she would start to panic. She would just stand there and scream for her friends. We would have to locate her and guide her back to the group.

The chickens always put themselves to bed at dusk and CJ goes out to close the coop once it is dark. However, that night, he could only find 5 chickens. One was missing. We all grabbed our flashlights and went out as a family to search for whom I was sure was Betsy the lost chicken. There was no sign of her though. We did see a fox run off into the woods. We were worried but could find no sign of her. We locked up the coop and just hoped she was sheltering down in the woods safely somewhere.

CJ saw no sign of her the next morning either. It was only later when I went looking for her again that we discovered the truth. Betsy had been murdered! On my walk, down by where we had seen the fox, I noticed a large swath of feathers. There had been a struggle here and Betsy had fought hard. Walking further down below Cow Cow’s pasture I noticed several more areas of feathers, in sections, quite far apart. One location was but a single feather and a small pool of blood. Oh… poor Betsy! She had wandered off by herself, with no protection, and had lost her life. She had put up one heck of a fight, but she was not strong enough to fight off her predator. It was a sad day.

We assumed it was the fox we saw. However, later that day I was making my rounds and noticed a HUGE vulture hanging out on our fence post. With my chickens very near. Mr. Rooster Gooster (that is his name) was being a lazy bum and not even paying attention! I ran up screaming to scare away the vulture. I will add here…. Those are big birds when they are on down on your level. Holy moly. His wingspan was just as long if not longer than Tank! Thankfully, he flew away. I would have had some serious issues if he had come after me! After saving my chickens lives, I stood there making sure I had all my girls accounted for. Rooster Gooster had been standing by me (with no issues) the whole time. Suddenly, he decides that he is jealous that I came in and did his job for him. He huffed up as big as he could, flapping his wings, and came straight for me! I kicked at him to back off, but he was truly offended this time and proceeded to try and kill me. I ran.

That mini velociraptor was hot on my tail. I ran faster. Tank could not see that I was in danger, and with my brain in full flight mode I forgot about him being outside. I remembered about halfway to the house and screamed for him. He cam running but was too far behind. I ran even faster. I was getting a side stitch. Evidently roosters do not get side stitches as he was never more than two feet behind me. I was close to the back door of the house but then realization hit! I will never get the screen door and the regular door open in time. He is going to catch me while I am trying to get the screen door open and I will die. I spot one of Tank’s toy balls on the ground and swoop down during my run to grab it and throw it at him. Rooster Gooster don’t care; Rooster Gooster ain’t scared of no ball. He never falters. Yep. I am going to die via chicken. Thankfully, right as I reach the screen door, Tank catches up and saves the day. He stands between me and Rooster Gooster daring him to come near his mama. That will teach you, stinking rooster!

We decided to put the chickens in the pasture with jasper and added the electric poultry net back up as well. I do feel bad that they do not get to wander now. I may go out and put some wire up on the gates so they can free range in the pasture with Jasper there to scare away any predators. On a good note, that darn rooster will not be able to come after me again!

Poultry on Pasture — They are now double-protected with the poultry netting and the donkey!

That same night, Lil CJ came down to tell me that he thought his guinea pig (named Rat) was not feeling well. I went up to check and it was obvious something was wrong with him. A quick google search of his symptoms made it clear he had an upper respiratory infection. We carried him into the bathroom, and I gave Alayna permission to take the longest, hottest shower ever while I sat with him in the steam hoping it would help him breath a little easier. It was almost 8pm so there was no option of a vet. I tried to look up anything I could to help him, but the only thing that could help him were antibiotics. We made him as comfortable as we could and let him sleep in the bathroom where it was still warm and steamy. Unfortunately, he did not make it through the night.

The next day I dug a small hole next to two doggie graves from the previous property owner and Lil CJ and I buried Rat the guinea pig. We lined his grave with bricks, just like the others and placed a small piece of split wood on top for added protection. It was very sad.

The Day after that, CJ announced that we had lost the 1^st meat bird from the brooder. We are not sure what happened. You always expect to lose some of the meat birds, but these were doing so well I had hoped all 100 would make it out to the pasture. It was so close too! We had planned to move them out the following week! Poor little thing. All the others were happy and healthy, so I am thankful we only lost one bird.

That is the hard part of owning so many animals. You always do your best to take care of them, but death is a part of life. We must learn to deal with it as best we can and keep moving forward.

RIP Betsy, Rat, and meat bird who had no name because I cannot name 100 birds.

Farm Update for August 18th, 2020

August 18, 2020

by charles.lafferty Cow Getting Started with the Farm

Things are moving right along here on the farm!

Jasper got a little attention here recently. We had the farrier out to take a look at his hooves and he got a nice new pedicure. He was not impressed. We haltered and tied him to the barn.

Jasper Investigating the Camera — Jasper was curious to see what I was doing in his grass.

CJ was at his head while the farrier handled his feet. I stood by feeding Jasper apples to try and calm him down and distract him. I am not sure how often he has had this done in the past. He certainly was not comfortable with it. He did behave well though. While he did not like anyone messing with his feet, no one was donkey-kicked in the face as I suspected would

happen. You could tell he was just trying to get away. I was impressed with the farrier’s complete lack of fear with Jasper. It was interesting to watch and he manhandled my donkey quite well. He would take hold of Jasper’s leg and would not let go of it until the job was done, even if it did cause him a few bloody knuckles.

Overall, Jasper’s hooves just needed a little trimming. He did have a slight case of thrush on one hoof that we are treating with peroxide. We will continue the treatment and keep an eye on it.

Cow Cow is doing well and getting bigger every day! I can tell he is lonely and wants to play so I got him a beach ball to play with. He absolutely loves it! I could not believe it! I have CJ go

Cow from the side — Cow Cow strikes a pose

in with me (just in case) and throw the ball around with him. He pushes it around with his head, gets excited, and starts bucking all around. Admittedly, I normally run away at that point and then go back when he is calmer. It is so cute to watch him play and it makes my heart happy.

We did set up a better system for delivering water to the pastures. We hooked up enough hoses to reach the pastures. This works much better than carrying multiple buckets. This sounds pretty simple but CJ was concerned that the water pressure would not be able to push the water that far and uphill. I think CJ just enjoys working hard. I however, really do not like carrying buckets, so I tested it out to see. Works like a charm and now is the go to method.

I think CJ and I will be setting up an electric fence in the pasture to where we can get in there and do what we need to while still being separated from Cow Cow. He wants to play and even went to the extent of jumping up while CJ was cleaning out his water trough. Cow Cow had both front hooves up on CJ’s shoulders! Not cool, Cow cow! Bad cow. He is getting big enough to push even CJ around. CJ was able to swat him off and no harm done. However, if that had been me, he would have knocked me down and trampled me to death. This is not acceptable.

Due to his loneliness and eagerness to play, we are discussing getting another cow for him. I am not sure how I feel about this. On one hand I know it would do Cow Cow so much good to have company and another animal to play with. On the other hand, this is more work, more feed, more issues, and I am just not sure we are ready to take that on. CJ is of the opinion that two cows would not make any more difference than one. He often reminds me of my “just do it” attitude. I do not think that he realizes how much that particular attitude has changed! I fear soon I will be the victim of a cow gang. We will discuss the issue further before we make a decision. While we have learned a lot, there is still more to learn and I want to do better than our first cow purchase experience.

We have found another resource with a gentleman that plowed our driveway last year. He is also a farmer, and has stated that he could provide us with hay this winter for the cow and donkey. He also has a connection with a Jersey cow farmer and she is willing to come out to our farm. She is happy to give us advice on what type of hay is best for the cow this winter and any other tips that she can give us. Hopefully she can come out next week. I am excited to meet and learn from her!

Chickens in Poultry Net — The Chickens are hunting for bugs.

The egg laying hens are doing well and back to laying eggs regularly now that the temperatures have calmed down. We did lose the one sick hen. We are still not sure what was wrong, but she continued to decline even though she was isolated from the others and had access to food and water. We are down to 5 hens now and the rooster. The rest of them seem to be healthy and doing well thankfully.

We are gearing up for the new meat birds coming in September and already have customers placing orders! So exciting! So proud of CJ and his crazy idea of farming. When he sets his mind to do something, nothing can stop him! He is achieving his dream! I love experiencing this new adventure with him, even if most of it is spent with me running from the cow!

Farm Update for August 2nd, 2020

August 3, 2020

by charles.lafferty Uncategorized

First and foremost, Cow Cow is doing great! He has come so far from where he started! He is eating great, gaining weight, and enjoying the pasture. CJ even taught him how to drink his milk from the bucket instead of nursing with the nipple. This makes his milk feeding much faster, he slurps it up in no time! It is kind of funny watching CJ go in. If he has the milk bucket, Cow Cow will almost knock it out of his hands trying to get to it. CJ has to do a little dance and spin around, blocking Cow Cow before he can set it on the ground for him.

I have not been going inside the pasture because, and I cannot stress this enough, dying via cow does not appeal to me. However, my time has come, and I must overcome my fears. CJ has drill this weekend so it is up to me to care for all of the animals. I went in yesterday with CJ to see how Cow Cow reacted to me and he did fine. Of course, he has gotten used to CJ feeding him, so he mainly harassed him (which is fine by me). I went in to feed him his grain at lunch, but I took Lil CJ with me. He stays outside of the fence though. I do not know what I expect Lil CJ to do should Cow Cow come after me, but at least there will be someone there to hear me scream and alert someone of my demise. Lil CJ being outside the fence distracted Cow Cow long enough for me to sneak by like a ninja, dump the feed, and sneak back out. I had to go in again this evening, but he was further down in the pasture and could not see me. I opted to climb through the fence as it was closer to his feeding area and the sound of the gate opening would have alerted him to my presence. So, I climb in, tiptoe over to his shed, dump the feed, then run back to the fence as fast as I can and climb through trying not to fall or get hung up! I may have done a little ”Woohoo” upon my successful, unnoticed, escape. I can do this, even if I must do it ninja-style!

The egg laying chickens seemed to have taken a break in laying eggs. I think the heat is just getting to them. I can hardly blame them! I would not want to give birth daily in this heat either! CJ tried to get the hens to be fed purely on foraging alone, but this did not seem to go well for them. Even though they have a generous area to free range, it may not be enough to sustain them completely. We will continue to give them feed.

We do have a hen that is not feeling well. We are not sure what is wrong with her, only that she is weak. She can stand up but does not move much and when she does move, you can tell she is struggling. She also just falls out of the coop in the morning when coming out instead of going down the ramp or flying out. She can not get back up in the evening. We moved and isolated her in a pen in the barn for a few days with her own food and water close to her. She improved so we put her back in with the other hens. She quickly became weak again. I am thinking that because the other chickens can move faster, they are eating all the food and she is not getting enough. So, we moved her back to the barn. She seems to be doing well there, so we will keep an eye on her for a bit longer and see how she does.

We have two new additions to the farm! A couple of bunnies and one guinea pig for Lil CJ. We had great success with using bunny droppings at the old house to fertilize our garden, so we plan to do the same here on the farm. Lil CJ has wanted a guinea pig since he was little. We found one for free and can’t exactly use the excuse of no room now that we have the farm! He has a nice cage in Lil CJ’s room and Lil CJ has been taking good care of him.

Jasper the donkey seems to have a hurt leg (or hoof). He was limping the other day and I could see nothing visibly wrong. We called a farrier and made an appointment to have him come look at his hooves and deliver any care necessary since we are not experienced in that area. I also really do not want to get donkey-kicked in the face, so I will leave that to the professionals to handle! He does seem to be walking better now so he may have just sprained his leg or had a rock stuck in his hoof that eventually came loose. We will keep an eye on him until the farrier can arrive on Monday.

Things are moving right along here on the farm!

We needed a new Mobile Coop for our Hens

May 18, 2020

by charles.lafferty Getting Started with the Farm

The chicks are almost ready for the pasture. Their feathers are coming in and they are no longer the fragile little yellow chicks we picked up just a couple weeks ago. They will be divided up amongst the three chicken tractors we built and moved through the pasture under the supervision of Jasper the donkey starting next week. In the meantime, we needed to build another structure for our 6 egg laying hens to live in since they have been living in one of the chicken tractors for the last month.

Side vies of partial mobile coop — Initial framing of the mobile coop.

Enter the mobile chicken coop. We purchased an 8×10 utility trailer and built a chicken coop on top of it so that we can move the birds throughout the pasture allowing them to range out and gather more of their own nutrition. They will not have overhead cover, so hawks could be a problem, but in anticipation of that potential predator, we are picking up a Jersey Giant rooster to watch over them. The mobile coop has plenty of roosting space as well as nesting boxes with outside access which should provide ample space and protection for the hens while allowing us to collect eggs without disturbing them. We just have to install the door and then the coop is ready to go.

The hens have been providing more than enough eggs for our family and we are excited to get them ranging even farther out into our pastures to eat pests and spread fertility!

Nesting Boxes on partially built coop — Here you can see the access point for the nexting boxes.

Farm Update for April 16th, 2020

April 16, 2020

by charles.lafferty Getting Started with the Farm Uncategorized

Brooder construction — CJ staples in the 1/4″ hardware cloth to keep out even the smallest of predators

It has been a very exciting few weeks here at Skyline Pastures. We have constructed a predator-proof (we hope) brooder in the barn out of ¼” hardware cloth. We took extra care to plug every hole and ensure the sheets of hardware cloth overlap so no rats, raccoons, or anything else that can eat our chicks can get through. We are three weeks out for their arrival, and everything is ready. We even have a small generator with sufficient power to handle the heat lamps should the power go out. Then next thing to research is some sort of alarm to notify us if the power should go out in the middle of the night. It would be terrible to wake up and discover that the chicks died from a lack of heat simply because of a power outage. We are working on the e-Commerce portion of the website so that customers are able to place a deposit on their chicks. Our intent is to only sell 60 of the first batch of 100 to allow more than enough wiggle room for any losses due to the learning curve of raising chicks. Once it is up and functional, we will be sure to let everyone know so you can log in and reserve your chickens!

We have also added a miniature donkey named Jasper to our Farm Family. He came from a goat farm but once their goats had babies, he got jealous and needed to be separated. He is doing well on our pasture, although we wish he would eat more grass because he is not keeping up with the pasture’s growth. We will be getting him some friends (likely sheep) in the near future to both keep him company and add to our pasture maintenance plan.

With all of the grocery stores running low on items, including chicken, we see this as a prime opportunity to encourage people to stock their freezers with some of the best chicken possible. Who knows what lies down the road and having good food for our families stocked at home gives us one less thing to worry about! We look forward to keeping everyone posted on the chicks’ progress as we raise the up in the brooder and move them out to our pasture. Hopefully Jasper approves of his pasture-mates!