Posts Tagged ‘dog’
Definitely Cold
This polar vortex is one heck of a weather event, but we are enduring the harshness with general acceptance. I am always amazed that anything still functions at extremely cold temperatures like -31°(F), but at oh-dark-thirty yesterday morning my garage door opener jumped to life at the push of the button, and my car started without complaint, to roll out into the frigid darkness on its rock-hard tires.
As dramatic as the media are being about the danger of this cold wave, many implying that people shouldn’t spend extended time outside or they will die, I hearken back to stories from the 1986 Steger International Polar Expedition. They spent day and night out in temperatures that reached -70°F at times.
We should be able to handle a couple of days of 30-below.
When I got home from work yesterday, the horses were peacefully standing out in the paddock, soaking up the sunshine through their blankets. They are spending nights inside during the super-chill. Cyndie said they now all walk in on their own, one after the other, making their way into their appropriate stalls.
The chickens showed no interest in coming out after the snow last Sunday, so, now that it’s also wicked cold, we don’t even open their door. Yesterday, Cyndie found one beautiful egg in the nest boxes, unfortunately, cracked and frozen.
Cyndie dug out booties for Delilah’s paws, which we haven’t tried since the first attempt was met with total rejection years ago. The results were no different this time. She didn’t like them, but allowed Cyndie to put them all on. A few steps out the door and black boots were kicked in every direction.
It appears the wild rabbits in our vicinity are using activity to keep warm, as their footprints are pounding well-worn paths in the snow. I found a not-so-subtle entrance to a den dug into the snow beside the shop.
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As fast as this vortex from the pole has settled upon us, it will also recede. In its place, the forecast for the coming weekend offers a difference of 70 degrees, with Sunday’s high reaching the mid 40s.
That will definitely feel warm.
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Finally, Snow
So, if you are going to return north from a week in Florida, in January, you might as well dive head first into the coldest and snowiest days all winter, to make sure you will absolutely and thoroughly miss where you’ve just been.
Luckily for us, our animals so completely missed us that the love and attention they have showered over us has gone a long way to offset the angst of the painfully adult dose of winter that has greeted our return. (We still have all 9 chickens! Although, they weren’t all that fired up to show us any love. They may be hardy winter birds, but they don’t seem hardy enough to want to venture out of the coop when it is really cold, or the ground is covered with new snow.)
Instead of driving to the day-job, I stayed home and plowed snow drifts yesterday. It is hard to tell how much snow fell around here, because the depth ranges from about an inch in some places, to two feet in others.
I took a picture with Delilah in it, but I was focused on showing the fine pathway I cleared around the back pasture fence line.
Then I noticed that interesting cloud bank in the sky.
That was some pretty distinct delineation of cloud and clear sky right there. Nature sure makes cool stuff.
As Delilah and I walked the path around the pasture, I noticed the horses had made cute little circle tracks in the fresh snow, leaving little visible spots of where they foraged grass to graze.
It almost looks like they were on cross-country skis, as they moseyed along.
Speaking of tracks in the snow, as Delilah and I started our walk from the house, breaking trail in the new snow, we came to the spot where our trail cam captured a view of the fox last year. Something had just entered our property there within the hours since this overnight snowfall.
I decided to let Delilah follow the trail into the neighbor’s woods, in case we might find where the fox has a den. She was thrilled to have been granted access to this forbidden land and leaped through the snow to explore where the tracks led.
Well, even though it had been less than twelve hours since the majority of the snow fell, there were already a dizzying web of trails crisscrossing the wooded slopes. The snow was fresh and just deep enough that identification was difficult, but there were so many different pathways that I soon realized the chance we were following one fox had become very unlikely.
We reached a spot where tracks were everywhere, and the leaves beneath the snow were turned up in a wide variety of places. For a second, I wondered if it was a pack of coyotes, but then I deduced it was much more likely to be a flock of turkeys.
No wonder Delilah was so excited over that particular location.
I convinced her to reroute our exploration back toward our property and gave up on hunting for a fox den.
At least we finally have a snow cover that offers better footing than the icy glazing we had battled the previous month.
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She Knows
I walked into the kitchen and said to Cyndie, “She knows.”
Cyndie instantly agreed, “Oh, she totally knows.”
Our departure for a 9-day getaway to visit Cyndie’s parents in Florida was still a day away last night, but both of us picked up a powerful vibe that Delilah was already beginning to mope as a result of our telltale activity.
She laid under the table and watched us with her eyes, without picking up her head. Suitcases had been brought out of storage. Cyndie was kicking into high house-cleaning gear, and both of us were mentally grinding through virtual lists of tasks to be done, items to be packed, “i”s to dot and “t”s to cross.
Delilah has witnessed this scene before.
One of our newer house and animal sitters, Anna, will be taking care of our place while we are away this time. I’m hoping the weather will be uneventful and the predators all stay away while she is on duty. Wouldn’t it be a shame if we lose a hen (or hens) during her stay?
I’ve tried to point out to her that it can happen at any time, hoping she won’t suffer too much if a loss occurs on her watch.
We drive to the airport this afternoon for a flight out around the dinner hour, departing just as a mass of colder air with a chance of some snow is expected to pay a visit. Guess it’s not the worst time to be escaping to Florida.
I’ve been pondering what I might choose to do for blog posts while we are away. One possibility that keeps tugging at me is the challenge of choosing one photo per day to convey what we are experiencing. At the same time, I assume a week of leisure might free me up to do more writing than usual, so maybe I don’t want to restrict myself to a single picture.
Either I’ll write more, or I’ll take a break and write less. We’ll just have to wait and see what captures my fancy, after I settle in to that eastern time zone with the warm, humid air.
One way or another, you can rest assured that, for the next week, I will somehow be sharing the most delectable morsels of our adventures in Florida, visiting Cyndie’s mom and dad.
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Year Ends
Today is the last day of 2018. What do you make of that? I think it’s just another Monday, strikingly similar to all the others, no matter where they fall in a year.
Our animals don’t seem to notice any particular significance to the date. The passage of time is doing our balding Wyandotte hen a bit of good. New feathers are slowly growing in.
They have all handled the day of rain and following freeze well enough, mostly by spending the majority of the ensuing days beneath the overhang with the horses. For their part, the horses show signs of understanding the precariousness of the icy slope, but it hasn’t kept them from braving the danger to walk down to the waterer, even though we put a tub to drink from by the barn to save them the trip.
I noticed several marks of slipping hooves which was rather unsettling, but they are choosing to make the trek of their own free will. I trust their horse sense in this instance, partly because the last time we tried to outsmart them, it didn’t go so well.
Walking Delilah around the perimeter trails has become a treacherous exercise of trying to walk like a penguin over very unpredictable surfaces. She hasn’t been slowed much by the conditions, so there is an added challenge of being pulled along by her, faster than little steps accommodate.
When she stopped to give a prolonged inspection to something that caught the attention of her nose, I spotted this single stalk of some plant that was dropping seeds on the snow. It looks like such a delicate process playing out, despite the harsh elements nature has been delivering lately.
It’s just another Monday, and life goes on.
I don’t know if it is something of a placebo effect, but since we are now over a week beyond the shortest day of the winter solstice, I got the impression it was already lighter outside during our late afternoon walk.
Or, it could just be the dawning of a new year.
Farewell to 2018 and greetings to 2019! It’s all just a series of individual moments. May we benefit by paying attention to them all.
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Snow Wrecker
The worst thing to happen during snow season is a rainstorm. Dry snow is so much better than wet snow. Wet snow becomes slush after a time, and after the day-long rainfall we experienced yesterday, we ended up with nothing but a soupy slush.
The ground is frozen enough below the snow that water won’t soak in. Instead, it pools until the water reaches an outlet to the next lowest spot.
The drainage from the paddocks that flows across the back pasture was running like a river when Delilah and I braved the rain for her mid-day walk.
She made it across without much effort, but my big feet were going to make a definite splash. I stopped to gather my courage and plan my maneuver. Delilah busied herself with a face wash while waiting for me to take some pictures.
Everything I tried to do was made significantly more complicated by the umbrella I was fumbling to keep over my head.
As we neared the road on this typical trek around the property, I spotted the stump where our mailbox is usually mounted. That meant a snowplow must have roared past and tossed up a blade-full of the slush; a mass that packs more punch than my plastic mailbox can survive.
We found the box portion unceremoniously discarded upside down in the ditch, soaking up rain. Luckily, the plow had blown by before the mail delivery arrived, so there were no drenched bills inside.
Delilah growled at the odd scene as we approached.
I guess I kind of growled, too. Expletives.
The paddocks are a disaster of packed down slush, transformed into a dangerously hard and slippery wet surface against which the horses struggle to maneuver their hefty weight. We didn’t bring them inside overnight Wednesday, despite it ending up being the smarter thing to have done.
I brought them inside last night, with hope they might appreciate it even more, after their previous misery.
Even Pequenita was able to express her opinion about the nasty conditions outside yesterday, even though she is supposed to be an exclusively indoor cat.
Before the rain had totally destroyed the several inches of new snow that had fallen on the deck at the beginning of this weather event, I was preparing to light a fire in the fireplace. I opened the door to grab some kindling from the box out there, without noticing the cat had positioned herself right in front of me.
‘Nita walked outside before I had a chance to corral her.
Two steps into the sloppy snow, she just stopped. It was not a good day for an escape.
Maybe not good for her. Escape is pretty much all I want to do from this weather fiasco.
Rain has no place in our northern snow belt during winter. Bah, humbug!
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So Christmassy!
Christmas morning with Cyndie’s family is all breakfast and presents, on a grand scale, both. After getting lavishly fed, we headed downstairs to find 23 people’s-worth of presents around the tree.
It doesn’t take too long for Santa’s little helpers to distribute the packages around the room.
Then begins a cacophony of ripping paper, saving bows, exclamations of surprise/love/and delight, and many voices talking all at once.
As quickly as possible after everything was opened, I needed to slip out for a return trip to the ranch, where Delilah was patiently awaiting some attention. She was very grateful to have a chance to get outside to do her business. I granted her as much time and freedom as possible, trying to make up for the many hours she has been left alone in the last few days.
She seemed to think it made for good opportunity to hunt critters that live in the grass beneath the snow.
“Wha-aat?” she says after we get back inside. “I’m a good girl!”
After I got her fed, and darkness moved the chickens into the coop, it was time for my second drive of the day to Edina.
The Christmas feast which included salmon and beef tenderloin, easily justified the added driving.
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Cyndie stayed at her parent’s house overnight Monday and all day yesterday to help with preparations.
Christmas 2018 was definitely a day that felt wonderfully Christmassy in our family! The added blessings of having Norwegian relatives joining in the festivities was icing on our cake.
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Well, Hello
Here’s the thing, I was home alone last night, tending to chores while Cyndie was out. I had finished feeding and cleaning up after the horses, and walked Delilah, but the chickens weren’t quite ready to turn in for the night. It was another beautiful evening, so I suppose they were taking full advantage of it.
After killing a few minutes back in the house with dog and cat, I noticed it was probably dark enough to go close the chicken door. It is such a brief trip, I chose to leave Delilah inside, but did tuck my headlamp in a pocket, just in case it was too dark inside the coop to easily do a head count.
It wasn’t too dark, and I could see that the one Wyandotte that chose to perch against the wall above the window (well above all the others on the roost) just so happened to be the hen missing head feathers. A possible clue that something is setting her apart from the others. Whether it’s her choice or theirs, we don’t yet know.
Anyway, this is beside the point. I didn’t need the headlamp. Well, not until later. After dinner, I wanted to work on one of my creative projects, and noticed my headlamp wasn’t in the drawer where I keep it.
Who took my headlamp?
Oh, yeah, that was me. I had put it in my pocket when I went out to close the coop. But then, why wasn’t it still in my pocket?
This time, I decided to let Delilah come with me. I was guessing the lamp had fallen out of my pocket on the run down to the coop. With a different flashlight in hand, we set out to backtrack my route.
While Delilah mostly obscured my view of the trail, I staggered to keep up with her while scanning the path as best I could. As we got close to the coop, it became obvious that Delilah wasn’t just in her normal rush, she was frantically straining against the leash to get at something.
When I looked up to see what she was after, two little red dots were reflecting the beam of my flashlight right back at me.
Delilah was right in front of it at this point, and I suddenly had to juggle the dang flashlight and her leash to reel her back toward me. The critter just sat, staring. It looked to be about cat-sized, but it seemed odd to me that it hadn’t executed a mad dash in the face of Delilah’s rather threatening level of interest.
Despite our canine’s freaky level of urgency to be granted access, I successfully clipped the locked leash to a tree so that I could make a solo approach for identification.
Well, hello possum.
It stared intensely at Delilah, not up toward me as I stood right in front of it, beside the front door of the chicken coop.
It likely showed up to scrounge the bounty of chicken food off the ground that the hens kick out of the pan we set out during the day.
I got all growly and menacing and the pest finally turned and skittered into the underbrush.
Shortly afterward, I located my headlamp in the snow and everyone lived happily throughout the rest of the night.
No pics of the adventures in the darkness, but this is the lovely face of our wee one who joined me when I crawled into bed at my bewitching hour:
Well, hello there Pequenita!
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Holiday Spirit
Even Delilah is getting into the festive spirit lately. We received a gift of hand-me-over dog toys from Katie at work, and I couldn’t wait until Christmas to see how Delilah would react to them. The strange scent was definitely cause for a thorough analysis, but then she succumbed to the irresistible instinct to chomp.
Actually, the squeaky red and green candy cane didn’t draw out teeth until I kicked it away. She initially walked up to inspect it, and then stepped right over the toy as if it didn’t exist. That’s when I gave it a kick across the floor and she ran to get it.
After that, it was just like her squeaky yellow monkey. She wants us to chase after her and try to grab the toy so she can shake it loose from our grip.
Santa’s elves have been working long hours to deliver packages to our door each day this week. Must not be any names on the naughty list, based on the number of things waiting to be wrapped in the “don’t-go-in-there” room.
For the record, there are no children living with us, so I think we just play this game to maintain the spirit of the season.
I don’t mind being free of the burden of conjuring up believable tall tales to keep the myth alive in innocent eyes. Such a weird combination of love and deceit.
Cyndie and I don’t actually hide any intentions from each other. We tend to celebrate the holiday by jointly selecting an item that will be a treat for both of us. This year it just may end up being new bar stools for the kitchen island. We tried doing it once before, but were overwhelmed by the expense of getting what we really wanted.
Sticker shock times four.
I don’t expect that prices have gotten any better, but we are hoping that either our standards will have relaxed, or we will have gotten over the shock of the costs, to possibly propel us toward finding something that can work.
The ones that were here when we bought the place are in need of some tender loving care by someone who knows how to weld. I hope that person happens to browse Craigslist.
Today, at the day-job, staff have decided to modify the annual company potluck lunch between Thanksgiving and Christmas by having Famous Dave’s BBQ restaurant do all the cooking.
Works for me.
Ho ho ho.
The holiday spirit is feeling very merry and bright, indeed.
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Cyndie’s Shots
Cyndie has always been incredibly generous about allowing me to post photos she has taken. Lest there ever be doubt, I add her name to the bottom right corner of images of hers that I use.
On my way home from work yesterday, I received a series of images texted from Cyndie that reflect scenes she had captured during the day.
“Why, yes, I’d love to use them!”
First off, this fascinating shot reveals that a couple of deer decided to lay down in the middle of a trail, for a long enough time that they melted the snow all the way down to the ground.
That’s a first. With all the excellent cover available, these two chose a large clearing for their naps. Must be feeling plenty safe on our property.
Notice what a difference a few days makes with regard to the snow sticking to the trees. Scroll down a couple of posts and compare this shot with the two I posted a couple of days ago.
There is still plenty of snow out in the fields. Cyndie framed up this gorgeous view of snow drifting around a culvert.
Delilah looks so stoic as an accent to the shadow and shapes below her. I love the perspective of different elevation this provides.
Finally, there is this beautiful sunset.
If you can make out the chicken coop in the distance, the low sun is shining through it such that it looks like a light is on in there.
It’s fair to say that Cyndie has probably contributed more pictures to this blog in the last year than I have.
For that, I am extremely grateful. Thank you, C!
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Well, This
So, I mentioned in Sunday’s post that it’s been many years since we had a real Christmas tree in the house. I guess we forgot to appropriately prepare for the interest our dog and cat might have in this incredibly natural smelling specimen suddenly appearing in their living space.
Cyndie was away for a few hours yesterday morning, and this is the scene to which she arrived upon her return home:
Oops.
Live tree went topsy-turvy.
I might need to rig some wiring to hold the trunk in a vertical orientation, regardless the added few pounds of feline that might be exploring the branches. Or the canine who would obviously be interested in shepherding the cat back down out of said tree by means that would likely exceed the simple norm of just barking incessantly.
Maybe, if wires are going to be required at all, I should just hoist it up in the air and let it hang from the rafters.
It is so strange to hear myself say this, but… I think I already miss the artificial tree.
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Relative Something 