Posts Tagged ‘Rain’
Between Showers
We received rain in several waves that lived up to the weather forecast for yesterday. Despite the precipitation, we pulled off a few good projects on our to-do list for this week. First off, the horses had a morning appointment with the farrier.
Heather reported a significant amount of growth in hooves since her last visit. The horses were reasonably well-behaved throughout each of their trimmings. Mix was unnecessarily fussy about the confinement we forced on her for all of an hour and a half, but stood well when that was required for Heather to do her thing. The herd returned to calm as soon as halters were removed and gates all reopened. They didn’t waste much time getting back out on the fresh grass.
For my next project, I decided to set up under the hay shed roof to cut some blocks of wood for the shade sail posts going into the ground.
The plan is to screw these blocks onto the 6×6 posts to add a ledge that will resist forces pushing upwards. I decided to get fancy and cut angles in the bottom side of each block so there won’t be a flat surface to push against from below. Since these blocks will overlap on one end all the way around the square, I made one additional cut at a compound angle to mate the slant of the adjacent block.
Go ahead and try to picture that in your head, if you can figure it out. It was all rather experimental for me, having no experience with this level of carpentry. I’m understandably chuffed that I achieved the result I was after and only needed to cut one extra block due to a mistake.
For reasons that escape me, the horses came back to the paddocks and hung around nearby as I worked. You’d think the repeating loud buzzing sound of the saw starting and stopping would drive them off, but it was just the opposite. It made me happy to have them linger in the vicinity while I was in production mode.
When I was finished with that project, I looked at the radar and saw that time was limited until the next batch of rain. I decided to take a crack at mowing the labyrinth between showers.
I made it all the way through the labyrinth and cut a lot of the surrounding area before it started to sprinkle again. It was light enough rain that I was able to keep mowing until I finished everything I wanted cut.
For the first time in several years, we are expecting a dry, sunny day for World Labyrinth Day tomorrow. We are not in the best climate zone to show off our Forest Garden Labyrinth in early May, but we make due. It’s a little like having a flower show without any flowers. That doesn’t mean a person can’t enjoy taking a meandering stroll down the curving path while meditating on global peace, but it would be that much more inspiring to have leaves on the branches and flowers on stems.
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Perfectly Wet
Precipitation fell slow and steady all day yesterday, giving us the perfect moisture for growing roots to soak up before the ground has frozen solid for winter.
We didn’t let the shift of clocks back to standard time influence much of our normal routine, but our later morning arrival at the barn seemed to surprise a large rodent. We had entered through the back door, and as I was moving through the darkness toward the light switches, I heard a squeak and noticed Asher hop and twist.
A flip of the switches revealed a rat out in the middle of the floor. I suspect Asher had chomped the poor thing once as it was making no effort to dash for cover. I scooped it up with the manure rake and, after one last bonk to end any suffering, offered the barn pest a hot burial in a compost pile.
Based on the vast network of tunneling occurring in the sand floor, it is easy to assume that there is probably more than just that one culprit lurking about. It is really difficult to discourage unwelcome pests when feeding horses cracked grains that result in endless spillage.
The mares aren’t very fastidious about constraining the leakage from their mouths exclusively within the edges of the mats we put out for that purpose. There are cracked oats and corn scattered far and wide in the vicinity of the barn overhang.
The barn pigeons are in their glory, and the flock has grown to city park proportions with this abundance of food. The rats are probably getting their fair share.
We are employing a variety of attempts at eradication or, at the very least, discouragement to avoid the rats reaching a population approaching the pigeon flocks. Apparently, the neighbor’s cat that regularly prowls our grounds doesn’t put much pressure on rats residing in the barn.
Walking toward the house after chores, I noticed Cyndie chose the grass over the pavement. The wet conditions have left the paddocks muddy, so striding across the grass is a way to wash some of the grime off boots before entering the house.
The moisture was so needed, so perfect; I’m of no mind to complain about a little autumn mud.
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It Rained!
Real rain fell on the land last night. It was glorious. Adding to our excitement, there were moments of spectacular lightning bolts flashing across the sky. It’s been over a month since we received any measurable precipitation, and the ground was as dry as I’ve ever seen it.
I’m actually looking forward to the possibility of some mud in the paddocks this morning, although it would be a surprise if the ground didn’t fully absorb all the water like a thirsty sponge.
Despite the two nights that dipped below freezing last week, there are still places where the grass continues to grow, and Cyndie just found new blossoms on the hollyhocks she got from Liz. I don’t know what to expect next after this dose of life-giving water.
Maybe a period of normal weather. Wait, what is normal weather?
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More Wet
This may be the legacy of our summer of 2024: wet and more wet. It probably will be overshadowed by Joe Biden’s announcement of bowing out of the 2024 campaign for President and Kamala Harris rising to take over the cause boosted by an impressive groundswell of support. Compared to that, our water-logged trails, sloppy paddocks, and fast-growing plant life will likely become barely a footnote.
It was mostly dry when we got home yesterday afternoon. The puddle that we like to call, “Paddock Lake” near the bottom of the larger of our two paddocks was just a little muddy in the middle and the drying edges were already cracking. The one-and-a-half inches of water in the rain gauge explains the standing water in the tractor tire tracks in the hay field where 14 large round bales were transferred out on Friday.
The fact that the excess water in the paddocks appeared to be quickly drying offered some hope that we may be reaching that point of the summer when the ground is able to absorb the rain as fast as it falls. That might work if the rain didn’t keep falling again and again as if it was still the month of April.
Shortly after dinner last night, our weather apps began to ping messages of impending rain and warnings about lightning.
We received a good soaking. Whatever had started to dry out yesterday was freshly wetted again.
I’ll be wearing my wet boots to walk Asher and tend to the horses this morning.
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Rain Chances
“Don’t worry about the future” is wise advice. “Live in the moment” is a great idea. However, in order to pack for a weeklong trip, I need to visualize how the future days might turn out. Will I need any warm clothes or not? Should I pack a raincoat? I need to put myself in that future place.
Well…
That forecast indicates my biking and camping future next week has a pretty consistent chance of being a wet one. I think I’ll want a raincoat.
Today and tomorrow I will strive to fully appreciate the comforts of home before setting off on an adventure against the elements on Saturday.
I wonder if it’s possible to ride a bike while holding an umbrella.
We received a fresh soaking of under a half-inch of rain yesterday, forcing me to delay mowing until today and tomorrow. I salvaged a tiny amount of the day by fence trimming for an hour before dinner. It felt a bit like “too little, too late” but it was better than nothing.
Our weather forecast for the next two days shows no sign of precipitation. I’ll be cutting grass wherever the turf supports the tractor tires enough to not leave mud streaks.
We’ve decided to try sawing branches from a maple tree shading Cyndie’s garden and then need to prepare the horses for a farrier appointment before noon so it looks to be a busy day on the ranch.
At least I shouldn’t need an umbrella. Yet…
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Imagine That
Yesterday, I gave myself a day off from conditioning my body for long-distance cycling with a plan of riding this morning. Although it would be good practice for the upcoming Tour of Minnesota, during which we ride rain or shine, I did not have it in me to go out and get cold and wet while subjecting my bike to the abuse of rain riding.
I’ll wait for another (dryer) opportunity.
At least I finished mowing all but the wettest areas of grass yesterday afternoon before this latest dose of saturating precipitation.
It was rewarding to find the horses equitably sharing space under the overhang this morning as rain poured down. Maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise to me but they were even positioned properly for their feed stations. That is not a common occurrence.
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A volunteer from This Old Horse asked if she could feed the horses yesterday afternoon. I was not completely astonished this morning to find where she dumped the manure in my compost area and had to double-check with Cyndie about who dumped it.
I tease Cyndie about her penchant for choosing the most inappropriate pile, which is what our volunteer did yesterday. The thing that I don’t understand about the choice, whenever there are no obvious piles for freshly dumped manure, is how they decide to pick the oldest, most composted, most ready to be removed for other uses pile from the five or six options.
The last thing I want is to have fresh manure mixed into it.
My response each time this happens: “Imagine that.”
I guess I have become more educated than I’d like to admit about what the differing stages of composting manure look like. Newer piles that are very actively “cooking” may be hard to tell apart but it seems to me the oldest pile that looks like the closest thing to dirt should be the last of the choices.
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Successful Test
We didn’t get the downpour I was expecting would show me the improvement achieved by my rerouted gutter downspout, but the daylong drizzle yesterday produced results.
A puddle was almost forming in the grass beyond the outlet of the last stretch of the downspout. That is water that would have been soaking into the dirt along the foundation from the ineffective (broken) plastic solution that had previously been in place for years.
It must have been more than a drizzle at some point in the last 36 hours because Cyndie reported over an inch of water in the rain gauge last night.
Knowing that this kind of rain was on its way, we jumped to accomplish as much as possible on Saturday afternoon during a dry spell. I pulled out the diesel tractor, rearranged equipment, and retrieved the wood chipper from the back of the garage.
Using knowledge gained from previous failures, I detached the loader bucket to reduce weight and picked a strategic route to reach the wood chip “station” by the labyrinth without a problem.
A few years ago, I got stuck and created a muddy disaster trying to drive that tractor along the fence line of the back pasture. Saturday, the tractor tires did nothing more than leave a reasonable impression on the soft earth.
There is so much I don’t know about using heavy equipment, but in the eleven years I’ve been playing the role of Wintervale’s property manager, I have figured out how to get along at a level that serves our needs. When the shear bolt broke during the session of chipping a big pile of oak branches, I wasn’t the least bit fazed.
We used that excuse to decide we had done enough chipping for the day and I simply wrenched in a new bolt when I got back to the garage. No big deal.
Before gaining these years of experience, I would have perceived a broken bolt as a sign I had done something wrong. I saw it as a failure. Something to be avoided. Now I keep stock of spare bolts and suffer no unnecessary concern when they are needed.
A successful day of using our equipment to accomplish tasks is a good test of the knowledge I’ve gained from the school of hard knocks.
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Messy Mire
The previous few days of rain and record-high temperatures have created a muddy mess in the paddocks. It really makes me miss the years when it didn’t rain in the winter.
I found skid marks in the big paddock that revealed one of the horses slid on all four hooves for a length of about four feet. I assume one of them had started to bolt and then tried to slam on the brakes. Thank goodness they all looked fine when we arrived to serve their evening feed.
The soupy surface was as hard for me to walk through as it was for that horse that had tried to stop. Luckily, the four of them calmed down significantly after a few minutes of munching feed. I was able to focus on the art of picking up manure around them that was virtually inseparable from mud sliding into the tined scoop.
I have a feeling the horses and I will share the feeling of relief when conditions change in some way that will to put an end to the sloppy mire. I am imagining the ground finally getting covered in clean, white snow.
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Rain Waves
I picked a good day to go to the movies yesterday, and not just because of the discounted tickets on a Tuesday. Overnight Monday we received such a thunderous downpour I fully expected to find washouts left and right. That didn’t turn out to be the case but then the wave after wave of sometimes frightfully heavy downbursts interspersed among periods of really rainy rain all day had local dry creeks flowing like rivers by the time I returned home.
I drove to Hudson on my own to see, “Killers of the Flower Moon.” The ticket cost me $5.50. A medium bag of popcorn costs $6.25.
On my drive to the theater, I found myself getting closer and closer to a wall of heavy rain ahead. Making my way inside before the heaviest rain fell, I headed directly to the restroom after purchasing my ticket. This movie is 3 hours and 26 minutes long. Need I say more?
The quality of the film lives up to the skill and experience of the people who created it. It feels wrong to find myself appreciating a film about such diabolic events in U.S. history. I’m glad the true story of multiple murders to steal the wealth of an Osage family who profited from oil on their reservation at the turn of the 20th century is getting told. Hopefully, it will keep alive a historical truth that plenty of people would rather not acknowledge.
There was a point during the movie when the roar of the deluge outside pounding on the roof of the theater briefly wrenched the audience’s attention from the cinematic world and then another time a little later when dramatic thunder claps didn’t seem to fit with the action on screen. It took some thinking to separate the two events going on at the same time.
It also takes thinking to comprehend the violence occurring in the world today is tragically similar to countless human casualties perpetrated throughout time. It seems hard to believe the human race hasn’t been able to grow more enlightened than what is represented by deadly conflicts that continue to exist to this day.
Those of us beaming waves of love to the world are going to need to up our game somehow to create hope that a tide can be turned with unprecedented global results toward ending human atrocities.
Imagine beams of love that rain down in waves able to wrench our attention from killing “others” and overflow hearts with visions of peace.
Amen.
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Can’t Control
If I could, I surely would have the rain refrain from raining on us during the hours when my friends and I want to go for a bike ride today. It is taking a lot of effort to hold my attitude in a healthy place against the unfavorable weather forecast that has been threatening for days to rain out this event we have been preparing to host.
While we were on a walk with Mike and Barb yesterday, Cyndie found a bright red heart-shaped leaf.
A gift from the universe to help us maintain a focus on love despite whatever rain clouds might come our way.
Last night our world was brightened mightily upon the arrival of my biking buddies Bob and Julie in advance of today’s planned ride. Healthy energy combined and magnified as we introduced Asher to them and then took a walk down to see the horses.
The soil is so desperately dry here and the growing plants and trees are so visibly parched that rain showers are needed more than my friends and I need to bike. I can’t control the amount or timing of precipitation falling today but I can control my reaction to it.
If it isn’t raining for the few hours we’d like to ride, that would be just grand.
It seems weird to say it, but if it rains a lot all day, that would be even better.
The “September fall colors ride with John” can be easily morphed into an “eat a lot of great food together, converse, and play games by the fireplace” with John and Cyndie event.
I definitely can’t always get what I want. I really, really wanted to ride with my friends and enjoy the beautiful scenery on the roads nearby.
I want the type of weather we had here during the four days prior. However, the opportunity to have a great time with good people provides priceless value regardless of the arrival of ride-busting precipitation.
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Relative Something 