Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Ah the Joys of Farm Life





Sorry if I have not been as quick with the replies and/or gotten to comment on each of your blogs like I try to do every day. The past few days have been hectic for me.

It seems everyone around me is either sick, injured or hobbled in some way right now. The Mrs. still has not gotten her car back even though they promised it would be done a week ago so I am driving her back and forth to work. That is killing about 3 hours a day right now. My Dad is recovering and finally got back at it this morning so I don't have to go check on him every morning any more.

My Mother and Step Father were told they were required to get a Flu shot at each of their respective places of employment and then both went down sick yesterday so guess who has been doing all the feeding and such. Both the ones currently penned here and the flock of ewes on their pasturage.

While giving Ram number one and his paddock bitch their hay this afternoon I got a whiff of something bad and noticed a dead possum in their pen. I have no clue how or why or where but it was a good sized one, only the dog could have done it in. My best guess is the dog got it and critically wounded it and it crawled into the pen trying to escape and died.

So my duties now included getting rid of a dead possum.... Yummy.

I burned it in the concrete block burn pile I constructed this Summer. The dog was much too interested in it for me to do anything else with it. Luckily I had enough old boards and small limbs already loaded up for burning that it was enough to do the deed.

Random dead animals is just a part of living out here. Most times you just don't really know how the local wildlife ends up where it got you just remove it and carry on.

While attempting to maneuver the gate with a dead possum on my bedding fork the paddock bitch made a run for it. He went straight for the feed barrels and threw the top off with such grace that I knew he had practice at it. Of course he is used to ignoring my mother when he gets his head into the feed barrel and was not prepared for me when I came back. That wether may weigh more than a small steer but I can still get him man handled in a way he just has never had to deal with. He was so surprised I managed to pull his head out of that barrel and push him sideways he turned and ran right back into his paddock with his pretend tail between his legs.

One of these days when I get the barn cleaned out completely I am going to deal with food storage needs and make them escaped animal proof.

Anyway I did manage to take a picture of one of my girls (Barb #56,732 to be exact) working a bitterweed bloom. One of these days I am going to have to do something about all the bitterweed in the pasture as well.

Keep Prepping Everyone!!!


15 comments:

  1. Well I am so happy to find out that there is a weed in the country that I don't have, no bitterweed here, yet. You are a one man team!

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    1. SF - It pops up in the Prairie region on over grazed pastures. It's actually toxic but large stock don't eat enough of it to hurt themselves usually. Now Sheep it can kill if they get into it.

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  2. You are always busy. How did you ever find time to work a paying job??

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    1. Rob - That's a good question. Luckily my parent's health has not been a major issue until this year.

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  3. Most of the dead animals I find are feral dogs one of the neighbors shot. It has been getting pretty bad lately and sounded like a war zone a couple of evenings ago when the cattle rancher mowed down a whole pack of em. thankfully none of that group staggered over to my place to die, but alas it happens regularly.

    best,
    Dan

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    Replies
    1. I have had that happen here. Not recently but the neighbors have had to shoot some feral dogs in years past.

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  4. Poor possum. I throw dead chickens and the like into the woods. The next morning they are always gone.

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    1. Harry - Anything dead I chuck will come back and be scattered over the yard. The dog who wandered in and stayed can smell a freshly killed rabbit from over a mile away and he will bring it back to chew on. Even as fat as he has gotten he cannot get that scavenger mentality out of his system.

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  5. It tires me out reading about your comings and goings. I don't move fast but if you need help let me know. At the very least I could sit on a stump and tell you what to do :)

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    1. eileen - That has become my Father's job now it seems. As much as he hates it.

      Luckily the Wife's car is back today so I can get more work done once again.

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  6. Too late for it this time around, but you could have disposed of the Possum and had dinner ready for the clan! Mwa ha ha
    http://www.cdkitchen.com/recipes/recs/628/Baked-Possum84305.shtml

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    Replies
    1. Julie - That's just yuck. I hope to never have to eat possum even freshly killed.

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  7. Never a dull moment in the country ... I miss that.

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    1. RP - Ya it would be nice if the excitement was a little less gross sometimes :)

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