Friday, June 09, 2006

Jelly Bean


Jelly Bean
Originally uploaded by mzones.
This may look like a donkey to you and me, but to the lambs he spends
his time with, Jelly Bean is a life guard.

I went on a field trip with some other interns here at Biltmore. We
spent the day with Dr. Ted, the VP of Agriculture. He took us to the
west side of the property where the majority of the cows on the estate
are raised. The estate raised lamb also hang out here. There's about
15 acres of grapes for the winery, grapes grown here are Chardonnay,
Pinot Grigio, Cabernet Franc, and Cabernet Sauvignon. Also, Biltmore
has a nursury here where they have all sorts of plants for the garden
and yard being grown in plastic nursery pots. These plants are
available for visitors to purchase at the gardens by the mansion on the
estate.

Anyway, back to the donkey named Jelly Bean. He protects the lambs from
coyote and dogs, which are their most likely preditors in this area. I
learned that donkeys don't like dogs or coyotes, so it's in Jelly
Bean's nature to keep them away from the lambs. Who knew?!?!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The problem is, how does he fight coyotes?

mz said...

Donkeys are good punters. He kicks them. ;-)