Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Change Over To Winter

Here's about 8 inches of packed manure/hay

Using Kubota power to loosen pack

It's hard to manoeuvre in the pen

This is a very busy time of the year for us as we have to change over the tractor to bucket and blade from the mowing deck and then add the chains. Oil changes and lubes for both tractors are done as well. The toughest job by far is cleaning out the main sheep pen which is why we made removable wooden slats so that the Kubota can squeeze into the pen and use the bucket to loosen up the hard pack of hay and manure. It's still back breaking work both for the shoveler and the tractor driver (me) because the the front end of the tractor is heavy enough with just the bucket. Add heavy manure pack and it's an upper body workout for sure. Mike is cleaning out the goat pen to earn money for a Cry Baby Wah pedal for his bass. That's not easy either and the tractor won't go in there, so it's a back breaker. I figure we have one more sheep fence move and then the snow may fly and they will head to the barnyard.

I've given Mike a few weeks of an hour a day after school to get the job done. He wants more work after that as he has his eyes on a home theater for his room. Maybe cob web removal on the rafters and grates around the old horse stalls are in order. After that though I'm not sure I have anymore work left for him to do.