On the rare occasion that Tim has to leave the ranch for some reason, I get to help feed.  This morning as I head out, Optaciano, our night man, is returning from an “all-nighter” taking care of the ewes and lambs born during the night. As I pull up to the hay yard, Melendez is already hooking up the hay wagon.  His surprised smile makes me wonder if he’s glad to see me or he’s thinking “uh oh, she’s driving the tractor today”.  I know Tim and Melendez take turns on the hay wagon, as it is hard work, peeling the flakes of hay off the large ton bales.  Melendez doesn’t ask, but climbs onto the hay wagon, ready for the task, as I climb into the heated tractor cab.

We head to the lambing shed, and as I look around, it is again, a beautiful morning at Lava Lake Ranch.  We are well into lambing season and the ewes that have not had lambs are milling around as we turn into the lambing area.  Claudio and David are already inside the lambing shed feeding the ewes and new born lambs.  When I was at the shed Sunday evening, there were 10-15 lambs, today there are well over 100 lambs, with the jugs (pens used during lambing) filled with mostly twins, and three set of triplets.

Now, it’s back to the hay yard to load up more bales to feed the horse herd and rams.  The horses are all looking fat and furry as they have their long winter coats on. As they fall in behind our wagon, I think of the horses’ names, most of them descriptive: Young Mare, Old Mare, Strawberry, Paint and so on.  Fortunately none are named Loco.  If our herder’s ever name a horse Buck, and he’s not a buckskin, BEWARE!  I’m also reminded to do some winter riding soon.

With the remaining hay, we head to the rams.  For obvious reasons, we keep the rams (males) separate from the ewes. They jostle for position to get the first hay flakes and butt heads when they get irritated with each other.  The rams are kept down by Lava Lake, where there is a natural barrier of lava flows, which you can see in the background of the photo below.  Not only is this natural barrier great for separating our organic operation from the outside world, it provides a natural fence too.

Once we are done with the larger animals, Melendez will finish up with the dogs and then go down and help the guys already in the shed.  It is a constant job; assisting the ewes who are lambing, feeding, cleaning the jugs, bedding with organic straw and preparing for the next morning’s feeding.  It is a wonderful natural cycle and all of the hard work irrigating and putting up the organic hay during the summer begins the new cycle of lambs for the this year.

As I was driving home to Lava Lake Ranch last night, I glanced up at the digital thermometer in my rear view mirror and already knew I would not want to get up early the next morning. Negative 15 degrees. Mind you, this is without the wind chill factor! I refuse to have a thermometer at the ranch, as sometime I just don’t want to know. It seems easier to shrug on the coat, heavy boots, gloves and hat, because to me, anything under 10 degrees is just darn cold and being aware of the exact temperature makes it seem even worse. I wonder if Southern states, experiencing the same cold snap, are just as shocked by the 20′s as we are by the -20′s.

When I see such low numbers on the highway, I take heart in two things. First of all, the ranch is 2 miles off the highway, and those two miles often make a difference in temperature. Sure enough, as I turned off the road, the thermometer continued to climb and by the time I reached the house, it recorded a balmy -2 degrees.Woohoo! I have a theory to explain that thirteen degree difference, although I lack scientific research to back it up. The ranch is bordered by over 6 miles of Craters of the Moon National Monument, which is primarily comprised of lava rock, so I surmise that the lava rock retains heat during the sunny days, and generally makes our area slightly warmer. Secondly, we are surrounding on three sides by high mountains, as if they were hugging us to stave off the cold.

At this time of year, we are preparing for our first wave of new born organic lambs, and so weather is always a concern for us. We already have 3 babies on the ground, who evidently were not aware that our lambing date is still a week away. I am always amazed at how well our animals tolerate the cold winter weather here in Idaho. I’ve had others ask why we don’t lamb during warmer weather. We do have two calculated reasons for our lambing dates. The first being that when animals are grass finished (all of our lambs are), we have to estimate the end of the natural forage availability and then work back to the desired weight and age, which is dictated by their birth date (as well as food availability and weight gain). We’ve also found that warmer weather usually brings wet, sometimes freezing rain, which seems harder for the animals. It also seems (in my opinion) that when it is so darn cold, it is more sterile than a warmer, mucky environment.

While the chilly temperatures can make getting out of bed tough, the gorgeous sunrise and cold mist held down by the thermal patterns surrounding us make bundling up worth it. Plus, the ewes, lambs, horses and dogs survive without indoor heating year round. I was always taught growing up to feed your animals first, and then to thaw yourself out over breakfast. I do hope it warms up a bit as lambs continue to arrive.