Take Them Any Way I Can Get Them.

[sheepdog 10]

Today I had what I consider to be a minor mirical. Doesn't happen very often, so it made me pretty happy and for a change I feel like I actually acomplished something today. For the past week or so I have been calling the goats up to the barn in the morning and giving them a little grain. The object of this exercise is to get them to coming into the barn so I can lock them in and worm them. It hasn't really been going well. Always several that won't come in, especially the young kids still nursing who aren't hooked on grain yet. And then there has been a small group that found an escape hole in the fence last week, so I was hoping the morning grain would convince them to hang around. We can't even fix the fence until they are all in. Well, this morning everybody was back inside the fence, and when I called them up we managed to get all but about 5 inside the barn. I figured we'd better at least do the ones we had caught, so the hired man and I went threw them all and wormed them. It went pretty well, I managed to stay on my feet and he only hit the ground once or twice. He catches and holds, and I measure the wormer and put it in their mouths. Then he marks the one's we've done with a bingo marker so we can tell who's done and not. The goats that had not come in the barn all were hanging around out in the barn lot, so when we got done I left the herd in the barn, and we slipped out and opened a gate into another part of the barn, where I have a komondor and her newborn pups locked in. It took some doing but we finally got all the stragglers caught and wormed too! That in it'self is pretty close to a mirical. But the most amazing thing of all was managing to worm all my komondors too! 3 where in the main part of the barn with the goats, and one was in the other section of the barn with her newborns, so those weren't really a problem. However, I still had one female dog loose, and she is very feral. Under normal circumstances, I can't get within a hundred yards of her. I figured with all the comotion going on there wasn't a chance of getting her. She had been sitting way out in the pasture watching the show the whole time we were working. So I sent the hired man off to fix the holes in the fence, since we finally had all the goats back in, and I started in on the regular barn chores, filling the water tank for the goats and chickens, and all that stuff I do every day. I was nearly done when I turned around and looked, and there sat the wild dog, right behind me by the barn gate, not 10 feet away. I thought to myself, surely she won't let me catch her, but I still had the wormer in my pocket, so I gave it a shot, and that is my mirical for today, she let me walk right up to her, pry open her mouth and give her the wormer! I bet it's been 6 months since I've touched that dog! I couldn't believe she let me do that, let alone her coming to me like she did! I was just shocked! and very happy!