Sienna's Fence

Sienna inspired our fence project.  

Sienna started helping herself to our good nieghbor's chicken eggs, straight from his coop, and I was worried she would help herself to a few of his chickens too.  When she went to visit our far nieghbor during their daughters senior photos, we got some cute pictures and a chance to catch up, but we also got worried that she was so far from home. Our neighbor warned us that the highway was very close.  We decided to implement plans for a perimeter fence, ASAP.  On the back side of our little farm, the fence is wire on mostly metal posts that connect all the pasture fences together, but in the front of the house, we used wood posts, and painted them black.  

Brandon has been building all our pasture fences by digging post holes with a gas powered auger, or with old fasioned post hole diggers, and then tamping the dirt around the base of the post with a heavy metal bar.  It's slow, and exhausting.  

To speed things up, we borrowed a fence pounding machine, and Jamie came over on a rainy weekend to help install the posts.   Despite the rain, and more than two tractor malfunctions, we managed to get all the wood posts in place and return the machine on time.  

Here's a little clip of the machine in action.  It was amazing, and once they figured out how to get the posts in straight, it made quick work of a big job.  Not quick enough. 

I took lots of pictures the day we used the fence machine.  It wasn't very cold, so working in the rain was kind of nice and the drizzle made the tree flowers even prettier.  

Little redbud trees planted years ago are finally big enough to be a presence, and pair well with the apple tree near the hammock. 

While the fence was in the works, we tried putting Sienna in the pasture fences near the sheep.  It worked okay, but she didn't like being kept away from us and Wendigo, and we didn't like it either, so we would let her out.  

On Sunday we were working on the fence with both dogs, when Sienna took off after a smell.  She would do that - just take off after something, like a deer or a rabbit, and she could run so fast there was no stopping her.  Like when she would go shark eyed and chase a chicken.  Her instinct to chase would kick in and she had no self control. 

We worried all day, but then someone called our number from her collar and kindly told us where to find her body by the guard rail.  It was late by the time she was retrieved and burried under the apple tree.  

Sienna was the best bad dog I've ever had.  She chased and killed, and barked all night.  She jumped and scratched with muddy paws and head butted those she loved.  She stank like the skunk she harrassed and the dead things she loved to bring home to chew, and had ticks and burrs, and sticks tangled in her tail.  We thought she was great and wanted more than five months of life together.  We will finish her fence before we get another dog.      

Ernest is Ours

 

I mailed the mandatory veternary inspection form today, along with this photo of Ernest.  These were the last two items I owed the equine adoption agency, and now Ernest should be offically ours!  

I'm not sure Rufus is as excited by this as I am.  You mean we have to keep him?  Ernest passed the vet inspection, getting good ratings for his coat and foot condition.  He did have to get his teeth "floated," which meant he was sedated, rigged up with a wicked looking metal halter that pried his mouth open, and his teeth were filed with an electric grinder.  The vet said older equines sometimes have the outside of the teeth grow too long, and that's probably why Ernest was packing his cheek with chewed food, which isn't good for his teeth.  Ernest balked when he saw the needle, but once that part was over he handled having his teach filed pretty well.  He wobbled and sneezed from the sedative for the rest of the evening.  

Our ewe, Lambchop, never had a baby.  Brandon is nearly finished with the fencing on another small pasture, so we can rotate our grazing, and we have two more ewes on order for May.  We're not counting lambs before they hatch, of course, but we're hoping that next spring will find us with lambs for the freezer.  

Sienna, our newest livestock gardian (ha!) dog, killed and ate one of my chickens yesterday.  Sigh. 

I ordered chicks, which should come in the mail at the end of May.  I'll raise them in my brooder until the have feathers, and then they are for my parents or my friend.  It will be fun to have little chicks again! 

We might have flurries tomorrow, and a few nights of below freezing temperatures, but I think winter is behind us.  The frogs are calling furiously from the neighbors pond, the birds are in a twittering frenzy, insects swarm my headlamp during my nightly rounds, and the plum tree has so many blooms that the air smells like candy! 

View from Above

 

The world really is round!  These photos are a from the end of November, when my brother and sister-in-law and nephew came for a pie and coffee Thanksgiving campfire, and brought their drone.  Shane let me watch the screen on his phone so I could see what the drone sees, and make screen shots.  Can you believe Brandon cut all that grass!  Not just our fields, but our good neighbors field, and even his neighbor, so everything green you can see in the photo.  

That bright red tree in the front yard is the small volunteer Brandford pear, and that pile of wood is the cut up trunk of our old shade tree.  Those small brown circles in the front lawn are little soil hummocks made by the mole, who is Brandon's nemisis.  Brandon recently said the best thing about Sienna, our new dog, is that she loves to kill moles.  I think she makes a bigger mess than the mole during her excavations, but Brandon thinks it's worth it to reduce the mole population.  She doesn't eat them, so we find frozen mole-sicles by the front door regularly.  They do not have eyes, I checked. 

The pool is covered for the winter, and the garden looks just as messy from above as it does from the ground.  Last summer four helicopters flew low over us while we were skinny dipping in the pool.  I tried to shield myself with the wall of the pool and told myself they couldn't really see much.  Ha! You can see everything from up there! 

The donkeys have turned their little paddock into dirt.  They enjoying rolling in the dust, and the light tan spots in the field are places they roll and kick up clouds of dirt.  Now that's it winter, it's mud.  We're discussing pouring a concrete pad so they have a place to stand at the food trough with their feet out of the mud.  The farrier trimmed their hooves last week and didn't report any foot problems, but I would hate to stand in the mud for meals, and everytime I move the trough they trample the surrounding area into mud.  I don't have to worry about Ernest overeating grass.  I wonder...if all the green things in world were edible to you, and you had a big appetite, would it be terrible to look out over the fence at all that green while you chewed your hay?  Like eating a dry salad in land made of hamburgers?  

In the south facing view you can see the little forest I'm encouraging on the east side of the house.  That bright green shrub in the forground is bush honeysuckle.  I can't wait to cut that down and feed it to the goats!  

There we are, waving from the campfire!

Snow Day Morning Chores

 

Finally, a work day snow day!  We had perfectly picturesqe snow on Christmas day, but I already had the day off so it hardly counts.  The perfect snow day is an unexpected day off, right?  

Especially if you have a collection of fuzzies to keep you company.  Sienna puppy is growing so fast, but I predict she will not be as large as Wendigo.  I've been reminded that I thought Wendigo was a challenge when she was Sienna's age too, but now Wendigo seems a perfect angel compared to Sienna. 

Sienna chases, chews, and pounces but it's so good to have a dog that will do all my chores with me again.  Wendigo limits her exhertions to protect her bad knees, but Sienna sticks with me no matter how many trips I make to take to visit the goats.   

We begin our mornings chores with a visit to the donkeys on our way to the mobile chicken coop.  Good morning Ernest - what a big yawn!  

The mobile chicken coop has been moved into the small fenced paddock next to the donkeys.  This gives the chickens their own space to eat and assemble at the coop without being harrassed by Sienna.  The chickens can get out of the fence through gaps, but they tend to stick to the tree lines and back fields to avoid the dog.  I miss seeing them near the house, but it's nice that they keep their mess to the back of the farm now.  

With only ten hens, a rooster, and two guinea fowl, there's plenty of roost space in the mobile coop, yet five of the hens are roosting in the cedar trees at night.  They are taking a risk that a racoon will nab them while they sleep, but they roost so high in the tangled branches I can't fish them down and re-train them to the coop.  Cross you fingers that Sienna and Wendigo take their guard dog duties serisously.  

I moved the chicken food to a lidded barrel near the coop, and I have water buckets near the fence that I can fill from the hose.  I secure the coop door open in the morning, spread chicken pellets on the ground, and bust the ice from the water bucket.  Sienna waits with the donkeys while I tend the chickens.  On this snow day, instead of the normal excided exodus when I open the door, all the tree roosting chickins quickly hopped inside instead.  I don't blame them for wanting their feet out of the snow.   

Look!  Eggs in the nest box!  

After a winter break, my hold hens started laying again when the days began to get longer. The giant white eggs are from the little white hens, and the smallest tan egg is from the giant red meat hen.  

Good morning, Rufus!  Are you anxious for your breakfast hay?  I break the ice on the donkey water and give them a couple flakes of hay.  I've been told that mini donkeys can live on a single flake of hay per day, and a flake is approximatley four pounds of hay.  Rufus and Ernest love to eat, so I give them each a flake in the morning and each another at night.  They would eat even more if I gave it to them, but Ernest is supposed to be on a diet.  I've been cutting little maple saplings from the tree lines and pitching them in the fence.  They eat all the little twigs and peel off the bark!  I think they get bored without something to chew on.  Especially Ernest, who nibbles on the wood gate.  

I need to weigh a flake, because I may be giving them way more than they need, and Brandon is worried I won't make it through until spring with the hay we have stored.  I can easily use a bale each day, and we won't make more bales until the end of May.  I do have one last giant round bale from the year before, so maybe we'll squeak by.    

The goats are living in the fence in the woods behind the zip line field.  Can you see the little shed in the photo?  It's a bit of a walk from the hay barn or the water spicket, so I get plenty of steps during my chores - even some wieght lifting as I carry hay and water.  

My nephew and I walked to visit the goats when we had our camp fire thanksgiving pie celebration, and he mentioned that all these animals seem like a lot of trouble.  Tell me about it - Ha!  I told him that I spend about a half hour on chores in the morning, and another in the evening, so I get an hour of outside excersize every day, rain or shine, because if I skip it my animals will suffer or die.  Talk about motivation!  He said he spends an hour outside playing basketball every morning since he can't go to school.  Why didn't I think of that! 

Unlike the sheep, who rarely need their hay basket filled as they spend all their time grazing grass, the goats are voracious hay eaters, and hay wasters.  Can you see how much hay has built up inside their fence?

The goats are standing on nearly two feet of hay they drop from their basket, and once it hits the ground they don't eat it.  It's good for them to have clean hay bedding, and all that organic matter heats up as it composts and makes a nice warm bed for them.  Brandon found a big wooden crate dismanlted in the dumpster at school.  He brought it home, reassembed it, nailed some tin on for a water proof roof, and cut a little door way into it.  The goats think this goat house is the perfect place to cozy up out of the weather, and I laugh when I see them all come squeezing out of that little hole like clowns from a clown car.  How do they fit?   

The last chore is to feed the wolves dogs.  

Wendigo thinks it's rude to take photos of her with her mouth full. 

Seinna looks ferocious when she chews! 

Chili Competition Pie

Jamie won our annual work chili cook-off this year.  There were nine entries, and he won first prize, which is a day of paid leave.  Instead of entering a chili in the competition, I baked pies.  The award for pie baking is the joy of crafting the pies, followed by the pie admiration of my coworkers, and then the miserable state of everyone's digestion after eating nine bowls of chili and giant hunks of pie for lunch during a work day!   

I enjoyed making these pies so much I couldn't resist taking photos. Cutting butter chunks into flour is so satisfying.   

Apples, peeled and ready to fill a crust. 

I made a little extra dough for each pie this time, and it was nice to have plenty to cover the dish, and even a little extra for a tiny bonus pie.  

Flipping the rolled out dough into the pie plate is always tricky.  But look, I did it perfectly this time! 

Isn't it pretty, with the edges all crimped?  

The apple peeler/slicer crank tool thing I have always leaves a little bit of peel on the slice at either end of the apple.  These slices with peel were perfect for the tiny bonus pie made from the extra bits of dough.  

Cinnamon and sugar, poured over the apple slices.  Oh yeah.  

Then a mixture of flour, sugar, and butter sprinkled on the top.  

Baked to golden perfection!  

While the apple pie was baking, I rolled out the dough for the chocolate pie.  Success!  

The chocolate, sugar, butter, egg yolks, and evaporated milk are heated on the stove top until the butter melts, then poured into the unbaked crust.  I used up all the extra bits of dough in the little bonus pie, making the crust extra thick so I only had to steal a little filling from the big pie. 

When the pie was nearly done baking, I used the egg whites and sugar to whip up the meringue.  I even added and extra egg white, so it would be tall and fluffy.  The meringue goes on the hot pie, then back in the oven until it's golden brown.  

The meringue is always taller out of the oven than it is when it cools.  I wonder if there's a way to keep it from shrinking?  

Brandon was prepared to be dissapointed that I was baking pies for a party he wasn't able to attend, so the little bonus pies were perfect.  He got to have a slice of the pie, but we didn't eat an entire pie all by ourselves!