Posts Tagged ‘slippery footing’
Tricky Footing
As demonstrated by my antics a few days ago when I tried to plant my feet to slow my momentum on the way down the backyard hill with Asher, the ground this time of year does not offer dependable footing. With the extreme swings of temperature we’ve been experiencing, the dirt and turf freeze solid overnight. That alone makes for a rather annoying walking surface that is uneven and unforgiving.
It only worsens as the day progresses and the sun thaws the uppermost layer.
The melting turns the first centimeter into a greasy slurry that then rides atop the hard, frozen layers below. It becomes a diabolically unreliable footing to hike on.
I’d rather walk on the almost-as-unreliable scree on the slope of a mountain.
Part of the problem is that you can’t see that it will be slippery. It’s like being gaslighted. Perception and reality don’t align.
In areas where there is no grass, like around my piles of composting manure, I ran into a different challenge. The black dirt looks solid enough, but I am well aware it will be slippery so I step carefully. My boots didn’t sink in, so things seemed tolerable. However, it got messy real fast when I picked up a foot and discovered that the thawed top 1 centimeter was staying attached to the soles of my boots.
In the good old days, we only dealt with these conditions briefly in the transition from winter to spring. This year it’s been happening throughout the entire winter. I keep hearing Paul Simon in my head singing, “Slip sliding away…”
March is not coming in like a lion. If the folklore holds, does this portend storms at month’s end?
When it comes to weather possibilities in this day and age, I don’t know what to believe anymore.
At the very least, I’d like to believe the tricky footing will be behind us sooner rather than later.
.
.
Disastrous Footing
One of the things that make rain in February so awful is the aftermath. Any snow that has been packed down by driving, walking, or horse activity turns into a wobbly polished surface of slippery ice. It’s about the worst possible situation for the horses to move around on, especially on slopes like the ones in our paddocks.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Yesterday morning, while I was doing my best to provide a way for the horses to cope with the slippery conditions, Mia made the mistake of trying to make her way downhill. It was a decision she couldn’t go back on once she made the first move. I was a bit traumatized to be witnessing such a precarious maneuver by a 1200-pound hooved beast. She slipped and stutter-stepped her way down the slope, ultimately avoiding the worst outcome and coming to a stop while still on her feet.
The frantic trip down the icy surface appeared to make it obvious to Mia that she wasn’t going to be able to move around on the ice even though she’d made it to that spot. She seemed to realize her only option was to get back up where she’d come from. After just a few seconds of hesitation, she began moving her hooves to head back up but there was more slipping than stepping happening.
She knew momentum was needed and bobbed her head and flexed enough muscle to attack the incline with some semblance of a run. Somehow, that slipping run was successful and she arrived back to the muddy surface around the overhang.
I was working on covering a pathway with old hay to provide footing to get down to the waterer.
I’d already set out buckets of water under the overhang because it was so treacherous for them to reach the waterer but offering the potential route down felt better than doing nothing at all.
I have no idea how long the icy condition will persist.
In the image above you can see the icy area is darker than the white snow in the distance. I may attempt to rake some sand and/or spread more old hay around on the slope to give the horses options for moving around. The scariest risk comes when one of the horses feels a need to get bossy and the target of their aggression panics in her hasty attempt to escape. If all four horses are confined to the limited space by the overhang, things can get a little testy.
Last night I closed gates to split them into two groups of two to minimize their bickering.
There is no place for shenanigans when the footing gets this disastrous.
.
.
Slippery Stepping
It’s ‘walk like a penguin’ time out on our trails, taking super short steps and placing each foot carefully. As we started down the big hill of our perimeter trail yesterday morning, I noticed the pathway had gained a decorative border from boot prints on each side. We have both been choosing to step in the deeper old snow on the sides instead of taking our chances on the icy, packed center lane.
Icy conditions were even more dramatic on the north loop trail near Cyndie’s perennial garden beneath the big willow tree. That spot is located at the low point of the neighbor’s plowed field where runoff water pressure is high. It flows up out of the ground there during heavy rains and obviously pushes up and freezes this time of year.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Conditions were certainly good for growing ice crystals Wednesday night. Cyndie captured these closeups as I continued ahead with Delilah on a trek to the mailbox.
We continue to experience profound swings of temperature between melting during the days and deep freezes overnight.
A sure sign maple syrup season is just around the corner.
.
.
Glazy Morning
Wet precipitation when the temperature hovers around the freezing point is a perfect recipe for hazardous footing. This morning we woke to ice covering everything and faced a slippery challenge walking Delilah and making our way down to feed the horses.
To our surprise, the horses were navigating the crazy conditions with relative ease. I suspect the advantage of having four points of contact with the ground and being almost ten times our weight allows them to deal with the slippery footing better than we do.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
They were judicious about moving around and calmly settled into enjoying the feed served up in their pans on the ground. I get a sense that their ability to cope with the situation better than us is a function of their living outside in the elements. They were experiencing it as it was happening throughout the night and adjusting to conditions as they changed.
In contrast, we arose from our warm, snuggly bed and stepped out of our comfortable house into the shocking iciness that threatened to slam us to the ground with each slippery step.
I tried to prepare Delilah for the craziness on the front steps but she pretty much had to figure it out for herself when the pads of her paws couldn’t get a grip on the surface.
The outlook for the rest of the day is the opposite of sunny. There is more rain expected, possibly even thunderstorms this afternoon, but with a little warmer temperatures so maybe not as much ice.
We aren’t sure about how the horses will deal with heavier precipitation. They have shown significant anxiety about being confined to stalls in the barn so we are inclined to leave them out until they get uncomfortable enough to need a break from the weather. Maybe then they will be more interested in the indoor option.
In preparation for the possibility, we added pads to the floor of Mix’s stall after she carved up the soil something awful with pawing and kicking last time, when she kicked boards down in a tantrum. In addition to the dust storm that must have resulted, she excavated a few large stones with her aggressive gyrations in there.
Tonight might end up being a chance to test that new floor.
As always, the weather will dictate our decisions.
.
.
Trail Bulge
For some reason, the heaving path down the middle of our trails fascinates me. Some days the bulge stands out dramatically. Yesterday, I tried to take pictures that would show how high it had risen, but the two-dimensional images just don’t do it justice.
First, I tried shooting from my eye height when standing. Then I crouched down and snapped a shot for comparison.
I’m not sure there is any difference between the two for revealing the surprising upheaval of earth compared to the ground on either side of it.
The hump is frozen solid, but the very top surface of leaves and dirt melt just enough to get slippery. It becomes a challenge of constantly choosing whether to step on the residual ice or the decaying leaves for the better footing, ever wary that either could result in a slip.
Add in the frequent jolts on the leash when Delilah wants to make haste after some critter ahead and it’s a wonder we ever make it back to the house clean and dry.
When the trail offers better all-snow footing, and during the summer when it’s not very wet, I occasionally allow Delilah to race as fast as she wants and run behind her, but that is chaos for planting my feet. It tends to be at a pace that I can’t maintain for very long, after which she willingly settles down to a brisk walk and I spend the rest of the jaunt gasping to recover my breath.
Over the weekend, I noticed that it is the corner fence posts that are all getting pushed up, despite my having released much of the tension from the wires.
It is easy to push the fence posts back down using the loader on the diesel tractor. Almost too easy. The first time I tried it, I was shocked over how little resistance there was to the hydraulic power and weight of the bucket. The complication is that the period of time when the ground is thawed enough to easily accept the posts being pushed down, the tires sink in and put me at risk of getting stuck and/or tearing up the surrounding turf something awful.
It becomes a classic case of timing being everything.
I’m not going to worry about the fence posts for now, but I will be anxiously awaiting the trails getting back to flat again as soon as the frost goes out of the ground.
Bring on the spring mud season!
.
.
Relative Something 