A great deal has happened since I last posted I am reminded of the opening lines from A Tale of Two Cities: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope..." Thus has been this past year.
Last time I posted we were about to harvest. Here is the short and long of it. My neighbor cut the fields for me. I needed to rake the fields twice. I managed to rake the fields once, then flew to Seattle to support my folks through their surgeries. I flew back a few days later to learn that my friend, Jane, died. This was late May.
She use to hand paint eggs. Such a talent. Her daughter let me pick out a couple of Jane's hand painted eggs to keep in remembrance. The eggs I selected were based on some of our conversations and how I saw her. She was a woman of grace, kindness and love. We talked about feeding the song birds and how she missed being able to enjoy the song birds. Here are the pictures of the eggs I selected.
I finished raking the field for the second time, when my neighbor came back and baled. We got only 500 bales. Dry falls and winter usually make for a thinner crop. Here are some pictures of the fields being cut. Below those is the rake that I attach to the back of the tractor to rake the rows into wind rows.
These are the rake teeth. The lower bar and upper bar make a sweeping movement and throws the hay into wind rows.
Sorry no pictures of me raking, as my husband was at work.
The bales had to sit
through some rain. I set them up into tepees to keep them from
getting ruined in the rain. Here are a few pictures to give you an idea.
My husband was out of town during the baling process. Lesson I learned: I can no longer throw these bales of hay onto a trailer to stack. Rain was coming the evening I took this picture. I managed to buck these into tepee arrangements before the rain hit. This protects the hay some what in the rain. Now the end sitting on the ground usually gets damaged a bit from the wet ground.
I did sell 155 bales before the rain. So I bucked nearly 300 bales. What is bucking hay, you wonder? Bucking hay is grabbing a bale by the two baling wires lifting up and using your knee to buck it up to a trailer or to stand it upright. Found out my right knee is falling apart and bucking hay is no longer an option.
I would suggest if you do buck or move hay, do NOT wear shorts. I wore shorts! It was 90 degrees out and humid (rain was coming). My legs were scratched from the top of my socks to the base of my shorts. Also managed to stab a piece of hay into my leg. Found that when I knelled down. I could only remove this piece of hay with a pair of tweezers! Yes, it hurt.
Oh, yes good idea to where a long sleeve shirt too. Yes, scratches all up and down my arms. My neighbor uses metal wire for baling. I managed to cut my arms and legs on some of the ends sticking out. Haying is not for the faint of heart! This is probably why we can NEVER find anyone to haul hay out of the fields for us. It is actually physically demanding work. BUT FUN!
We finished up the harvest after June 10th. Rather late, but until I get the equipment I need, I rely on my neighbor and his schedule.
Summer was hot and dry. Not as hot as the previous summer but hot enough. We killed 4 copper head snakes in our chicken coop this year. Plus another one I killed just outside the coop. It was a copper head snake year for us.
We lost Buffy, one of our ducks, to a copper head snake bite. Nothing can be done for ducks to save them from a poisonous bite. Not that I did not try, but to no avail. Took her about 4 hours to die a slow agonizing death. I stayed with her. She died on July 5, 2013. Phoebe followed Buffy around and was quite lost for a week or so.
A week or so after Buffy's death, my dear friend Leslie had an accident. She got a new horse and had been riding the horse name Buddy. We were talking about her rides and being rather motherly, or pushy, I made her promise she would carry her cell phone while she was out riding alone. Yep, the next time she went riding alone, Buddy threw her. This caught her off guard and she missed breaking her neck and fracturing her skull, but broke ribs, punctured a lung, broke her shoulder blade, yes, shoulder blade and a small bone out toward the end of her shoulder. She was so happy she had her cell phone! She called for help the best she could with a collapsed lung. To add injury to insult, as the saying goes, she managed to stand up and lean against a round bale of hay for support. Surprise, fire ants attacked her. Those helping her got the ants off of her and off she went to the hospital. Spent several days in ICU, then down to a wing.
When she got home, I offered, rather bossy like, that I would feed her animals morning and evening. She complied. I learned this: NEVER get between two large horses, especially during feeding time. They will mess you up! Did it only once, got the message.
Now Leslie and I are animal lovers. She has 5 barn cats, 2 indoor cats, 2 dogs and 2 horses. They all like to eat. I got to know them and spoil them for her. They like it when I come to visit. I always bring a treat! I did this for a couple of weeks until she was able to do a little on her own. Now her husband like my husband works out of town. So we help each other as much as we will allow each other. We are a couple of very independent ladies.
While she was laid up, I would visit after the evening feeding of the animals. We got to spend time, that we normally do not take, to get to know each other better. We talked and shared past experiences from our lives and found out we had many more things in common than we thought. She is teaching me how to be Southern and I am teaching her patience with a Yankee!
In the spring, I began planting sunflowers. However, more lessons to learn! I made the mistake, yes! a mistake! I planted sunflowers in the same spot for the third year.....bad, bad idea. They got attacked by a very nasty bug that loves to eat sunflowers. Here are some pictures.
But first some information. Did you know that sunflowers have wild relatives? What? Yes, Sunflowers have relatives that are wild, not like our wild relatives. In fact, there are 4600 (recorded in the U.S.) wild relatives of domesticated crops. Just about any crop you can think of there is a wild relative. Example: Sugar, rice, sorghum, sunflowers, echinacea, various berries, nuts, peaches, cherries, beans, squash, tomatoes, sugarcane and grapes have native gene pools. Now isn't that interesting?
Here are a couple of pictures of the wild relatives of sunflowers. These grow next to a field down the road from me. Aren't they cool!
Okay, maybe more than a couple of pictures! Now why is this so exciting to have wild relatives? Sunflowers are one of the few food crops that originated in the United States. Also sunflowers are considered one of the most important crops, estimated to be a $384 million industry in the United States. Impressive isn't it?
The excitement around the wild relatives of domesticated crops is this. In the 1970's when rice harvests in Asia were decimated by a virus, yep a virus, scientists studied some 10,000 wild species of rice and found one with a resistance to the virus; the rice crops were saved.
In 1996, a wild sunflower in Kansas was found to be resistant to ALS inhibitors in weed killers. Almost every crop has a story like these two. Now another interesting fact is that sunflowers originated in the U.S. but were commercialized in, you won't believe it, Russia!
Now before you go out into your yard or acreage to kill what looks like weeds, take a second look. You may have wild sweet potatoes growing. The wild sweet potato was used to breed resistance to pests and disease but in some cases actually create new crops. So don't be so hasty to kill what might or might not be a wild relative! Now if only "our" wild relatives were this useful.
Okay, here comes the sunflower show for you. But they did not do well as I stated before. I will not be planting my sunflowers in the same area this year. Plus I will give them a bit of natural bug killer this time.
First up, Evening Sun. I started with one row of flowers, then added a row as these grew. However, here is another lesson. I did NOT space the next rows far enough apart from each other. It got really crowded and some sunflowers just could not get sun to grow.
See the bumble bee?
These plants grow to be over 6 feet tall!
This is a lemon Queen
See those nasty bugs! They destroyed my sunflowers. Not this coming year, baby!
Now I ventured into Butterfly bushes this past spring and summer. Also grew some new lantana, hibiscus, mock orange, bougainvillaea, Mexican tarragon and more. The following are pictures from my little garden.
This is Griffin Blue Butterfly bush with butterfly
This is Royal Red Butterfly bush with butterfly.
This is Genvieve butterfly bush, just opening up. The blooms open from the bottom up.
This is Black Knight Butterfly bush
Trailing Lavender Butterfly bush
Royal Red Butterfly bush
This is Nano Blue Butterfly Bush
Pink Delight Butterfly Bush
White Profusion Butterfly Bush
Here are some Hibiscus, Lantana, Bougainvillaea, Salvia and Mexican marigold or tarragon
The Hibiscus are Lord Baltimore and Lady Baltimore
This is Blue River White Hibiscus, which the doggone bugs really liked!
This is trailing Lavender Lantana.These have a fragrance
This is Trailing White Lantana
These have a fragrance
This is Fantasy Lantana
This is Fantasy Lantana before it changes
This is confetti Lantana
This is Dallas Red Lantana
Here is a Rose of Sharon called Lucy
I have had this Dogwood for 3 years. This is the first year of blooms
These are Salvia plants
This is called Mexican Marigold or Mexican Tarragon. These bloom in the fall. They smell wonderful! The leaves of Mexican tarragon have an anise-like flavor that serves as a
substitute for French tarragon in warm, humid climates.
These plants do well in full sun and believe me they got full sun!
As with endings come beginnings. It was around midnight July 22nd. We hear this very loud mournful wailing on the front porch. My husband goes to investigate and finds this kitten. It ran from him. I went out and managed to catch the little thing. This kitten fit in the palm of my hand! It could not have weighed a pound. On top of it all it was wounded. Poor thing. I think it was just so frightened, hungry and at the end of its rope that it just wailed and wailed. Once we picked it up, the wailing stopped.
We look around hoping a mother cat is close by, but no other animals out there. You already know don't you. Yes, we brought the little thing in. I fixed up a bowl of canned cat food, adding warm water to it, while my husband held it. This little thing was hungry! Ate like this may be the last meal.
We fixed it a bed in a box in our spare bathroom. Ended up putting a stuffed animal in with it. That little kitten ate and slept all night. Happy to see us the next morning.
This is the kitten after a good night of safe sleep and plenty of food!
Yep, it wrapped us around its tiny paw.
Took it to the vet. Needed to know for sure if this was a girl or boy. We have a girl! Yep, she was 4 weeks old. She was attacked my an owl or hawk. She had the claw holes in her side to prove it. Today she has a spot that is scarred from the wounds with no fur.
Her name, with the help of Susie receptionist/tech at the vet's office, is Jiggs. Why? Hopefully I have enough photos to show you. She has lines going every which way on her little body. She reminded me of a jigsaw puzzle. Thus the name Jiggs.
Yes, she is cute. You can admit it.
Notice the different stripping on her.
By the time she finished playing in the bags, they were everywhere but in the big bag.
Oreo and Jiggs in August 2013. Poor Oreo. He gained weight over the stress of this little hairball kitten! I now know that Oreo is our stress eater. Oreo now weighs in at 25 1/2 lbs, up from 21lbs!!! I am not feeding as much food, but some how he managed to gain weight.
This is Grumpy with Jiggs. Grumpy is not thrilled either
Here she is after surgery hanging out with her best bud, Buddy.
Winter is coming.
I am flying back and forth to Seattle to help my folks with their surgeries and cancer treatments.Summer and fall are busy times this year. Early November was my last trip to Seattle. Those of you who know my folks, know their plates have been full this past year. Still more medical procedures ahead, then hopefully a nice break from the medical world.
We bought a big tractor to make farming a bit easier on me. This one is enclosed! Elle, to the left of the wheels, is one of our dogs. You can see the tractor is good size compared to her. I haven't had time to actually drive it.
As Shakespeare once wrote, "Now is the winter of our discontent."
Winter came rushing in froze us then rushed out, then rushed in froze then rushed out, rushed in again and so on. What a wild winter ride for human and animal alike!
I saw this hawk one foggy winter morn. I kept taking pictures as I slowly approached. He kept moving from post to post then brush. I finally got a little too close before it flew off into this tree.
Baby it was COLD outside!
Doves, eastern or western meadowlarks eating chicken scratch we put out for them.
My familiar visitor. See the small flock of birds in the back ground.
The hospital stay was an experience I do not want to repeat. The staff was great. The food was great, (I was on steroids anything resembling food was great). This was my wake up call to take care of myself. I tend to live as though I will always have tomorrow. WRONG-O What we have is just the present day, the present hour, the present minute. Tomorrow is not guaranteed to be there. I am learning to live my days wisely in the present. This is a huge learning process.
It took me nearly two months to get back on my feet. Thanks to my husband. To my church family bringing in food for us and a dear friend coming and helping me out when I was not strong enough to care for all the animals. I am a zoom zoom person. I can honestly say I have some of my zoom but not my zoom zoom. As the days go by, I hope to regain the rest of my zoom.
Part of my recovery is exercise. My dear friend teaches Zumba. Mercy, mercy me! It is a killer work out. You will leave sweating! I am looking into a gym workout as well. I need to get the broken down body into a healthy slightly less broken down body.
For Christmas, my husband bought me a camera to mount outside. I mounted the camera to a tree in our front yard. Since we feed deer, geese, nocturnal critters, and the feral cats that find their way here, I thought it would be interesting to see what animals come to eat. Here are a few pictures the camera took.
This is one of the feral cats that comes at night for food. I call him Baby Face. You cannot see it here, but he has this cute white patch around his nose and mouth. He has this deep meow for such a little guy.
Notice the cat staring out the door window to the right. Always a show going on for them.
This one is not feral. Someone dumped her. She stayed hidden for quite some time from us. I think she got chased off a lot. I call her Stubby. She now has a nice warm bed in our garage. She uses the dog door to go in and out. She wants to live in the house with us. But our cats say NO! We just cannot take in another one. She is very loving and just wants to sit on your lap.
What you have here are red winged black birds male and female, cow birds and starlings. There may also be doves and very few song birds. They are going after the corn and roasted soy beans the deer left.
Here are a couple of recent photos of Stubby.
Spring is showing its colors slowly. I have fruit trees with blooms on them. My Forsythia is blooming beautiful yellow flowers. The Canada geese are coming back. Some stay all winter, but others come and go. This year a bird that I have no idea what it is showed up with the group. Managed to get a few snaps of it. If you have any idea, I would like to know what it is.
This is really a pretty bird. I did not get a picture of it in flight. The lower half of its wings are white, in flight. In the picture above you can see a little of the white. It has a white strip across its beak. When you get too close it will hiss at you. Very pretty bird. Only came a few times. Glad I got these pictures.
You survived! You are now up to date on our farm. I am sure as spring takes hold, I will have more stories to share. Of course you know, spring is snake hunting season for me. The copper heads and water moccasins come out to play, along with the chiggers and fire ants! Yippee! spring....
