Tag: Critters

It’s Warm

Posted on by Farmers Blogger

Hello friends!

It’s officially that time of the year where we have to be very careful not to melt. We don’t see highs below 100 or lows below 70 for the foreseeable future.

Honestly, I don’t mind it. I’d love it if it was a little easier to get outside in the mornings, work kinda makes that hard sometimes, but I really don’t mind the heat so much if I don’t have to drive anywhere. My car doesn’t have AC any longer so to drive anywhere is wholly unpleasant.

I definitely don’t like the fire conditions either, and we are deep, deep, deep in that part of the year. Last year it was so smoky and so much of the country was on fire, that I think everyone is a little more on edge than usual this year. The Willow Creek fire in Oregon from a few weeks ago burned close enough to be viewable from my back porch (we weren’t in any immediate danger as the Snake River was between us and the fire, if it had jumped the snake we probably would have had bigger issues, however it affected some in my community). I was really worried that was going to be indicative of the smoke watch but so far, we’ve been very blessed to stay mostly clear.

The sunrises have been amazing lately

But it was a very clear reminder to be vigilant about fire safety and to keep a very close eye on the brushland behind the house. Just in case.

There’s a notorious hill in my area called “Chicken Hill”. I don’t know if that’s its official name or just something locals call it, but it’s a bit notorious because of its proclivity for catching fire. It regularly seems to go up and despite this well known fact, people continue to camp, live, and launch fireworks up there all summer long. This is the first year since I moved here full time that the hill hasn’t burned yet, and to be honest, I’m suspiciously waiting. Last year the chief of police was the one to accidentally set it on fire, so no one’s immune. It also always seems to burn out of control for longer than expected, you would think the fire department would have a specific Chicken Hill response plan by now (I say this in jest, firefighting is seriously scary, hard work and I have nothing but major respect for the work they do, especially the chronically underfunded rural departments). Very often it’s the 4th of July that sends it up in flames. We’ve been lucky so far.

In other news, I tried a new recipe with the kohlrabi from the garden. I have never grown or cooked kohlrabi before so I was pretty dang excited. First of all, kohlrabi totally looks like an alien vegetable out in the garden, with its big old leaves and funky green bulb. Super cute but definitely a little off looking. Based on appearance alone I was worried it would be a more bitter veggie but boy was I wrong. It honestly tastes like sweeter broccoli. The skin is a little tough but even so, I could totally see myself eating a fresh kohlrabi straight from the garden like it’s an apple or something.

Kohlrabi stir-fry

The recipe was super easy, fry some bacon. Then saute the kohlrabi, garlic, and green onions in the bacon fat. Wilt in your kohlrabi leaves (and some spinach if, like me, your leaves left a little to be desired in the bulk department) with a little stock, add your bacon bits back with some soy sauce, toss like mad, and serve. Salt and pepper to taste but remember this has bacon and soy sauce so… be careful about salting without tasting. It was such a tasty side, we served it with rice and pork medallions. I will be making that again.

I think this week our potatoes should be just about ready to go, they are starting to show signs of readiness, at least according to Google. A lot of how I garden involves a good old Google search, everything from bugs to harvests to produce storage. A modern farmer if you will.

Other than that it’s been pretty normal on the farm. I briefly headed up to the county fair (most of which was shot down due to heat) to support my little cousin who won grand champion in his 4H rabbit project. Super proud of him for working so hard. Ro has been basically on stall rest for everything from a pulled shoulder to stepping on a bee hive. She’s had a rough week or so. Poor Nellie still is struggling with that swollen leg of hers, which is somewhat normal for this time of year. It doesn’t hurt her as much as it just annoys her because it slows her mobility. But I give her time off, just in case, because learning should be a fun thing for her too, not stressful walking around on an uncomfortable leg.

One of Aaron’s prize-winning bunnies

Anyway, that’s all for us here I think. Stay safe and cool out there.

Until we chat again, my friends!

Just Workin’

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Hello friends!

We had a very magical moment on the farm recently! Junebug had a solo ride with Ro! What a wonderful moment for all involved! June was so proud of herself, as she should be, because she had to be incredibly brave and she had to remember everything she had learned. She had to convince Ro that she was confident and capable enough to be in charge on her own. It’s hard to convince any horse of your skills when you’re just learning, but especially a mare. Especially a full sized mare when you’re just a bit of a thing riding in buddy stirrups. And especially when you’re a little nervous because your big cousin has always been there to catch you and now she’s half way across the arena (I’d have made tracks though, and I still had the lead rope in hand, just in case). Plus there’s just a lot of moving parts to riding and even when you have been riding for a long while, it can be easy to let the frustration bubble up if you miss a cue or can’t achieve what you hoped. Sometimes it feels almost like ballet or something, a constant practice towards unattainable perfection, something I still have to grapple with. Also, horses are living creatures with their own opinions and worldviews and sometimes you can do everything right and still “fail” because it’s a partnership that takes 200% (pretty sure there’s a star trek quote in there somewhere, oh well). Ro loves working with the little ones, and she takes it very seriously, but she will see exactly how far she can push an envelope, and June got a small taste of the stubbornness only a mare can produce. It’s the stuff of legends.

A rare mare share! The girls sharing one of the mineral licks!

I was told an old cowboy saying once “you can tell a gelding, you can ask a stallion, but you have to discuss it with a mare”. I think that fits Ro pretty well. She’s rarely truly naughty, but sometimes she would rather know “why” than just agree. June had to answer the “why do I have to listen to you instead of my mom” question a lot as well as the “what happens if I just refuse to walk on”. June handled it like a seasoned pro, and when both horse and rider got a little more serious than I liked, we hopped off to go practice other things.

I’ve had to laugh this week, as the most stereotypical, the-universe-said-no thing happened. So, I really should drain, clean and refill my stock tank. I like to do it in the summertime, when it’s hot enough that the inevitable, giant mess I make evaporates quickly. This year, since sometime in April, my auto waterer was leaking like a sieve and would flood out the corral if left on (a bad trait for an auto waterer, it has but one job). I’ve had to manually check and turn on the water several times a day, which is no big deal really, but planned on replacing it because I don’t want something to ever come up and leave the girls low on water, ya know? Anyways, I figured, since it floods out all the time anyway, I’d just leave the auto waterer on, let it flood out in the 100+ degree weather, it would cycle the water out, I could just suck it up and do the cleaning when the water was overflowing, and it would sorta save me having to manually drain and refill. I’m sure you see where this is going…. It stopped leaking. Works fine now. Has worked fine for days. I’m not complaining, they aren’t necessarily cheap to replace, but like, really? It’s just confusing. Oh well.

I also put up the pool noodles on the metal gates. It’s the tackiest looking thing, duct taping pool noodles to your fencing, but I prefer to not scorch my hand every time I wanna go through the gate. Plus with little ones I really need to up the safety factor around those things, because a burnt hand is annoying to me, but could be a whole day ruined for a little one. This year, instead of full sized noodles, the dollar tree was carrying slightly skinnier ones. I thought this was going to be a problem but it actually worked out better as the noodles had a stronger grasp on the fence making them easier to install. I had hoped to get green duct tape, but couldn’t find any easily accessible this year, so teal it is. Learn from my mistakes here, don’t zip tie them to the fence. Yes I’m sure the duct tape is going to melt and I’ll probably have to saw the pool noodles off at the end of summer, but I had to do that with the zip ties too, plus contend with the mares spinning the noodles and then cutting themselves on the little end bits, they weren’t as secure, and if you move them too much through day to day use, the zip ties will saw their way through the noodles all on their own. Trust me, find another solution. And then share it with me. 

Alright-y, well that’s the news of the farm, thanks for hanging out for another week. 

Until we chat again my friends

Squishing Ponies

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Hello friends!

In a happy turn, it looks like some of the garden that we thought was a goner is still with us! Some of our kohlrabi has come back, our potatoes are on their way, and maybe, just maybe the squash is holding its own. Pretty exciting considering the hard battle it had to fight. 

It was about 101 degrees when I went out for these photos…

We’ve had a lot of little things to fix and figure out on the farm lately. We have a sticky valve problem in the sprinklers system which means no matter what your intentions are, you are watering the backyard. It’s also a little hectic because the particular zone that wants to always be stuck open waters the garden path and the driveway, which basically means if you are trying to get down to the rest of the farm, ya know, maybe you want to go to the barn, you are going to get wet. Really really wet.

Super fun things happened this week as well! My little cousin is coming out to ride again, and that always brings so much joy to the farm. 

We goofed a little in that we had planned on her riding after I got off work, and the universe planned on that being the first day to climb above 95 degrees. It was unfortunately very very warm, so rider, horse, and yours truly all melted a little. It was not supposed to do that according to the forecast. I broke a couple of my working horses rules to pull that one off, but since it’s not actually terribly difficult work for Ro at this stage we were able to fudge it a little. 

…so I am adding all of them regardless

But we had so much fun anyway. Lots of smiles and giggles and high fives. She’s a little taller now, so her cues are starting to be recognized. Ro still ignores them in favor of listening to me, but at least when I say “squish your pony and cluck” we are squishing actual pony, and not just saddle leather. When I help her make the cue with her leg, we can actually feel Ro react, moving gently away, and that was an aha moment for sure. Soon she’ll be able to do it all on her own.

(Squish the pony is a very silly alternative to telling someone to kick, because as my riders get older it’s easier to teach them to escalate their asking methods to meet the pony’s needs, than to deescalate. Squishing the pony requires a constant, firm but not sharp pressure, and when the pony responds, is a very fair, clean cue with a simple end.)

She’s also got a lot more confidence in herself and her actions, which made for a much more interactive ride. She was able to let go of the horn more and use her reins, and she was able to raise her little voice and ask Ro to whoa. She even asked me if I could mark her reins so she could remember where her hands go (little hands have to put down the reins a lot in order to do other things). I was super proud of her for advocating for herself.

I promised her that soon she would be getting her own official, certified riding helmet and a set of safe boots. She’s so so so excited. As she’s working with a new found confidence, I really want her to be safe while riding. Injuries are absolutely inevitable, if she’s lucky she’ll never have more than a bruised ego and some squished toes maybe, but more than likely she will have a fall or two, pull or strain a muscle, scrape a knee, hopefully nothing worse. But a correct helmet and boots will just be one step in the right direction for ensuring she walks away from a dust up with nothing but a good story. So, one Saturday soon, when I can get some time, we will be heading to the tack store, which is just incredibly dangerous for my wallet.

I am also spending some horse focused money on finally getting the trailer up to snuff. It’s been the project that just keeps getting pushed back but the problem now exists that if I want to keep my current farrier, I need to travel to his place for the foreseeable future. He no-showed our last appointment and has been having a generally hard time the last little while, so I don’t mind making his life easier, but it’s also another project I really didn’t need on my plate. It’ll be fine though, realistically it’s the kick in the tail I need, what if I have to trailer to the vet? Or pick up an unexpected animal? Or wanna go trail riding in my childhood happy place? It’s time to get the trailer functional and the girls retrained.

This was simply too cute to not share even though it has nothing to do with the post

There’s always something that needs doing on a farm anyway, might as well be a trailer restore.

Until we chat again my friends.

The Nerdy Owl is a Know-It-Owl

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Hello friends!
It’s very early in the morning. I’m awake because a hoot owl has taken to slowly circling the house and, unsurprisingly, hooting in the early morning hours.
Its supremely unsettling. I tend to wonder if it’s to upset the dogs, or if there’s vermin in the bushes around the house that he wants, but either way, being able to follow his path and knowing exactly when he’s outside your window…its unsettling.
This last fall, when I would be sitting at my desk later in the evening, I would often get the impression that I was being watched. My desk sits under the window, across the way from the window is some tall Arborvitae bushes and down a bit is a tree (possibly an Locust tree? Dunno) who’s branches reach out closer to the window. Well, the hoot owl learned that if he sat on top of the Arborvitae or in the outer tree branches, well, he could see right into my room. So several nights in a row I’d get an ominous feeling, start to hear the hooting, and I would look up from my desk just to make eye contact with him. Needless to say (but I’ll say it anyway) I started closing my blinds shortly after sunset, no matter what. Previously I’d just sorta waited until the next time I got up to stretch, but now its been made a priority all its own.
I’ve been told that seeing an owl peer through your window is good luck. It doesn’t particularly feel like good luck to have a large predatory bird staring at you while you work. Especially when you have a very small dog sleeping on your lap (admittedly, I don’t think the owl could see Watts under the blanket under the desk but still). So, I thought I’d look it up and see.

One of the owls in the parliament (I can’t tell you how difficult this shot was to get, but I respected the owls space and comfort and used a huge zoom)

(It’s at this point that I tell you my “research” consisted of a Google search, this was in no way thesis level work and you should probably double check what I’ve written before proudly declaring it at your next party/meeting/carpool.)
Looks like, based on the first three links of my Google search, that owls are associated with the night, death, and fear just about as often as they are associated with bravery and good omens. It also seems to be a fairly even split, on cursory look, amongst the Native American populations as it varies wildly by tribe.
In a more blanket “spiritual” sense a lot of religious and spiritual groups seem to see the owl as a sign of good fortune and wealth, and one looking in your window is meant to bring joy and comfort. But I could seem to parse exactly why they hold that belief.
Look, I don’t know if I felt comforted at all about an owl outside my window and I don’t think I believe in lucks and omens and signs. I do believe I will keep a better eye on my small beans as they go through their morning routines. Especially as this owl gets bolder and has started yelling when I turn on my light in the morning. In fact, he’s chewing me out as we speak. I’m meant to let the dogs out for their morning business in about an hour, I always stand out there with them anyway (I never let my beans out at any time of the day without supervision, as I don’t have a fence and they all grew up with a fenced yard, and even if that wasn’t the case, there’s just too many dangers for them to navigate on their own), but honestly, I’m kinda thinking we might push it back a bit. Watson is really owl dinner sized, and this owl has already buzzed family members, so it’s clear he has no regard for humans. Just yesterday he watched me take the boys out and softly hooted from a nearby tree. I have only ever seen this owl from a great distance in the daylight but I know he gets fairly close at night, under the cover of darkness. So I think outside time with the boys will be a two or more person job for the foreseeable future. Safety in numbers maybe, that way we can always have an eye out.

Nellie looking amazing.

We’ve had some other visitors around the farm too that have made the boys and I varying levels of nervous. There was a lone coyote around, maybe still is, dunno, that was getting a little bold and twice I ended up grabbing dogs and hauling them up on the porch and into the house with a quickness. I don’t know if he’s brave enough to try to steal or take on one of my dogs, but I don’t care to test it. I worry about Cordelia, the chickens, and the horses, but Cordelia spends most of her early mornings safely in the rafters of the equipment shed, the chickens are in the coop at night, and while the mares have run of the arena and corral at night, I am pretty sure my girls would win with a coyote, and I’d hear about it fast enough to get down there in help. Basically, I only worry my citified little canine pack because they don’t know any better and I get the distinct impression they would want to make friends.
We’ve also had a skunk hanging around. You can tell because of the way the farm often smells. Theres enough variety of critters around here that the skunk seems to regularly need to defend itself, or at least announce itself, and while I’ve not laid eyes on a skunk since my first year here (when one walked out from under my car and I called my boss to say I’d be late as I hauled to the house) I have absolutely no doubt this guy exists.
The deer have been more hit or miss but I know they’re around too. You can sometimes see their glowing green eyes in the grass and sometimes they still come down to watch me feed in the evenings. There are still tracks and droppings in my yard and evidence they’ve been snacking occasionally on my hay. So, they clearly don’t feel too threatened.
Well, the hoot owl seems to have chilled out, and I’m thinking it’s about time I started work for the day. Keep an eye out for critters on your morning walk, lemme know if you see anything cool!
Until we chat again my friends! 

Spoiled Horse Diaries

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Hello friends!

In today’s episode of “I sure wish someone would treat me like I treat my horses”, Nellie and Ro-Ro are out sunning themselves under what is becoming an increasingly rare sunny day, after spending the night and early morning all snuggled up in fluffy warm blankets due to the rain. They are also relaxing after yesterday’s very long day of having their hooves trimmed and conditioned and getting a chiropractic adjustment to address stiffness and any lingering winter creaks and moans. 

That’s right, after a long day of spa treatments and evening of lounging, my girls got to sleep in and are now sunbathing. If that isn’t the life I dunno what is. Although, some time between now and the end of this post, a break will be taken and a ride will be accomplished. I hope.

Meanwhile, yours truly has been perpetually cold for about three days after spending a ridiculous amount of time standing out in the middle of several different storm cells. Life of a farmer, I guess, but do you ever do something and immediately go “this is the exact reason I’ll be sick in three days?”? I could feel it. Fingers crossed I’m wrong. 

Photo Credit to Christopher, who occasionally texts me critter pics when I am in a stressful meeting

I’m so excited to see how Ro continues to move since she had a set of crossed ribs that we didn’t know about. She’s such a sweetheart and was just working away like it was no big deal, when we saw stiffness even the vet assumed it was just tender feet from all the wet ground they aren’t used to. Ro is such a trooper.

To clarify, we are having a devil of a time keeping their feet nice. It’s just been so soggy. Ro is shedding some of her frog and both my girls are prone to chips right now.

But so far, Ro is moving like a whole different horse! How long this lasts remains to be seen, we may need to schedule visits from our chiropractor more often, but she is running and bucking and kicking and having a great time during our lunge sessions and was way more willing and flexy under saddle. She’s needed a little longer during our lunge session to get her wigglies out, but I don’t mind because once she’s settled she’s got a very steady head on her. And everyone gets the zoomies on a sunny day when you feel good right? I mean, I don’t run per say but I definitely have a spring in my step and a willingness to tackle more projects and things when it’s a sunny feel good kinda day. All to say, I get her point, sometimes you just gotta run around like a total hooligan for a little while to get the crazies out. As her mama I appreciate she does it pre-ride.

Nellie is new to the blanket wearing thing…
…but she could totally get used to it!

Nellie, on the other hand, has had no interest in working whatsoever, and only interests in being a bit of a pill to Ro during her work sessions, although we are trying to remedy that. She is allowed to have “I don’t wanna work days” both my girls are, because of their respective leg injuries. If they are hurting I don’t ever wanna make things worse unnecessarily. But since the vet Nellie has been borderline snotty about it all, so we are stepping back and working on reminders like “pushing someone over to get the the fence is not nice”, “trying to run into your sister while she lopes is dangerous and not okay” and “pulling all the tack off the fences and throwing it into the dirt is not appreciated”, she’s also back to going from zero to meltdown really quickly, which tells me this is all probably a broken trust thing, she’s still upset I brought the vet out. This girl can hold on to feelings with the best of them .But we will get there, I’m kinda letting her come to me, when she’s ready to work again, she will let me know. She is still entitled to all the love and care in the world, but I do think it’s getting to her that Ro gets the post work cookies and she hasn’t in a while. While the definition of work is different for every horse, the rule on this farm is horses have unlimited amounts of love and care and all the necessities of a comfy life, but the coveted peppermint cookies are for horses that have worked that day. Work might look like letting me use the scary fly wipes on your neck, or it might look like practicing 20m circles at the jog, but cookies are a reward for a good attempt at something.
Honestly, “work” for my girls looks a lot like play anyway, compared to the life some horses live, my girls are basically mares of leisure. The fact that Ro often comes trotting in from the pasture herself because she’s excited to run and ride leads me to believe that the work level is about right for her. And that’s all the really matters to me, that in this team of three, we are all happy and fulfilled.

Until we chat again my friends!

Mail Call

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Hello friends!
Joe got some fun mail today, and he’s incredibly excited about it. See, ever since he was a puppy Joe has loved toys, especially Kong safestix, but he’s hard on toys because he’s an aggressive chewer. I try really hard to make sure about the time the latest toy needs to be replaced, we have new Stix in the wings.
But I sometimes miss the mark and we have to remove the old toy before the new ones arrive. This exact phenomena is why Joe has gotten really used to the Chewy signature blue box (not sponsored, just the only place I can easily get a hold of his favorite Stix).
This crazy dog recognizes the box from the moment the driver pulls it out and waits not quite so patiently at the counter as I cut all the non-dog friendly packaging away. Then one by one (I usually order three or four, in some combination of medium and large sizes for my giant teddy bear of a dog) I hand them to him, and he goes about showing anyone nearby his new treasures. The only downside to this is, thanks to the size of the Stix, if you are standing nearby, you should wear kneepads because he has no concept that he is suddenly a wide load. 


After he’s taken his new Stix, one by one from the box, around the house to show everybody, and finally over to the living room (the most wide open space and thus the best for playing), I get a happy dog tackle hug. Without fail, he hugs and cuddled until I relent, and we are sitting on the floor while he chews, shows off, and inspect the new toys. Sometimes he will hand his Stix off to me or anyone else who’s joined us on the floor so we can play too. But pretty soon he’ll need it back for chewing purposes.
The rest of the work day I get more than my share of the steps in because anytime I sit down to work at my desk for more than 20 minutes, Joe comes in and begs for more play time, and who am I to say no. He loves his toys so much.
Scooby liked toys a little when he was younger, but he has always been more of a zoomies kinda dog, enjoying playing tag with us and other dogs over playing with toys, I think because his big brother, my childhood pupper Winchester, was the king of human vs dog tag matches.
Watson (and Sherlock, sweet little guy) were never as into toys, I think in large part because toys generally aren’t made for their size and if they are we would have to monitor so Joe didn’t eat them. Sherlock did enjoy the occasional rope toy, but his favorite thing was crawling up into the toy box and falling asleep. I have some cute video on my old SD of him quietly puzzling through how to crawl up into the bucket and promptly laying down (before looking up, seeing his mom filming, and diving for my lap). I’ll have to see if I can easily get to that SD.

Editing Amanda here: could not get into the box with the SD, it’s in the rafters of the shed and needs more hands than I have)


Weve had some crazy repairs to make on the flatbed, and we realized that, at some point in the future, were gonna have to tear apart that engine in the name of actual preventative maintenance.
Looks like whoever owned it before us had a penchant for breaking the heads off bolts and then completely ignoring the problem so that weather and leaks and such could get in there and make triply sure those bolts would never move again. It’s an effective technique that means that teardown for cleaning is a pretty lofty goal at the moment.

I really hope this video upload things works….. please, please, please, please, please!


We finally were able to find a small, reasonably priced generator for the farm. It’s not a whole home backup, which is still on my “wants” list for the property eventually, but it’s a lovely little portable generator that will pull double duties on farm chores as well as whenever we do have a power outage and need a little emergency power to run the pump or fridge temporarily.
Dad was quite excited because it means he now how power anywhere on the farm he needs it, which has been an ongoing issue for a while. The way our farm is laid out, all the outbuildings are congregated on one side, which is perfect about 90% of the time, but not great when you realize two thirds of the farm doesn’t have outlets so things like electric chainsaws and weedwhackers and things become a problem. Since we have lots of fence lines that collect scrub trees and tumbleweeds like they are Pokémon, a generator to run those things and keep the fire risk down is a must. Clean fence lines can function as a small-scale fire break.
That’s about it for now, lots of new “toys” on the farm this week.
Until we chat again my friends 

The Event of the Season

Posted on by Farmers Blogger

Trigger warnings: vet stuff, needles, vaccinations, minor injuries, general farm medical dramas

Hello friends!

 It was farm call day last week, where all the critters on the farm that can get vaccinated, do. 

This one was definitely a little rougher than the others, not going to lie. But it all worked out in the end. Allow me to explain.

So, Ro, Watson, Joe, and Scoobs are pretty much seasoned pros about the vet. Scooby admittedly gets pretty nervous when we go into the actual vet office, and he does try to hide, but when it’s all said and done he stands quietly for his checkup and shots, he just needs a little more reassurance. Totally understandable. And, since I started scheduling farm calls, it’s been much more pleasant for him, since he has no idea it’s checkup time until it’s already in progress. No time to get worried.

He’s a close talker
“Mom, look at my ball” (I buy those in bulk now)

Nellie, on the other hand, has a sixth sense about vet call days. We can do everything like normal, heck, there have been times I’ve forgotten the vet is coming out, but she knows. She knows. She will decide the level of crazy she wants to bring when they arrive, but make no mistake, she’s stewing on it beforehand.

The last few times she’s been fine, this time unfortunately she surprised us with how quickly she hit meltdown mode. She was trying really hard, ate some cookies from the vet’s hand and the lovely vet tech’s as well. But she was getting more and more nervous. After that fact I learned that the stray dog that had caused quite the ruckus earlier in the day had come back and my dad was attempting to prevent him from coming back into the corral, I’m assuming that was a large part of why she melted down so quickly, because while she likes dogs, she doesn’t like scary yappy jumpy dogs. And Ro doesn’t like dogs at all so the vibes were off.

(For what it’s worth, we tried to catch this dog forever, and when I called my neighbor she was pretty sure he lived down the road, so we are fairly certain he made it home and was just out on a walkabout)

Anyways, after she ran me over and kicked the vet, we opted to just let her live her life, which I believe was the right choice safety wise, but then after she calmed down she was so in my pocket, like she knew that wasn’t the best behavior and was trying to be especially cute. So, she definitely did not have a great time. It’s so hard because once Nellie has decided there’s an issue, that’s that, she can and will hold on to being suspicious about it for days. Unfortunately the vet and I will need a little recovery time as she grazed him in the shin and strained my shoulder (we’re fine now though, mostly just bruised egos).

While we vaccinated the dogs, we were discussing what to do with Nellie, as I love her too much to let her go unvaccinated, and we ended up with a two part plan that eventually leads to our happy ending. First, we discussed how to get her comfy with the vet, and we decided it probably made the most sense to either get her more comfortable with the needle or more relaxed around the vet so she isn’t thinking about the needle.

So, we decided that first I would try giving her the shot myself a day or two later, and if that went poorly we could give very light sedation so she was just a little bit safer and we could react just a little faster than she could. 

As you can imagine there was one idea I liked significantly more than the other, although neither sounded like the makings of a fun time. 

I won’t keep you in suspense, Nellie was such a good girl that two days after the vet call I was able to give her her vaccinations myself. At first the plan was to hide the needle and sneak attack, but she was on to me immediately. Honestly I should know better by now. So, I showed her the needle and spent about an hour holding it up to her neck, pinching, and feeding a cookie as reward. I kept waiting for the meltdown, but she was all here for the game. After she had thoroughly convinced me this wouldn’t be a big deal,  I spent an additional 20 minutes psyching myself up because while needles don’t bother me, poking those I love does. 

Ro is going through a food stealing phase, please ignore her extra weight, we are working on it
The pasture looks a lot better than this, but the girls always seem to stand in ruddiest area during picture time

But we did it! She stood so still and nicely that I honestly didn’t know what to do, she was such a good pony. My technique wasn’t great, so unfortunately there was a little swelling and the equivalent to a little equine bruise from a shaky needle, but a couple video calls with the vet and he wasn’t concerned. She was even friends with me after the fact, which was totally new because usually she needs a little alone time to reevaluate what happened. 

As of today, now a few days later, both girls had the teeniest of injection reactions in the form of sore muscles and lethargy, combine that with a string of poor weather, and they have had many days off. Nellie was super touchy about her neck (understandable) but she’s coming around now. Like I said, she just needs a little extra time to process things occasionally. 

So all in all we came out fine. A little more eventful than last year, but the girls are healthy and vaccinated, the vets brushed shin was remedied with some donuts delivered to the clinic, and I can lift my arm above my shoulder again. Plus Nellie Belly and I have a whole new level of confidence since we handled vaccinations all by ourselves. Nellie requests I work on my shot-giving form though, so suggestions on how to do that are appreciated.

This has been a bit of a longer tale of farm shenanigans, so I better wrap this up here.

Until we chat again, my friends!

Everyone Loves a Good Back Porch

Posted on by Farmers Blogger

Hello friends!
Its officially work outside season, which is, of course, the best thing ever.
Not only is there actual outside work to be done (like redoing the gardens) there’s also just “work that can be done outside”. Luckily, I can usually swing a couple hours outside with my work laptop before the battery starts screaming. It’s a pretty solid little battery, I just usually put it through the ringer trying to develop for, and test against, large scale usage. Obviously, I can’t easily mimic hundreds of users on my local machine, but I can do enough and that’s hard on the battery, among other things.
I absolutely love being able to work outside, although admittedly the farther from the router I get the sketchier my slack notifications become. But I think my coworkers are fairly used to me at this point.
Our Wi-Fi very suddenly cut out this week and would not come back for anything. I was pretty annoyed because a few months ago the radio equipment our ISP provided failed unexpectedly and it took about a month and a half to get it all fixed. A very stressful month and a half when you work from home and are trying to use your phone as a hotspot. My phone has literally never been the same, and I am thinking I may need to upgrade soon because the battery now gets hot enough to fry eggs on.
I used to have a backup connection in town (I used to work entirely in town because we couldn’t get reliable internet access at the farm at all) but I had to cancel that recently as they tripled the price of the service and it was rivaling the cost of my entire electricity bill for the farm. Too much for something I hadn’t used in months.

Buds!! As seen from porch!!


Of course, about a week after I cancel, queue the farm internet suddenly going down. Like i said, I was beginning to get really frustrated and annoyed because I didn’t not want another six months of them being “sure it wasn’t their equipment”. But they got someone on the problem right away, because apparently it wasn’t just my farm that lost service, and the cause? A maintenance person accidentally slicing through a very important cord somewhere in the ecosystem. So only three days down for service, not six weeks. Thank goodness.
An update on Scooby now that he’s had some time to adjust to being a visually impaired pupper. He’s mastered most of his usual routes, and the four steps on the porch. He’s gotten weirdly comfortable with just walking over the top of, or through the legs of, Joe instead of going around. For Joe’s part, he’s gotten very good at standing or laying very, very still while Scooby goes about his travels. He’s pretty patient. He also goes out after Scoobs if he gets too far out in the yard or too close to the retaining wall.
Scooby does still struggle when things are out of place, sometimes he sees them, sometimes he doesn’t. He noticed the Easter eggs on the floor this morning and avoided them but didn’t see the work boots and stumbled over them. I tend to think it’s a depth perception and color thing. Both the carpet and boots are tan, the Easter eggs are decidedly not tan.
We are very lucky to have some very caring folks are part of our “pet raising village” too. Scooby has regular visits with our groomer (they all do) who I truly believe loves these critters like a crazy aunt loves her niblings. She takes special attention to Scoobs now that he has a hard time navigating new or rarely visited places. And our vet has been coming out to the farm for the yearly checkups/vaccinations but is now more accommodating than ever, letting Scoobs stay up on the porch, so he feels comfortable. They also have bumpers they put up in the rooms when he has to go into the clinic so he can’t get stuck under the furniture. We have some amazing people in our lives.
We have blocked up a few places for Scoobs too, although he still gets stuck under the dining table once in a while, he’s a lot better at working out where he is. He’s such a brave little trooper.


And a happy little guy too now that I can pop open the back door while I work, and they can hang out on the porch. They absolutely love being able to hang out outside and in the afternoon when the sun peeks in. Its covered and gated so the littles are protected from predators and Joe is theoretically protected from cars, tractors, the horses, or whatever else he’s decided to make friend with. Although he creates danger for himself because he likes to force his head in between the railing slats.
I occasionally joke about being a “boy mom” because when I describe the everyday chaos to my cousins with human children, our stories sound suspicious similar. It sounds like I just have three young toddlers waddling about. It also helps that anytime someone addresses one of my critters is sounds a lot like “hey Scoobs, where’s your mama?”
(Real talk though, as much as I love being a fur parent, I absolutely realize it is 4000x harder being a parent parent. I only make those jokes around those who unequivocally know I’m joking)
Welp, I’ve prattled on for a while, so I’ll leave this one here. Otherwise, I’ll write a whole book and the editing will be a nightmare haha.
Until we chat again my friends! 

Hippity Hop

Posted on by Farmers Blogger

Hello friends!
Easter was fantastic at our house; I hope you had a lovely Easter too! (Or a lovely Passover or Ramadan).
We got incredibly lucky with the weather. It poured all day the day before, and it actually snowed and blew and rained and hailed, etc. etc., basically the entire week before. We got approximately two hours of clear skies on Friday to try to clean up the yard and we did our best.
But amazingly, it was beautiful and sunny on Easter! Cold, definitely large-jacket-weather, but so sunny and pretty. I got lots of family photos so hopefully with the lighting some of them turn out well.
We hid 350+ eggs and I am still convinced we haven’t found all of them. I think we got close though, the kids absolutely loved it. Each kiddo got a bucket and a little toy, either a stuffed bunny or a little set of pocket cars they could choose from (among the youngsters in my family stuffed animals and pocket cars are valuable riches, you see). After that it was off to the races.
This year there was enough youngsters that I had to send some grandparents and a grand uncle to the basement to supervise a Veggie Tales screening, because there’s too many bright sunny open windows upstairs to peek through, and the Easter Bunny is shy, you know.

(Most of my Easter pictures include family who would like their privacy respected so please enjoy these photos of some of the decor)

We had a lovely potluck dinner, I made ham and some chip dip, and lots of desserts. My extended family brought, in turn, turkey, some potato and pasta salads, some warm casseroles, and a couple more desserts. My mom tried her hand at deviled eggs and a little pasta salad kit, with supervision, and she did pretty well. A lot of the steps she remembers, it’s mostly just timing and remembering the safety rules, as well as reading the recipes. This is a huge improvement from even last year when she could hardly stand in the kitchen by herself without becoming overwhelmed. It’s easy to forget all the progress she’s made post strokes, and it served as a good Easter gift.
I also had set up an ice cream bar with lots of toppings, so the kiddos were very pleased. And very sugared up by the time they left. That’s my job as the fun cousin, although I think the parents were on similar sugar highs, we really did go dessert heavy this year. But we are a family of sweet tooths… sweet teeth?
Before we ate we had a nice reading of the bible story. This worked out well because, while I had made an Easter Bible Trivia set, everyone was so keen to be out in the sun we ended up forgetting about it entirely. I’m super glad we were able to get at least a little of the true reason for the holiday into our celebration. I think sometimes it’s really easy, I know I’m super guilty of this, to think about the Easter bunny for the kiddos and the food and the games and the yard and forgetting the whole Jesus thing. I’m guilty of that at Christmas too.
The kiddos also got to feed the horses some multicolored carrots, courtesy of our neighbors. The local research station rents land from my neighbors, and I’ve gotten to know some of the field workers. Since they are allowed to take home any harvests afterward (the research station is currently interested only in the seeds) I often get gifted some of the excess, this time, easily 15 pounds of various carrot varieties. I’m so grateful, not only that they think of me but also because its gorgeous, meticulously grown produce. I’ve been cooking with them lots, sharing with family, and feeding them to the girls, and even then, I don’t know if I will be able to use them all in time. Can you freeze carrots? Anyways….
The horses and kiddos had lots of fun, especially because purple carrots stain little fingers and horsey tongues, and little June was telling her little cousins about how she rides Ro and how “Manna” can give everyone lessons. I might be on the hook for a couple more tiny novice cowpokes this summer.
We got to try the new ladder golf setup, and everyone really seemed to enjoy it. I was a little worried about the tethered balls flying with the little ones around but for the most part they are pretty good about staying out of the game zone. My family tends to get a little competitive so the wee ones have learned pretty quickly to not get involved unless they really want to play.
I also bought a game called Throw Throw Burrito, but with the wind a little blowier than usual we didn’t think an outdoor card game would work exceedingly well. No worries, next get together we will throw three-foot inflatable burritos at each other, we have the whole summer after all.

I hope you guys had as magical a weekend as we had. I need to spend today cleaning up, my house looks like an Easter bunny exploded, so I’ll leave this here.
Until we chat again my friends! 

It’s Blowin’

Posted on by Farmers Blogger

Hello friends!
Winds blowing like crazy again. It does that this time of year, but it seems like it’s a little crazier this year. A little harder, a little colder, a little meaner.
The other day it was blowing hard from the west, just a mean, terribly biting wind. This was especially odd since we almost never get winds from the west. Northern winds sometimes, southern winds most often, but never western winds. Or at least, we don’t notice them because out hill often disrupts that pattern before it bothers us. (Eastern winds are a metric we can’t really gather because of the hill as well).
But today its blowing terribly hard, absolutely rattles the house when it hits, its brought some nasty storm clouds and driving rain too, although no thunder yet. I wouldn’t be surprised if that came along soon enough though.
I’ve tried to be a little less of a helicopter mom with the animals during rough weather days now. When my mares first came home, I would keep them in the corral area with food and stand near them supporting them if it even rained. Then I was reminded that all I was doing was teaching them that I found unpleasant weather scary, and they should too. Well, that’s not what I wanted because short of the severe winds like today, or hail, tornado warnings, etc., weather isn’t a big concerning thing. So, i started trying to just do the occasional check in but mostly let them ride it out. I still bring them into the corral when the wind gets really bad or the thunder starts really rolling, because they have to walk under a tree to get to the corral for water and shelter from the pasture and that gets exponentially more dangerous the deeper into the storm we go.

Here’s Joe, because I really don’t know how to capture “wind” effectively and don’t really want to soak my camera or phone in an attempt


But, it also means I get my steps by walking back and forth from the kitchen window to my desk about a million times, and out to the living room picture windows to monitor the weather. I’m still a nervous pet parent.
Weve been so unsettled this year that I think the girls are really getting used to the insane weather, yesterday it graupeled (I have no idea how to verb that noun) multiple times, and then would be sunny three minutes later. They didn’t so much as flinch. When it got pretty loud in the house, I stepped out just long enough to see if they needed to be under cover, and they ignored all attempts at attention getting in hopes of eating a little more grass before they were called in. Usually if they’re ready to go in the corral, whether for the evening meal and tuck in, or to come hangout while I clean the barn, or to escape the weather, they’ll come get me at the corner of the gate. They can go in by themselves, and they do regularly travel in and out, but if it’s a little spooky that day for some reason, they’ll wait for me to walk down to the barn, so they have someone friendly on the other side of the scary space.
The weather though, has been so exceptionally spastic this year, the girls have started to be much more brave about their daily activities, and pretty much only start to get worried if the wind picks up or I come put to usher them in.
It’s been a couple days since I wrote those earlier paragraphs, and we’ve had two major wind advisories since then. One, later in the evening, I was home alone and had luckily just taken the boys out to use the restroom and gotten the girls bedded down and fed for the night. No sooner had I grabbed my dinner and snuggled in with Project Runway (it’s taken me a while to catch up with the most recent season, don’t judge me), suddenly I was on the phone with family members letting them know that they needed to either stay where they were and settle in, or come home NOW because the winds were getting out of control and the dust was getting so thick I could hardly see across the pasture.

Here’s my dinner, because I really don’t know how to capture “wind” effectively and don’t really want to soak my camera or phone in an attempt

Luckily Christopher made it home (he’s been taking care of a friend’s house for a bit while they are off having a couple babies, so he had to secure their animals) and shortly after so did mom and dad, but not without crazy stories. By the time they got home the winds were sustained about 35-40 mph with gusts closer to 60 mph. It came up so fast.
Christopher’s car was hit by a bunch of debris and dad and mom watched with horror as the camper trailer in front of them on the highway lost its awning to the wind. Shattered and scattered debris across the highway. I’m so grateful they made it home safe and feel just awful for the camper trailer owner.
Even as I type, the wind is gusting 60+ mph and the freezing rain has me panicking about the animals getting too cold. I just spent the last hour with them and am soaked through. Ro has a blanket on, Nellie only recently decided blankets might not be scary so this storm has convinced me she’s getting one this week. Hopefully my local tack store carries Nellie sized blankets.
All in all though, I will forever be grateful that my “crazy” weather stories are so mild, and send all my love to those where the weather has cost them their homes, and in worst cases, their lives and the lives of their loved ones. It’s a terrifying weather year, that’s for sure.
Until we chat again my friends!