One brown sheep

There is a roaring blizzard outside right now. I awoke on and off during the night, listening to the howling wind and the sleet and snow rattling against the window, worrying about the animals, as I always do during harsh weather. I pictured the buck shelter picked up and tossed by the wind, leaving the bucks exposed and possibly injured. I got up, opened the back door with some difficulty against the drifting snow, and peered into the darkness.
The shelter was still there.

After a summer of scattered tarp-over-stock-panel shelters, we finally have decent shelters for all of our livestock. The "girls," our Nigerian Dwarf dairy goats, have always had it good in their barn space, as have the chickens in their "Coop de Ville." We built a stand-alone, shed-roofed shelter for "the little boys"---our Nigerian bucks and wether---in August. The sheep have been roughing it for longer: we finally built an A-frame shelter for the rams and wethers in November, and the ewes just got access to barn space a few weeks ago. But most of the sheep are Shetlands, and as a primitive breed they generally prefer to be out in the elements. The ewes are using their barn space now, during the blizzard, but this is only the second time they have sought shelter there, the first time being during a monsoon-like rain storm a couple of weeks ago.

Through the window, I can see sheets of snow blowing sideways past the house and billowing in great eddies around the barn and shelters. One brown sheep is huddled next to the fence with his head down, his brown ears, sides, and legs a dark contrast to the snow covering his back and the top of his head. Although there is plenty of room for him in the A-frame shelter, he is lowest in the hierarchy, of mixed parentage and a non-Shetland to boot, and the others won't let him in. I am having a hard time with this, but there is not much I can do about it at the moment. The others also don't let him eat at the hay feeder, so I spend a lot of time putting hay in other places so that he can eat, even though he only gets a few bites at any flake before one of the more dominant animals notices and chases him away. This is Brown One, whom we tried not to name but had to refer to in some way---the last lamb we will send to the butcher this winter. His litter mates have already gone and he misses them. I am wondering whether he would be happier and less abused in the ewe's paddock until it is time. Maybe tomorrow, when the storm breaks, I will try moving him. Or maybe I should just put the rams back in with the ewes, to be sure that they're bred. Either way, someone won't be happy. The only one who doesn't seem to mind the rams' company is the older wether, Voe. He doesn't back down and doesn't get chased.

It's time for me to gear up and go out to tend the animals. I will bring them water and break the ice out of their buckets. I will make sure they have plenty of green, dry hay, and give everyone just a bit of grain. I will check the chicken coop for eggs and see whether Nigie, the one hen out of ten who lays an egg every day, has tried to hole up in the goat barn again to escape the roosters. I will stuff hay into multiple places for Brown One, preferably places that provide a bit of a windbreak. I will glare angrily at the rams and Voe, cozy and dry in their A-frame, before returning to my own warm, dry house.