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We had a breezy, but gorgeous day. I think we hit 74 today. I got the north garden weeded. Asparagus is poking up, although not enough to eat yet. The tulips are up, but we only have 3 pairs of Purple Martins. I wonder if something happened to them over the winter. We should have over a dozen pairs.

About a week ago the robins returned... always a good sign!

Nice day here.... reached near 60 with some sunshine.

Cleaning and organizing even as I'm down to under a thousand feet of pruning (a few hundred feet a day)- cleaning the garage and garden shed isn't too bad... in the Autumn everything gets crammed in and usually once it's straightened out it's fine, but this season I'm starting on the old farmhouse, so I needed to reorganize the garden shed some to make room.

The trouble with reorganizing is that if the changes are too drastic I'll never ever find what clever place I put things! Fortunately I didn't have to make any drastic changes.. just added some shelves for plastic and storing fertilizers.

Most of what is in the farmhouse is leftover building materials, so at this point it's either use it or get rid of it... then I can start demolition and have HUGE piles of junk to deal with.

Sometimes you just can't win!

It got over 70 here & we have a lot of bluebirds. The robins came through a month or more ago. Lots of worms for them. I was planting in the gardens yesterday & hit a dozen worms with every shovel full - a little hand shovel.

I think I have everything pruned, although I'm not sure what I'm going to do about the 'giant Thujas'. They're an aborvitea hybrid that grow fast, but fairly narrow. I bought them because they said they could be pruned like a hedge, but I haven't been able to find anything about what happens when you cut the main stem on the various boards. I put in one footers 5 or 6 years ago & some are now over 7' tall. They're supposed to get up to 80' tall, but 15' would be plenty.

In between them, I planted some Blue Spruce, much slower growing, but a lot longer lasting. I'm hoping that between them I'll keep the road & the neighbors out of sight from the house.

I know what you mean about reorganizing things more efficiently. I too find 'clever' places to put things where they tend to disappear. Then they're out of sight & mind, so I go buy another. I HATE that.

Good luck with the demo & storing all the stuff. Maybe you can make a shed with some of it to store the rest in. That would be efficient & keep you busy.
;-)

But but dut... what do you mean you don't get flocks of artic red polls in Winter?

My understanding is when you cut the "main stem" it branches out, thus becoming a hedge.

I agree completely... the first two years I transplanted about 100 trees filling in various places and making a wind/noise screen along the road. The saplings I transplanted fit in a shovel, and six years on I'd need the loader to move them. Slowly but surely the gaps are filling in, with the wind break along the road still years away from being effective, though it was very effective at teeing off the neighbors! Who wants a view of the road anyway!

If (BIG IF) I can get the old farmhouse structurally sound it'll be a great storage space.. room for spreading out the equipment, adding a garage space... lots of possibilities. IF....

Typical Spring day, rain, sun, wind, sun, more rain.... hey at least I don't have to remove the screen door on the farmhouse, the wind did a nice job on that!

I don't know that I've ever seen a red poll around here. They're on the 20 common bird song CD of Ohio birds though, so you'd think so. That's not many miles north.

I don't know why anyone would want to see the road, but I certainly don't want to see my neighbors' houses. I would love to be able to afford enough land to get away from them all. Since I can't, trees will have to do.

The trees will stop growing dramatically upward if I cut the main stem I'd guess, but they will still gain some more height, I'd think. How much & how fast, though?

I guess I'll wait until they're close to tall enough & then clip the tops when they're just in range of my pole trimmers. That should be tall enough. If they get too tall, the winds we have will kill them. I lost a 20' Cleveland Pear last year from them. Snapped it off just 2' above the ground where the trunk was a solid 8" diameter & took out a big chunk of another. They're not all that strong, but that's pretty impressive. One of the things I've noticed about this area of KY is we don't have all that many tall trees. They're trimmed too often.

How long has the house been let go? We had an old farm house on our farm & it was irreparable. We put a roof & some siding on it & used it for storage, but it would never have been inhabitable. We started fixing one bad spot in the old kitchen, wound up going down to the studs on 2 walls & part of a 3d. Then wound up going into the basement, jacking things up, replacing joists & coming upstairs to pull out the lower few feet of the walls. We got it good enough to last a couple more decades, but we'd have had to do a lot more for habitation.

We hit 80 today. I mowed the front lawns again, put down some grub killer on 2 side lawns where the animals don't eat & the moles are bad. A storm was supposed to come in, but it stayed just north of us. I needed the rain to drive the grub killer in, too. Drat. I jinxed it.

The GREAT news is that Blue is feeling better. He's been fighting an infection in 2 teeth & in his jaw for months. He had a nasty, snotty nostril the whole time, but it has been cleared up for over a week now.

Today he & Chip were bouncing around, in, & out of the pond, then galloped up by the barn where they all started bucking, rearing, & carrying on. It's great to see the old man feeling frisky again. He's been moping off away from the herd & getting skinny no matter how much Marg fed him. It was tearing her up. Now, with the spring grass, he's getting some weight back on & obviously feeling better. Yippeee!

I've only seen artic red polls once... when we hit 42 below zero with a couple weeks of 20 below for the high! They're an artic bird... too warm around here usually, and you'll never see them that far south. Point being climate has much to do with what critters show up. I'd love to have bluebirds but it won't happpen!

When conifers are trimmed naturally the surrounding branches continue to grow up, taking over the main stem. I'd trim your arborvitae at least a foot below where you want the tops to be and then plan on "hedge trimming" the tops forever. (better you than me!)

The farmhouse was built in 1925, moved in 1940 and at that point the owner added a basement stairway, compromising the structural integrety of the floor. The floor is now buckled in several places, but the walls remain almost square. The sill is rotted at least a foot down all around as there wasn't proper drainage for the past 70 years. The fowtower was worse, as a shed was added to it that leaked, comprmising the structure and rotting one side of the main supports ten feet up. I recovered the tower... may have to buy bigger jacks though to get the farmhouse up off the ground. I'll see come September after I've gutted it...

Nice windy sunny day in the low 60's. I completed one project..and it only took two years to get aroundtuit! I added wheels and moved the Sled Shed (snow mobile shed) so my back yard is open for the summer!

It's great your critters are getting all frisky and happy... but mowing already! Ouch!

I just finished mowing the back yard for the third time. It was really high. I really need to mow parts of it twice a week, but that doesn't happen.

I'm not terribly worried about how tall the aborvitae get. I'd just like to get them tall & bushy enough to crowd out the view of the neighbors & the road, but also stay strong enough not to get too torn up by winds & ice. I'll let them go a few more years. As usual, I'm getting ahead of myself.

Good luck with the renovations. Sill plates aren't impossible to replace, just a drag. Years of settling can't be undone in days which makes repairs that much harder & slower. Enjoy!

Third time mowing? Darn.... My mowers still tucked away for at least another month.

Yay, finally finished the pruning! Got five trailer loads of saplings for the compost (about five pickup truck loads if you load to the roof) and the front five acres are in good shape.

The first time I pruned the farm had been neglected for many years and I had thirty loads of brush! Making progress I guess.

Now I'm worn out... may need to take an early weekend!

We had our first asparagus of the season today. My wife & I aren't much for gardening, but we do love fresh asparagus.

Bad news on the horse front: Speedy, my daughter's old Games pony, has a bad abscess in his jaw. He's over 30 years old & hasn't been doing as well the past few years. We just got Blue, my wife's favorite old Thoroughbred, through 3 months of doctoring for something similar. We didn't think he was going to make it.
:-(

Horse dentists must be expensive! Reason number 45 NOT to have a horse...

Well, I thought I'd do one small thing since it was warm today... but of course one thing led to another and with it 72 and windy this afternoon it was too good to lounge around.

Saturday being my "official" day off, and with the snow almost gone and the ground almost thawed (at least a foot down), looks like next week will be even busier and I'll need the day off to rest up!

Like you with mole poison, I've fertilized the trees and blue berries hoping for the predicted rain tonite. We'll see!

Bad joke of the day: Speedy glue.

But seriously I hope your horsey makes it OK! Congrats on enjoying asparagus. Here the grass is just starting to green up and the lilys are popping up.

We don't have a regular equine dentist any more. Used to in MD. That guy worked 4 states. Here we use one of the vets that does it & have their teeth looked at with touch up floats every year.

Bad joke. Erin is coming up Monday & will spend the night. The vet will be here to look at Speedy on Tuesday. Cross your fingers. Maybe something will pop & he'll get better. He's a tough old bugger.

Our pony, Patches, got something similar & in 1.5 weeks had to be put down. He wound up getting all kinds of tumors that grew fast & screwed up his breathing. He was another tough, wonderful pony, & it happened while Erin was in the hospital with a cracked spleen after Topaz spooked at a deer.

On an adult, they would have had to remove her spleen. On a teenager, they thought she might heal it, so kept her in the surgical ICU for a few days in case she started to bleed out. It healed & she was able to go back to regular activities in just 6 weeks rather than the 6 - 9 months it takes to recover from a removal. Whew! Keeping her away from horses for 6 weeks was tough enough. Some folks get hurt & have the sense to stop that activity. Horse people aren't like that. They just go back for more. It's an addiction.
;-)

It was 80 on Thursday, 31 this morning. Brrr! Glad to hear Maine is warming up, too. Yeah, this time of the year is a busy one. There's always a project or 4 waiting, isn't there?

My wrist, the reason I'm no longer a carpenter, seems to be getting worse. I weeded some gardens Thursday night & it hurt to use my hand all day yesterday. The whole arm hurt from my knuckles up to warning twinges in my elbow. I'm not sure how the elbow can still hurt like that. It's the 'tennis elbow' thing, but I tore that ligament out years ago when it locked up on me & I forced it straight. Stupid arm. These 'old age' aches & pains are frustrating. I have too much weeding that needs to be done.
:-(

The exceptional warmth only lasted a day, but it and the rains last night and this morning were enough to make all but a few patches of snow dissapear.

Near sixty today. I did use the rain this morning for an excuse to finish a very good science fiction book.

No more excuses for putting off digging projects even as I start filling the woodshed for next Winter.

Lets not even get started on PAIN! I don't even ride horses, but the aches and pains never end. I did something to my shoulder three months ago.. feels like I puled something with shooting pains all up and down my arm when I do strenuous things like put my shirt on, but it just won't recover very fast.

I continue on, compensating as best I can for the weakness and muddling through the pain. The one good thing about getting old is that one can figure out a better way using brains instead of brawn. For example: I use a three pronged weeder with a handle, similar to a rake, and can weed the gardens without bending or grubbing in the dirt in short order.

Thats what they mean mean by "wise old men" isn't it?

If you don't wise up, you won't get anything done, right?
;-)

We got up into the lower 50's today. Gorgeous after the frosty start. I did a little weeding & gardening. Also some vacuuming - the most hated chore. Took a nice ride on Chip with the dogs. Saw a fox. Amber paced it down the fence line & made sure it stayed clear of our property.

Upper forties here... spent all day cutting, splitting and stacking firewood.

But.. did Chip object to having you AND the dogs on him?

Ha ha. No, they get to run along side & round about. We don't even have any dog sheaths. (Seriously, they used to have them for Fox Terriers.) Didn't get in a ride today, although I got some fun pictures this morning when I fed them.

I finished the 2d crocheted pony. It came out better. I'll try to get the pictures up soon. Now I'm ready to do one out of Speedy fur yarn.

I mowed the backyard & about half the yard for the 4th time. I just mowed it Thursday evening & even with the cold nights, the grass is popping so fast that I was ejecting clumps of grass from the mower. Good news for the fields, but I'm tired of mowing already.

Woo hoo, near 60 today! Day two of firewood... one more day and it's done!

Better crocheted pony, as in without the insane eyes?

Mowing agin? Wot!

I saned down the eyes on the other one a bit, too.

You're really moving on the firewood. How many cords?

I need three and a half cord to fill the woodshed (and get through the Winter)... I figure one more day of cutting, splitting and stacking should do it.

Around fifty and mostly cloudy today. Today was about burning berries and bears. I lucked out and got a daytime burn permit and spent midday burning a couple blueberry patches... about 500 square feet. Burning every few years rejuvenizes the plants, keeps down weeds and mitigates diseases. I won't have any berries in those patches this season but I'll get about 16 quarts from them every year for the next three years.

Went out for our morning walk and discovered the squirrel feeder tipped over and their bowl licked clean. Yogi Bear is back!

I saw him last year in the middle of the night stolling across the yard, then heard him next door knocking over a trash can. Roscoe and I followed his trail the next morning and discovered he was mostly eating smelly plastic meat wrappers (as evidenced by his poop)... slim pickings as this is the time of year they wake up hungry but there isn't much for them to eat. He's about 400 pounds.

I don't have stinky trash, but he always stops by the compost. This year I'm prepared with sunflower seeds and dried out bread I've been saving for him.

Maybe he'll leave the squirrel feeder be... we'll see!

You certainly seem to be making short work of the wood. Good going.

We don't need burn permits here, but I don't know of anyone burning fields, either. Might need one for that. I remember that blueberry fields were burned although I never saw it done. I never made it to Maine in the spring, usually just the summer.

I have a bear skin rug from a small black bear that thought my grandparents' place was too interesting. I don't recall which one shot him. Might have been Granny as it was her bird feeders he kept raiding.

I had trouble loading my peanut feeder this last time. Marg let Blue in the back yard to get some extra grass & he chewed on it. It's a 3" cylinder of 1/4" hardware cloth so woodpeckers & such can break the shells & get the peanuts, not a horse feeder.
:-(

Horses deserve peenuts too don't they?

Progress slows, yesterday with rain and drizzle though I did get some blue beries transplanted from the shade to the big sunny patch, and today was shot because I went to look at a rust bucket. While the rust bucket is fifty years too new (NOT a 1944! miodel), at least I'll have a vehicle for the summer. AND I'll get to practise my bodyworking skills!

Though after losing pretty much two days Spring chores are piling up! While I should finish the firewood tomorrow it's time to start the garden while everything else gets put on hold.

He didn't get any peanuts, just beat up the feeder.

I just had a wonderful meal of steak & potatoes with fresh asparagus, just cut tonight out of our patch. Yum! Made up for an otherwise kind of frustrating day.

We started out with a hard frost. I had to plug in Marg's bus & spend too much time scraping the windshield. Then I got home & had to mow the back yard. I still had a bit left to do when Marg was ready to let me in to Speedy's paddock. I got half of that done when the belt on the mower broke.

Speedy is over 30 & can't be on all this fresh spring grass, so Marg put him in his paddock & he's not happy about it. Being an escape artist, there was no way I could get through either of the gates by myself with the lawnmower. Anyway, I guess I know what I'm doing tomorrow evening.

Perhaps you should make "Mowing" a new catagory... under general crafts of futility!

Had to cancel the rust bucket. There was a problem with the door, and after looking at the photos it turns out the door problem wasn't due to rust... it was due to a bent corner pillar on the cab. Of course, the seller didn't know anything about the vehicle being totalled.... guess I'll have to keep looking even if the chances of finding an honest seller are slim.

Nice day here, and we're in for a wekk of "nice" weather, though I much prefer rainy Springs to sunny... helps the plants get going when it's wet.

Mowing is definitely a craft of futility. Catchy. I like the way it sounds. I didn't get all the mowing done. By the time I'd put the new belt on & finished up what I'd started the night before, I only got the south end of the lawn done. When I started doing the eastern center piece, I came around the shop to see Rascal standing there all tacked up with Marg's helmet in front of him. Marg was not in sight.

I found her sitting on the ground with her face all scraped & we had to ride in to the hospital after I got Rascal untacked & the barn squared away. She's better today. She managed to get her nightgown off by herself, took a shower & got another one on.

It's been kind of a drizzly day, so not good for mowing since most of what I have left is steep. I wouldn't have the traction I need. Besides, I had to do the laundry, grocery shopping, horses, goats, dogs, & wait on Marg. I hate grocery shopping. The store layouts are done by sadists. I don't do it often enough to memorize the maze.

Gee, I'd rather have drizzly now that it's time to start the early stuff in the garden!

I don't believe in lawns! Seems like a waste resourcesWhen I mow I only mow a border around the gardens and the trails around the farm. In the autumn I'll mow everything and add it all to the compost. Grassy fields provide cover and food for any number of critters from creepy crawlers to birds.

What do you mean you don't just tie out the goats and let them deal with it?

I hear you, I hate grocery shopping and household chores, though I usually make it through the grocery store quick since I know where everything worthwhile isn't. See, if you can get Marge to ride the goats in the Eastern center piece of the lawn you won't have to mow or do grocery shopping!

About 70 today and sunny. Spent all day configuring and figuring how to use the implements of destruction I built this Winter. (see welding) Looks like we're in for a long dry spell....

Except for the back yard, we don't have any big lawns. I agree, they're a waste. Most of ours are small areas to contain parking, the driveways, & gardens. The backyard is big, about 1/2 acre, but its fenced in for the dogs. They have plenty of room to run around even when we can't get them out in the fields. Marg wants a pool in one side, I want to plant an orchard. It's grass now & is a good open area for tossing the ball for the Jacks without the horses joining in.

...sounds reasonable... except you always seem to be mowing!

Darn, another perfect 70 degree day. Fire danger is increasing fast.

My list is getting smaller. This morning I finished transplanting the last 40 square feet of blue berries and then went out on the trails and collected four loads of wood (about a third of a cord per load) and moved it to the wood pile before I got tuckered out.

Pretty soon I'm going to have to start rain dancing.....

I'm sorry to hear you're not getting the rain. We're having about a perfect growing season - the reason I'm constantly mowing. I keep pecking away at it a piece at a time, but have to go back over each piece every 3-4 days. Well, at least the fields are coming back strong.

I'd really like to turn the backyard into a bushy place with just paths to mow. I'm working into it slowly & sneakily. I hate the idea of a pool. I know Marg wants one, but she likes laying around in one. I don't, but guess who has to pay for, clean, & maintain it?
;-)

Marg is doing better today. She even went for a short walk around the barn, although I fed today. I'm taking off at 11am tomorrow so I can get home to take her to the doctor. She's not up to driving yet.

Sorry to hear Marge is still off her rocking horse....

Another perfect day here... except no rain! I have to water the transplanted blueberries and trees.

I am making good progress... spent the day building up a new trail out in the woods so I can access another section of firewood. A day of shoveling fill and loading wood as I got to it, but that job is done BEFore the biting bugs came out!

The Spring chore list is slowly getting smaller....

Speaking of spouses, I had to borrow money from the ex to buy a vehicle.. a real nice 03 chevy S10... and she blackmailed me into letting her use it to lug around her kayak. Oh well... as long as she doesn't wreck it, though most of her wrecks tend to be parking lot fender benders so it's not too risky... I hope....

I have a Chevy S10, 2003, too. LOVE it! I use it around the farm mostly now, but it's still tagged for the road. It's so handy with 4WD & a 6 cylinder. It goes about anywhere because it's small & the bed is low so it's easy to put stuff in.

I took off work early so I could take Marg to the doctor. She's off work until Monday, still wears out quickly & gets dizzy, but doing much better. She fed the horses tonight. I was busy planting marigolds around the bases of trees & weeding.

Great minds think alike! Mine is a "base" model... 4 cylinder five-speed with two wheel drive. Not much power but good enough for what I need to do.

I'm delighted to hear Marge is improving... now if you can keep her off the mean horses.... or add a seat belt to the saddle!

Another sunny day in the 70's even as the West gets snow! Wicked hot working weather for Chipping brush what with all the safety gear (heavy clothing, Real Ear Protection (muff type), etc. etc., but I got the brush around the compost done.

I may take a break beofre I start chipping dead limbs to make mulch for the blue berries... I've accomplshed a lot this week and my age is showing!

My first S10 was that model with the 2.2 liter engine, although it was a '97. I loved it, too. This one has a 4.3 liter engine - the same size I had in my full size 1/2 pickup for years. That 1/2 ton had 8' toolboxes & a ladder rack on it, all chock full. On the weekends, Marg used to pull a steel 2 horse trailer with it, too.

Having that much power in my little S10 makes it like riding a rocket when it gets slippery out. I went sideways on the highway one time because the automatic transmission decided to down shift. I really wish I had the manual transmission in it. It was nice not to have to shift for my commute, but for farm work or slippery weather, it sucks. Still, I love that little truck.

We got to 80 yesterday & it felt hot enough to me for the little bit I was doing. Just more mowing & some mulching. My mulch is shavings from the lathe. Better you than me doing the chipping.
;-)

Wot? Mo' mowing? Damn!

A couple nice days here... sunny and in the sixties, though so dry that today I threw a cigarette butt in the fire pit and an hour later some scrap wood in there caught. Well, at least the scrap wood is gone....

Puttered yesterday, and today I started dealing with my "new" vehicle. The guy I bought it from sells used cars, but always with one big flaw and several small ones. My neighbors last car from him ran nice, but the gauges and unside lights were half shorted out and the trunk leaked. The S10 is mechanically sound (so far) with the major flaw being rust underneath, and the minor flaws being dings and dents. Spent today preparing the rust underneath, mostly the frame and the bottom of the edges, and next I'll get to practise my rust mitigation techniques.

I also found about half a dozen places where the frame drainage got jammed up, so it's good I removed the dirt. Hopefully once it's treated and primed with leftover Kem Kromik (heavy duty industrial primer)I'll extend the life of the body.

Plus it gave me a good excuse to put off chipping mulch.

I mowed again today, too. Got the mower stuck at the very end & the horses almost got out. Luckily, they know their names & the word, "NO!"

How the heck do you get a mower stuck? What do you have?

Yes, "No!" is the first command any animal needs to know... except for some reason cats have it the other way around... they say "NO!" to their owners all the time...

Yet another dry warm day... no grass growing here! Continued working on the back 3/4 frame of the S10, treating the rust and priming... another day and it will be 3/4 done!

I was mowing along the fence line & the area in the corner of the field near the shop has gotten a bit worse each year. It's just so steep that when the grass gets wet, the mower can't get enough traction to get up the hill & can't go back because of sliding into the fence. One of these days, when I replace that section of fencing, it will be moved uphill about 10'. It's really trappy & I keep worrying that the horses will slip into it.

'No!' is the first thing all the animals & kids learn. Good word. Keeps the trouble they can get into semi-manageable. Just semi...
;-)

I spent several hours digging around trees in the back yard creating rings that I filled with seeds scavenged from flowers last year. It's a mixture of cone, galladria (blanket) & 2 types of black-eyed susans. I figure something will come up. We're getting some rain now, so hopefully that will give them a good start.

I can get my "David Bradley" (a fifties mini lawn tractor with a David Bradley hood) stuck easily, but at 150 pounds I usually just pick it up and move it.

I've only ever managed to get one of the Case lawn and garden tractors stuck in Winter when I plowed into a ditch... while snowy ditches can be tricky usually just rocking gets them out, but just once I needed a 2x4 lever to get the lighter one out (light as in 900 pounds). I use the Flaming CASE for mowing... impossible to get stuck!



You must have a Craftsman or something similar....

Sounds nice.. flower rings around the trees! Now if you can just convince Marge watching flowers grow under the trees is SO MUCH better than a pool....

They have forecast several days of drizzly weather soon, so today I put in the first 100' row.. all the early stuff like peas, lettuce, spinach etc. I did water it but hopefully the rain will take over and get the seedlings going so I can use the irrigation line... much easier than sprinkling but the lines only water deep below seedlings.

I also put in the East garden, which being all oats and barley is low maintenance... no watering or weeding required!

Getting stuck is one of the joys of grass over clay. That corner where I get stuck now is a pain. It's OK unless I start slipping & then it's so slick it's hard to stand on. I have a little John Deere lawn tractor. It has the standard grass tires on it & they do well enough everywhere else. Unless I had chains on it, no tire is going to get traction on that hill once it starts to slip.

It's why I keep tire chains on my big tractor over the winter. This hard clay has little traction even for it's weighted rubber tires if it's slightly wet. The clay is hard enough that the rubber doesn't bite in. It's slick for walking at times, too. The horses do well on it, though.

There isn't any pushing the tractor out of the corner. It's too long, steep, & slick. Like I said, I'm going to be moving the fence up 10' or so when I can. If I were mowing along below the fence, there wouldn't be any problem with a slip.

John Deere makes good equipment... more than I can usually afford.

I don't have any clay unless I dig down about four feet. Its sandy here, while I haven't checked the geological information I think this must be the runoff from a melting glacier. Not far away there is a lot of clay.

Hmmm... so how did you get it out? Hook up a horse?

No, I pulled it out with my little S10 in 4WD from the top of the incline. The damn horses came over to help & almost got out. They're not that useful, although Rascal came in handy today, after he got out of the water trough, that is.

He likes to follow Marg around as she does her barn chores. One chore is to put away the goats & she's gotten into the habit of giving him a treat once they're away in their pen.

Tonight, Rosie was fat & full & wouldn't get up to go into her pen. Marg walked over to her & nudged her with her foot, but Rosie just burped. Once Marg got her up, Rosie wouldn't touch the Cap'n Crunch & go to her pen. Rascal proceeded to herd both goats in! He snapped at them to hurry them along. They were delaying his biscuit!!!
;-)

The good news is that it's my anniversary today. Marg & I have managed 31 years together, more than half our lives.

The bad news is that Blue's nose is leaking green slime again & he fell in the pond yesterday. Marg has given me the chore of lining up the vet & knacker. I'll have to take the day off work, too.
:-(

31 years... Good for you!

Gee, I could do four marriages in that amount of time... (good thing I gave up after two).

The promised rain never came... a sprinkling is all. Still plenty to do as I got the berries mulched today. Next "predicted" rainfall is Saturday.

The leaves and flowers all came out this week... slowly. Need a boost of moisture desperately.

My son in RI says they're 6" below average rainfall. That's terrible. We did even more than that when we moved here, but have been lucky this year. Plenty of rain & everything is popping. Hope you get some soon.

Tuesday is the day. I'm taking off work, vet will be here at 9, the knacker sometime thereafter, likely in the afternoon.
:-(

I dancing like crazy... it's clouding up... could actually rain!

I hope Blue makes it OK... guess Vets aren't any more responsive than human doctors...

Another week over and added to the blurry recollection of making progress on the farm... I think. Sometimes it seems that farm chores are like a cereal killers to-do list... it never ends!

Have a great weekend (must be about time to mow again isnt it?)

There's a misunderstanding here. I have no issue with the vet. I needed him to schedule it first thing in the morning. Blue is not desperate yet, he's losing weight again, but still eating. I wanted to make sure his body would be removed ASAP, though. We're putting him down. It's just a matter of time & he won't get any better.

DMV Rocky Oliver has come out or let us come in a couple of times in an emergency. When Cutter squished Harley, he met the girls at the office & then took Harley home with him so he could get up & check on her every hour. He came out at 8pm & stayed until 10pm when Chip colicked. No, I definitely don't have any issues with him & his commitment to his patients.

No mowing this weekend. We got over an inch of rain today & Monday morning we might have a frost! Very rare event this late in the year. luckily, I have a bunch of burlap left over from the fly curtains in the barn last year. I guess I'll be draping it over the gardens Sunday evening.

Oh geez... the poor horsey's had it....

I guess a "knacker" must be some kind of horse ghoul. I'd of thought you'd bury Blue under a nice shade tree out back.

Finallly, rain! About an inch over the past two days... a good start!

The knacker man is a company that picks up dead animals. Not an easy decision, but digging around here is iffy. There are layers of rock which is why there aren't many basements. Large buried animals also can cause issues with contaminated water. The best place we have to bury him might ruin the pond. Not to mention the expense & hassle.

It's $125 to get the body hauled & they're supposed to be very reliable. A backhoe might be a lot more or free depending, but reliability isn't one of their strong points & this is going to tear Marg up enough. That 'poor horsey' is about like a kid to her. We're not into visiting graves, anyway. Neither of us have ever been to see our parents'.

Glad you got some rain. It cleared out here & we had a gorgeous day, today. They're no longer calling for frost tonight, but it is supposed to get down into the upper 30's. Pretty chilly for us this time of year.

That's too bad.. losing an animal family member is tough... my sympathies to you both.

I thought you had a loader? I've picked up a moose that was hit by a car (and finished off by the police) with the Ferguson. Just wrapped a couple ropes around it and tied it to the bucket. Most of it ended up out in the woods as I could only fit about 50 pounds in the freezer. It's interesting as when I checked the woods six months later not a speck could be found.

Partly sunny and chilly in the low fifties, with frost due tonite. Here frost can be expected for at least two more weeks and I only have frost tolerant plants in the garden so I don't have to do anything.

There's enough other stuff to do anyway....

I have a front end loader, not a backhoe. Deer I drag outside the fence & they're gone in a day or two. They coyotes & buzzards are quite quick & thorough. Still, I don't have a place for just putting the body out in the woods where the dogs wouldn't get to it & if they dragged a piece of Blue back to the house, Marg would just freak.

We hit 37 last night, just like the weathermen said. No frost & all plants came through fine.

Hmmm.. it might have frosted last night.. but I didn't get up till 6 so I didn't see any. Another cool cloudy dry day. The "pond" lost an inch just like every other day recently....

What, your loader can't pick up a moose? C'mon, my Ferguson is 60 years old... isn't newer supposed to be better?

I hope you survived the trama today...I'm sure it's hard letting an old friend go...

Fortunately when my ex buried her doggie too shallow she didn't see the chewed carcass before I reburied it. Wild critters will eat anything!