Freezer meals
Hungry sheep aren’t bothered by frigid temperatures.
As I write this it’s 2 degrees outside and the temps are dropping. By Friday we‘re supposed to reach -26 degrees — and that’s before windchill is factored in!
Three barn cats huddle on the cold pavement outside our front door — hoping to feel some heat from the gap under the door. They have a heated electric pad and blankets in a box in the shed but they’re angling to shoot indoors when I go out to collect firewood.
Inside the house we’re comfortable around our wood stove. The window on the stove glows orange after a day consuming seasoned white oak. The small squirrel-cage blower on the back of the stove converts cold, floor-level air into a warm jet-stream, drying wet snow gear on our makeshift basement clothesline.
The chickens, our guard-goose, and two Indian runner ducks are holed up in the chicken coop. The feeder is inside the door, but I have to watch I don’t get attacked by my goose as I feed them. The chickens have a waterer on a heated electric plate that I’ve walled off with some boards so their waterfowl friends can’t make it a frozen, splashy mess. The goose and ducks have a heated water bowl outside the coop, but on cold days our ducks are always sitting on their feathery rumps, pulling their legs up off the ice. Because of the cold, I gave them a small bucket of water as room service.
The sheep seem unbothered. Almost four inches of wool keeps them warm. Whenever they pull mouthfuls dry hay from the feeder, they drop some (a lot) and build up a soft bed that keeps them up off the cold bare ground. At night they “nest” in the loose hay and keep their pencil legs warm under the wool. They like to be together so I’ll find them with their chins on each other’s back. I sometimes avoid going out early or late because I don’t want to force them out of bed.
