Woodstone Prairie

 Happy 4th of July!

I can’t believe it’s been a week since I’ve posted… We’ve been keeping very busy, the days are just flying by.

 It’s been an up and down kind of week, but that seems to be the norm for us. On the “up” side, I had the vet out last night to give Blaze his shots and take a look at the donkeys… and everything looks good.  We’ve finally decided on names for them, by the way… they are Tilly and Tucker. What do you think?

I think Tucker is especially photogenic…

Anyway, the vet was out last night and the farrier was out a couple of days ago. Tilly’s hooves are trimmed, she’s walking better and no longer having to stand in the mud. I’ve also been able to stop the anti-inflammatory medication. I was told that she is about 9 years old, and Tucker is her “baby” and is probably about 2. Believe it or not she still has milk, so Tucker was only recently weaned (or is still weaning, I haven’t actually seen him nurse, although it looked like he was hinting around to nurse today… ). I guess it’s not that unusual for a donkey to nurse her baby for that long… especially if food is scarce.

Tilly and Tucker, grooming each other…

Tilly was a wild burro… adopted at some point in her past from the BLM. Tucker was born after she was rounded up and adopted out. We were a little (ok a LOT) concerned that Tucker might not be “fixed”, but the vet and farrier both agree that he appears to be gelded. Whew! (If he wasn’t, we’d have to have it done, and it couldn’t be done until I’d gentled him enough to halter him, and get him to stand still for a shot…which might be awhile!)

I called the folks at Longhopes Donkey Rescue and we are going out there tomorrow to watch their trainer work with their donkeys, and get some ideas for gentling Tucker.

The goats left yesterday for their new home… It was very hard to see them go. M fell apart for a while after they left, but pulled back together fairly quickly so all was good. It did seem funny this morning to go out to the barn and not be greeted by Betty and Rose… the barn seems kind of quiet all of a sudden. (lol, I guess that’s a measure of how noisy those goats were, if a barn that still has two donkeys and a horse in it can be called “quiet”!) Blaze seemed sad when they left… I took them out through the barn, and he stood in his stall for hours after they left, looking into the barn… Waiting for them to come back?

I caught Blaze this morning throwing his weight around with the donks. Here’s Tilly, done eating, is heading out to the pasture… but Tucker has to dart by Blaze (who is extremely cranky, check out his ears!) to get out of the barn.

Whew, he made it, Tucker’s a pretty quick little guy!!

So that’s the news from the barnyard. I was going to write more but since this post has gotten long enough, I think the save the rest for tomorrow…

 I’ll close with some pictures I took this morning of the twin fawns that are living on the hill just west of the pasture. We’ve been seeing them off and on for a few days, but they are still very tiny and keep very close to mom.

Here they are taking a break from their nibbling to check me out…

Mom was there quickly though (my cue to get AWAY from the babies!) and seemed to be checking them out to make sure they were ok.

Sorry the pictures aren’t any better… This is the best my camera could do while still keeping me far enough away from mama deer to be safe!

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And finally, and sadly, an update on my friend Christiana… She took a turn for the worst late last week, and her doctors are saying that there is nothing more they can do. She had the option of going on life-support, or going home with hospice support. She choose to go home. It sounds like it’s only a matter of days that she will be with us….

Please keep Christiana and her family in your prayers.