Back from the ocean and into the gray.

We have begun serious rotational grazing – the summers are warmer and hotter than ever and the ground is try, the grass is half of what it has normally been. We have just put a new fence cutting off one third of the pasture, and we now have three areas to rotate – the side pasture, a new side pasture (newly fenced) and the back pasture.

We do not have enough good grass to get all of our animals through the summer, so we have rotated grazing in earnest, and the sheep, pony and donkeys don’t like it. They are used to going where they want and where the grass is greener. The usual benign and obedient sheep are giving Red a hard time, rushing towards the fence with the best grass on the other side and holding their ground.

Red is using all of his considerable skills to move them away from the fences and to whatever pasture we are using. Chloe and the sheep have eaten all of the grass down in the area behind the pole barn – our fourth area, now a paddock, no grass will grow there this year, it has all been eaten down, mostly by Chloe, who never stops (ponies do not take breaks from eating).

So they are all restless, a bit confused and frustrated. They get grazing periods twice a day, usually for between two and three hours, so they have plenty to eat. They will just have to get used to a new regiment. Fate joined the spirit of the things, rushing ahead of the sheep trying (unsuccessfully) to turn them around.

She did distract them and slow them down, Red got them where they belonged. This is a kind of chess match, I think it will go on all summer and perhaps forever, if the weather doesn’t return to normal. Which, I know, it won’t.