I know you are delighted to have this equipment. It sure makes life easier. on you and the sheep too! I have some of that orange "safety twine" too! I am so happy for you that you have this equipment, it's awesome!
LOL
Sweet Josie the Mule!
The ram is the white hair lamb, his smaller brother (going to be good eating with his super long loin) is the darker wooly lamb. These are the older lambs. The others are still youngsters.
Back wall of barn from on top of driveway. Lower left front is creep, upper left pen is larger ewe pen. Sydell panels, easily moved.
Again from top of driveway, looking into middle of barn, pen is creep 5' x 10'. Plywood wall has attachments to which to pin Sydell panels. By moving the creep over from the wall 18" using 2 extra panels, we make a run way behind the existing panels, around a corner and into an alley. At the top of the creep, which would be the middle of the barn, I can put the scale. Or when the lambs are off to slaughter the squeeze table.
This is the end where we would send the sheep through into the alley. Currently we have straw there for the lambing pens, since the area is not usable for anything, but that will move. 
This shows the view towards the back of the barn from where the scale or alley would open back into the barn. At the end the wooden gate opens into the small steep hillside pen for ewes and lambs. The metal gate enters into the large creep. This pen is where the ewes and lambs go after they are several weeks old. Right now, I have 2 rams in the left pen and the right creep is holding the older lambs. I will be removing Moy to the front field with Lewis. Axtell will stay in this pen with the ewes that have already lambed and are ready to rebreed. Hopefully this weekend.
Have not been on for a couple days. Had to let my blood pressure drop back to normal before I could continue with this journal. By rights DH, DS1, DS2, and myself should have been laying cold and dead from a massive family group stroke after Tuesday’s events. 
DH and I were at the DMV getting our driver's licenses converted to "real driver's licenses". 9:45 am appointment, arrived at 9:30 am. DD2 brought Doofus Dominic and his 2 year old to our house, DD1 brought her 3 children, aged 12, 9, 6 to our house. While DH and I were trapped in bureaucratic limbo, DS1 and DS2 got Doofus to help them move the retaining wall blocks around and continue raising the flower bed at the end of the new grass yard. They loaded the blocks off the field onto the truck bed, backed it up to the fence and had Doofus hand the blocks over to them as they stacked and built the wall. These are the blocks that simply stack in place to hold dirt, no mortar needed. It was over and done quickly.
DS2 got in with him and showed him how to do it. Then he made him catch and release several times. Then we called in the 12 year old (who is just as annoying but for other reasons) and finished the job. Suffice it to say we moved the 2 ewes and their 3 lambs into the small lambing pen from the large creep. Then we drove the 2 rams that had been in the small pen, separated from the ewes, into the large creep. We caught them, vaccinated them and haltered them. One went to the front ram pen, while the other was placed in a marking harness and returned to the small pen. This small pen is actually a nice sized steep pen on the back of the barn where the ewes and lambs are kept (after they are moved out of the lambing pens) until the lambs are about 80-100 lbs. Then the lambs go to slaughter. Now we had the ram in his harness in the pen, we moved the ewes back across the barn with their lambs in with him and set up the creep. We had to make the creep gate spacing wider since the older lambs couldn't get though it any more. Reaching the exhaustion point (mainly due to the children) we still needed to carry on.
Naturally, the sheep walked calmly out of the pen and obeying our gestures walked into the alley way. These are sheep. They did nothing of the sort. 
The sheep were brought up twice, both times breaking back into the gully when the grandsons, in a hurry to have this end, ran at them and scattered them. I told DS1 we needed a good dog instead of the grandsons. Finally, DH put Josie the Mule into the night fold and the ram ran in after her bringing the sheep with him. As we quickly closed the gate, we decided to do this another way. Propping both sides of the sorting gate open, we tried to herd the now hysterical sheep through the sorting gate into the small holding pen on the other side. Finally, one ewe ran in. The others followed her. As the sheep circled the unfamiliar confines of the small pen, we finally were able to push the ram back through one gate into the chute. As we did this, the frightened sheep realized that one panel of the fence was rather high off the ground. We had noticed this when building the alleyway but hoped the sheep would not. One by one they squeezed under the panel and took off again. We ignored them to deal with the ram. Once locked into the chute, vaccinating him was a breeze as was removing his marking harness, haltering him, opening the sorting gate back into the large pen and leading him down to the front Field of Celibacy to join Moy. The children were once again sent to round up the ewes from the gully. This time, exhausted, they ran into the night fold and we closed the gate. While the fish sticks baked I had a stiff drink. Sue me.![:\](/styles/default/xenforo/smilies/side.png "side :\")
Everyone decided their training might be resumed when we have recovered our voices. Though beaten, like the phoenix, we rise from the ashes and try again. Our family refuses to accept defeat. I did not say we were smart, just that we do not accept defeat.
