Fencers

Wednesday, the 17 of February, Christopher and I set off for Orange Walk Town on a mission to obtain some lambs, as well as possibly a fencer.


As I wrote in Restriction and Limitation, we had purchased an electric fence charger. We had installed this, and put it into operation. At first it seemed far too weak. I touched the wire and got a very mild shock. We watered the ground rod, and Johnny pointed out that I was wearing rubber boots. I slipped a boot off and standing on the ground in my sock, again touched the wire. Wow! Still, I had anticipated the shock would be greater, but it seemed sufficient. The sheep very quickly learned to avoid the wire.

As I also wrote then, we were using an inverter to power the AC powered fence charger. This became a concern when the battery did not last as long as we thought it should.

I tested to power consumption of the inverter running alone. This amounted to .26 amps. With the fence charger plugged in and running the two together used .44 amps. That is about half an amp, and that amounts to 6 watts. Seems like a light load right?

But that is 6 watts continuously. Or 144 watts per day. Less than two bright incandescent bulbs, but still a great deal to power off our batteries. We don't want to deplete our batteries by more than 20% ever, before recharging them. It is hard to know the capacity of used, rebuilt car batteries, but we are guessing roughly 70 amp hours. That gives about 840 watts of power per battery, 20% of which is 168 watt hours. We would need to recharge our battery about once every day. And half of that load was just the inverter itself.

They make battery powered fence chargers. And we were on the lookout for one.

We checked the big cattle company just outside of Orange Walk Town for sheep. They didn't have any lambs old enough to sell just then. But in about two months, they should have about 100 lambs available.

So, since we have traveled this far, we asked around, and learn we should go to Shipyard to find sheep. Shipyard is a big Mennonite community.

We headed off toward Shipyard, along with two men who needed a ride to Guinea Grass, a village before Shipyard. We dropped them off in Guinea Grass and proceeded to Shipyard. We spotted a Spanish woman and a Creole man, and stopped to ask if they knew where we can find sheep. But they needed a ride to Camp 2. Apparently Mennonite communities are laid out in Camps. On the way we managed to find out from them that we can find sheep in Camp 3. Oh, we also needed gasoline.

We dropped them off at their destination, which was some intersection. The woman repeated the directions, "just go straight until you get to camp 3, there is a fence and a gate, they have gasoline".

As we drove away from the pair, I asked Chris if he had any idea where one camp ends and the next one begins? He had no idea. I glanced at the temperature gauge and the fuel gauge and advised him that we were probably going to die here. He thought it was funny.

Eventually we come to a fence and a gate, and sure enough there were two fuel pumps. We got three gallons of gasoline at $4.25 a gallon and inquire about fence chargers and sheep. They didn't have, but say both could be found in Camp 9. Oh Joy.

Oh, I didn't mention, the Mennonites use iron wheels on their tractors. They do this so their young people can not take the tractor for a spin to town. The iron wheels are prohibited outside the Mennonite community, because they utterly, and completely destroy the road. So the road had become astonishingly worse upon arriving in Shipyard.

Eventually, we arrived at Camp 9, and find a nondescript store. I say nondescript because there is scarcely any indication that there is a store anywhere. They don't go in for ostentatious promotional things like a small sign announcing that there is a store on the premises.

They didn't have sheep, didn't know where I could get them, but they had a fencer, as they call them, and as I shall call them henceforth. It runs $132, I asked for a discount and he knocked off $2. There is no box, there is no book, the front panel is all in Spanish and it says 12 A 38 V.D.C. This looks very much like 12 amps, 38 volts, but I recall that in Spanish if it was meant to say 12 to 38 volts it might well say 12 a 38 V.D.C. The Mennonite man didn't really speak English, only Spanish and some dialect of German. But he picks up on my concern about powering this thing and takes it over to a 12volt power supply and hooks it up to demonstrate it works. Why he had a 12volt power supply and what was powering it, I didn't have to language skills to ask.

Feeling lucky, I purchased it.


Sheep, he indicates can be found in Camp 10. It is that way. If you notice, just above, they didn't know where I could find sheep a little bit before. But perhaps they had figured out the word I was badly pronouncing was ovejas.

Camp 10, long story, but we find it. Omitted is the house that has sheep, but wants $100 for a lamb, as well as the house that had just purchased their sheep Monday, and were not inclined to sell them yet. They directed us to the place in Camp 10 where they had gotten them.

Another store. Sheep, and a price... $.95 a pound, I pick, they weigh. They boy sent to catch the sheep for us guessed that the first ewe picked out weighed more or less 50 pounds. That is, more or less, $50. By now, I am down to my last $100. The second ewe I pick out is intentionally somewhat smaller. We weighed the lambs, first one is 55 pounds, and the second one is 43 pounds. Total bill is $187 bz, or $93.50 in $US. During all this, I was able to carry both, and being somewhat familiar with what a 50 pound sheep feels like, I judge their scale accurate.

The plan was to tie the lambs feet up together and set them in the back seat of our little car. Yea. The Mennonite boy managed to tie and load the lamb he was carrying with ease. After getting knocked down by the wild lamb I was working with and holding on to her while Chris forgot how to tie knots, I decided she could stand in the back seat the whole way home. Chris rode back there with them to keep them calm enough that they didn't cause a wreck or bust out a window.

After a long ride back over Shipyard's "roads", we made it to a nice dirt road and begin to make some good time. Eventually we got to the highway and back home.

One of the new lambs is SCC which is short for sugar, caramel, and chocolate.



The other little lamb is called Madchen.



The new sheep were unloaded, tied to posts, fed and watered. We attempted to begin the process of taming them, however our ram, My Little Dog, and a young ram with a certain but grim future, Mint Jelly, accosted the new young ewes.

My Little Dog checks to see if we have enough butane.



Mint Jelly refuses to pose for pictures because we are just going to eat him anyway.



Supposedly ewes will not allow mating unless they are in heat. These two are very young and it seems very unlikely that they are in heat the first day of their arrival. It seems far more likely that My Little Dog was taking terrible advantage of them while they are tied up. That is not the sort of establishment we want to be running. So Mint Jelly, and My Little Dog were tied up as well.

The next morning, we installed the new fencer. It works on 12 volts and uses .14 amps. It seems significantly more shocking. Touching the wire with one boot off was enough to cause me to scream and not touch the wire anymore.

We quickly chopped an area for a small penal colony to put our rapacious rams in. We strung up a line of wire using existing fence posts on one side and little sticks on the other side. This proved insufficient, so we added a second strand of wire, and raked the ground near the wire so there is nothing for the sheep to stand on near the wire but soft ground. Then we set the fencer on rapido, which means it sends voltage down the line more frequently. This will drain the battery faster, but it will help the sheep learn to avoid the wire faster.

The rams are currently contained. One of us has been watching for the past few hours to determine how they get out, if they get out. We need to know if they go over, under, or through the wires. This way we can figure out where to add a wire, or move a wire up or down.

The boys in the penal block.



We have the other battery in case the voltage falls on the one in use now. However that is the battery we recharge the computer with. Rebecca says I will be getting another battery very soon.

Friday. Mint Jelly, a young ram, appears to be fully functional. Despite this he still tries to nurse from his mother. Due to his sexual drives and desire for his mother, he managed to bust through the fence during the night. With Mint Jelly through the wire, My Little Dog had no choice but to go over the wire as well, else Mint Jelly would have his way with the young ewes. My Little Dog defends the ewes from Mint Jelly by trying to shatter Mint Jelly's little head, then proceed to try to have his way with the tied up little lambs.

However by then, we were on the scene with a dim flashlight. Both males were tied up for the night and the wire was repaired this morning. Mint Jelly was tied to a small tree inside the little penitentiary. Since he can not escape, My Little Dog, who is afraid of the wire, also remained confined.

The two little lambs have been untied, but trail a long rope, and have been foraging with Mama and Gray.




Since then, we have released the two males. They had eaten every green thing in their area anyway. The two female lambs have become comfortable with their new environment. And they are able to escape any unwelcome advances from My Little Dog or Mint Jelly.