Crumbling Walls

This old stone wall must have seperated the grazing field from the apple orchard, still standing and about to flower. Stone walls were built, by hand, one rock at a time, when the field was being plowed. Imagine the long, hard hours spent in the field toting rocks and placing them just so. A later owner disturbed it to put in a barbed wire fence on locust posts. Sister Bernadette told me about cutting down locust trees for fence posts when she was young. I have to wind up old rusty barbed wire lurking around my part of this once grand farm. Not good for sheep or humans wandering around in the dark. All this land was covered with trees, chopped down for firewood I think, then the stumps removed either by hand or with horses. Back breaking labor, but livestock need to graze and hay had to be put away for winter or no livestock alive in the spring. I'm busy today, with wool and other things. Up early to give an antiobiotic shot to a ewe who is breathing heavy and losing weight. Don't tell me I have a sheep with pneumonia. I talked Matt into helping me catch her before he left for his 10 day business trip. I have to get myself a leg crook. Libby Llop showed me how to use it and it seems easier than a neck crook. Once you get them hooked by the ankle you go hand over hand until you get to the sheep and wrassle them down. This is when I start thinking how nice it would be to raise little Shetland sheep...but I have the big, beautiful Bluefaced Leicesters who weigh as much as I do. What was I thinking?