Trimming Hooves the Hard Way

My Christmas Carhartt’s are shoved in the washing machine, stained with my own blood and smudges of soft wax like A&D ointment I’d squeezed from the glands above a sheep’s hoof. Todd has shed his work clothes covered in sheep shit and sweat. The streaks of sweat that ran down his neck are dry now.  This was the morning we set aside to trim hooves, a task we are only marginally better at, but will be tested by the added New Nine. It’s about 23 degrees, no wind, and gray skies, perfect working conditions.

We set up a small paddock in the barn yard that can only be reached by going through the shed’s big sliding door.

Todd has headed into the field to open the west gate and with no effort the original flock and the New Nine head up into the barn area where I stand tapping the side of a shallow bin of grain.  The original flock, familiar with me, and certainly familiar to the slapping sound of grain, come up and follow me through the barn door and into the temporary paddock, but I have no way to hold them in place as the small door has a bungee cord keeping it open.

We agree it will be easier to bring the original flock back into the barn, close off the small doorway with a panel and close the big sliding door, and get the New Nine into the temporary paddock through a swinging panel in the temporary fencing.  With little snow on the ground and lot of rebar, we have all kinds of panels we can move about.

In no time, we have our New Nine in the small paddock and the original flock in the barn.  It smells like a barn should, mostly hay with just a hint of sheep dung. We’re getting good at this, I think, but the real work begins.

Sheep’s hooves need to be trimmed a few times each year because their nails grow past their toes, curling under and untreated something bad happens.  I don’t remember what.  Our current method of trimming hooves is for Todd to capture, pin, shove, and haul the animal backward until he can lift up her front half and she rolls back or flops back into a low portable hammock hung from an unused feeder.

We’ll have 16 sheep to check today (one of the New Nine slipped out between a panel and the barnyard fence – no trimming for him today – and we decided not to trim lambs Crosby and Stills).   Todd starts with the lamb Jewel.

They’re strong, but low and it seems relatively easy for Todd to grab and muscle her backward into the hammock. He holds her steady about the neck while I go to the two toes of each foot, looking to see if the pointed front nail has extended too far and if the sides and back of the nail have curled over and around the toe. I’ve got a heavy trimmer that looks like a pruning shear, wicked sharp.  Sections of the nail are thick and hard for me to cut through despite the sharp edge.

Some of the lambs had trouble with their hooves in the summer because it was such a damp spring and their nails had partially separated from the toe.  In the summer I had tried to trim back that separated nail, and today I can see some still need more trimming.  I scrape out sheep poop that’s wedged in to get a better sense of how deep I need to trim.  While we have them still and in Todd’s arms, we check the inside of their lower eyelids to see how pink they are. The deeper the pink, the less anemic and therefore carrying an acceptable worm load.  Today we won’t need to deworm any of the flock, but we still have a ways yet to go.

On some of the sheep we’re breeding, I look for their teats to see if there is any sign they’re pregnant.  The teats are extended about an inch, bright pink. But since we’re never close enough to see them I’d have no real idea if this means they’re pregnant. My ignorance bugs me. When we get to Ella, one of Dolly’s twins, Todd stops to look at her fleece.  “This is gorgeous. Lots of crimp. This is going to be great fleece.” I smile. The pause that comes with a sheep in the hammock is calming and I find myself talking away. “You’re fine. You’re doing a good job.  Everything is going to be okay.  You’re doing a nice job.” Todd must know I’m talking to myself as much as I am to the animal in the hammock.

The rest of the original flock are strong and challenge Todd’s grasp at times jamming him up against the wall or dragging him in the wrong direction. Once we finish with one, he helps them tip forward out of the hammock but stays gripping them and ushers or rides them to the sliding barn door where he releases them before he tries to handle the next.  By the time we have trimmed and checked Eleanor, the last of the originals, Todd’s breathing has started to get hard.

On to the New Nine, a flock of Cormos we acquired about six weeks ago.  Although they are similar to Corriedales, they’re taller and a bit heavier. They are also far more skittish around us.  We have no trouble getting them from the temporary paddock into the small barn, but capturing and getting each one into the hammock is hard work and I’m useless in part out of fear. I don’t really know these animals, I’ve never been so close to all of them at once, and they are dodging, grouping and regrouping, trying to stay as far away from us as this small barn allows. They seem to share my fear, and all bolt at once the moment Todd moves toward one. Their height enables them to push away and drag Todd, and lifting them into the hammock takes all his strength. Todd is breathing even more heavily, and I’m getting sloppy. I miss a nail and clip the skin of my finger and smear blood on the white fleece of one of the New Nine.  I’m still bleeding trying to dig shit out of a curled nail. I’m pissed that I haven’t bought a tool like the one the Vet had on her last visit.  She has a horse hoof trimmer that is a stumpy blade with a sharp curved section that could carve away a sheep’s nail in tough to reach spots.  Todd is huffing. Some of the sheep land sideways in the hammock blocking a leg. I slow down. For the first time we are able to read the ear tags of the New Nine and mark down on the clip board a number and brief description, brown, silver, white snout.  Only Scampy, the oldest and friendliest, gets her name next to her number. I’ll have to go look up the rest on the pink sheet Mary Ellen gave us confirming the entire flock had been dewormed.

By the time we’re down to the last two, I decide I need to help, but it’s pretty pathetic.  I hold a head tight as Todd shoves hard against the animal to back her into the hammock. The front hoof doesn’t look healthy, cracked in the front, separated a bit from the toe.  And just above the hoof, I see a crusty glob and suddenly remember that sometimes a gland above the hoof can get clogged.  I tug at the crust and behind the crust, like a small tube of toothpaste, a thick wax oozes.  I squeeze around the gland and more thick wax oozes out. I swipe it off my fingers on my pants and press until its empty and move on to the other legs draining those glands a well. I should have checked all the sheep for this potential problem.

Todd muscles the last the sheep into the hammock. He’s exhausted from all the physical work; I’m exhausted from the stress that comes with being very close to the physical struggles and feeling helpless.

Todd brings the girls back down to the field while I get water. I walk with Todd who’s carrying a bale of hay to the boy’s side.  I’m still not ready to be with Calvin by myself and yet Calvin could care less about me. He wants the hay.  I stay leaning against the feeder staring at Calvin who looks back at me with his soft dopey eyes as he chomps on an enormous clump of hay, oblivious to the hard work we’ve been doing. I suddenly feel calm. Normal. The cut on my finger stings. We head back to the house. There has to be a better way to trim the hooves of a flock of sheep.

 

Peggy