Category: A Farm Animal Death

So Busy

The past little while has been pretty busy here on the farm as we have been getting ready to open Missus’s little shop out front of the house. The spring weather has continued to be pleasant, though yesterday and today it cooled down, especially in the mornings, and we put a fire in the stove this morning to cope with the unbearable chill. On the downside, we lost a few animals to a predator in the past few days.

I have had help from second son going down to get some firewood and a couple of sawlogs. The supply changed quite a bit from the first trip down to the second, indicating there are a lot of trees being trimmed at the moment.

We took a couple of days off this week and last in order to help Missus get her shop open, which she did for a short while on Monday. She is planning her weekends on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, so being closed yesterday and today were planned as a part of normal operations. We are waiting for the first customer to darken the door still, and hope that will happen fairly soon, or soon after we put up an ad on the local board online. A slow start ought to give us a chance to ramp up operations.

The weather has been fantastic for this time of year for the last few weeks. Earlier in the spring it was run outside in forty-degree temperature time with no jacket or anything extra to keep warm. Who could complain at the warmer weather after any Idaho winter, even a warm one? But it has been making it to the low seventies lately, and dropping into the fifties with little sun has left the house so cold that I had to start a fire in the woodstove today to take the chill off. It was mid-fifties in the house this morning, and there was no sun to take that chill away. So I went out to our persistent woodpile and gathered up an armload of poplar to bring in and burn. It warmed up pretty quick!

The large, open topped chicken run no longer holds out predators, or so we found out this week. I have seen raccoon prints in the yard quite a lot over the spring, but now it seems one has decided to try its luck at the ducks and goose. Raccoon or whatever, it got in and killed them all. It could have been an owl, to be fair. But I have stayed up late to watch for them and saw nothing. We ordered some solar powered motion activated lights to put up on a couple of the out buildings. They make enough of a difference to put sights on something like a raccoon.

So that’s the goings on here on the farm while we also do other things, such as get ready to have the kids out of school after their first year in public for some time. They are excited for the break! I am excited to have them around.

Preparing the Herb Garden, 2024

One of the boys and I went down to the woodyard on Monday to pick up some firewood and a couple of saw logs. There were a lot of new piles in the dump suggesting that it is cutting season for the tree trimmers. This time it went really well, and we got two big sawlogs right up into the trailer in no time. It was our 26-year-old who came along with, and I thought when we unloaded that it might be nice to show him around the sawmill rather than starting on the log splitter already. We easily got a couple of hundred dollars of poplar boards out of a small-ish log I had sitting on the mill already when we got there. I took mostly 1-inch-thick cuts out of an 8 inch wide by nine-foot-long cant. That left some thick flitches that will burn just fine and saved us messing about with little things.

Missus and I got into the herb garden yesterday and cleaned up from the winter and got some plants in shape for their growing season by pulling grass around them and preparing for some fresh mulch. We also worked the front yard some. Missus put in some seeds in the planters out front and I took out an old planter by the gate. We had intended for me to move that one, but the bottom was rusted out and all the contents stayed as I picked the metal planter up with the tractor. We mowed and edged in the herb garden, and I scythed and even got down on my knees with the sickle to cut around where a litter of kittens have been growing up nicely.

I went down to get something from the tool shed on the front of the chicken coop and noticed a dead duck as I passed the outside run. It wasn’t much of a corpse suggesting the visit of a raccoon. Then I saw two more fresher, slightly more whole corpses in another part of the run. That left only two ducks, a goose, and two chickens in that run, along with the rabbit hutches. I did not get a chance to find the hole a raccoon would have come through, and I suspected that since the electric wire atop the fence is inactive, it may have climbed over. By the time we were done with the day and all the work done, I was in no state to sit up and watch for a raccoon to shoot at, either.

Missus had to redo a wall in her tiny shop trailer that she had tried a paper on for decoration and had come down at the corners. She was fed up with it and decided to paint instead. For her to do the work I had to take some shelves off the wall first. I put them back up yesterday, too. It was a pretty easy reassembly and did not take long at all.

Missus and I will be back at it again today when the day gets started, and we hope to finish the bulk of the work and ready for the season. I put the tiller on the tractor yesterday evening ready to use today to prepare beds for some peas and gourds. I topped the gearbox up with heavy oil, and I will grease the zerks before getting started today. But tilling is a job I will do whenever she is taking a break. It is pretty easy sitting in the air conditioning and driving slow. Also, the tiller is a pretty good counterweight for unloading sawlogs tomorrow when we come back from the woodyard.

It’s coming up to 5:30 in the morning and I have got Garrison Keillor telling the news from Lake Woebegone playing on YouTube. There is about an hour left to get a little rest before it is time to get the kids to the bus stop. Time to get to work on that rest!

Back to School

We have been so busy getting so little done lately. Sometimes that’s how things seem to go. There is a lot that needs to be done, and there is a lot that we are doing. But does it feel like we are getting caught up? No. I guess that’s just the way things go.

We got the girls registered for their respective schools yesterday. Our youngest has not been in public school before, and the oldest has not been in for the last five years or so. Hopefully this is a good choice for them. We got them into a district next to our catchment area where the classes will be smaller and they should have the opportunity to know everyone well, and for their teachers to give them the attention they should be getting in an educational setting.

So that is the close of an era for me. I have had a kid at home for homeschooling every year since 2006. Seventeen years! Now, at 52, I have to get things together and figure out what I want to be when I grow up. I have till a week from next Monday.

Also yesterday, I went out to check the feed in the chicken coop, and saw there was a dead peachick on the floor. The mamma bird was not sitting on eggs anymore by the door. Why she had to nest right in front of the door escapes me. I saw her in the back corner of the run, and walked over. Every bird scattered but her. She stayed sat. I hated to do it, but I got her to get up and reveal a day-old chick. The other appeared to be three or four days old, at least. So, to prevent another loss, I gathered the chick and took it into the house where we set up a box and put it in for the night. It will have to be caged separately to prevent it being run down like the other one appeared to have been. I can see it going out again in a couple of months, when it is big enough to stand up to a flock of chickens. It only needs to be as big as a hen. The hens usually don’t bother with the peafowl the way they will do bullying another chicken. As much as I hated to separate the mother and chick, there is no better way.

My latest shop project has been a simple one. I have assembled a stitch pony so I can do some leatherworking at the work bench. It is a simple one, designed to clamp under the force of the bench vise. All I have left to do is get some tacks and put some leather pads into the jaws of the pony, then I can use it freely.

The tractor is running low on hydraulic fluid. It has a leak in one of the pistons on the loader. Honestly, it is a little depressing. Who wants to have to put it in for service. How long will they keep it for? But at least I know why the bucket has been drooping or reacting a little slow, I think. I think I know. I don’t know for sure, but when I tightened the hose to the piston, it acted a bit better. It just continues to leak, and I think I may be a bit tight on the crush washer and want to have a tech service it correctly. Maybe they can do it onsite. Or maybe they can just take the loader, if they have to. Then I can continue to use the rest of the tractor here for some jobs. I think I am a bit spoiled having had that tractor to do my heavy lifting for me!

Well, it is nearly 3AM, and I need to get back to sleep. Or at least try.

We Lost a Calf

I had a farrier by last night to look at the hooves of our mare, which have not been done for far too long. just before he arrived, I noticed that one of the calves was lying about looking like he wanted to die. With the gent on his way, I could not address it then, and had to get prepare the horse for her appointment. Once the farrier finished with her, I went right back over to where the calf was and took to dealing with him. There was nothing I could do. I went in to tell Missus that the calf looked like he was on his way out, and by the time I got back, he was gone. I have no idea what did it. I expected one to die before we got them raised. That is just my luck and skill with them. But I did not really expect it to be this one, and so soon.

That was bad news.

The good news was having the tractor to deal with it. I chained his leg and pulled him down the alleyway to the main part of the pen, and then bucket loaded him and carried him across to the field and let him out near the swale at the bottom. He is far from anyone and will no doubt decay in the springtime. It was a snap do sort it out, and I really enjoyed having the cab on to keep warm while at it. It also helped to partition me from the gruesome factor.

That was the good news.

I picked up the cutting edge for the bucket, and the bracket to put on the SMV sign at the rear of the tractor. I am finally legal! I mounted that on tonight and feel a lot better about getting on the road with the machine. Mind, I don’t have to drive it far to get to the pasture. But it’d be my luck I would get the attention of the police in that little stretch. And now I don’t have to remember to put on the hazard lights every time, though I probably still will.

Our forecast for the next week is cold, but dry. Perhaps I can get some things done! I have the pallet forks on so I can take things out of the granary, and put some other things back in. It’s not that I can reach in with them, but I don’t have to carry things across the yard.

I have been getting the parts needed to put in the outlet for the welder on my panel in the garage. There is a bit more to it than there would be with a regular breaker. It has been unexpected, as I have not done this type before. So, I am learning. I think I have everything I need to finish it maybe tomorrow.

Last Day of Summer

I received a report this morning that the last of the chickens in the goat pen is dead due to raccoon. I really liked that chicken, and am sad to know it. I will be out in a bit to feed the animals, and I’ll clean it up then.

I bought animal feed yesterday, with hopefully enough to get through October, apart from hay, which I won’t need for about three weeks or so from now. If so, this will be the cheapest month on record for us for years, ringing in at just under $100. With only two pigs left, and the animals still on the field, the cost is low for the moment, and will be till around November, when I need to get the livestock off the field and start feeding them hay.

With costs low for the moment, I am taking advantage of it and tooling up the workshop to be able to do some wood projects. I started last night making a drawer, complete with dovetail joints. There are a couple more tools coming to help me finish it. Starting it has helped me figure out what I still need, and what is hard to work with, and what will be easier. I want to be able to build a dresser by hand before say, November? Not that I need one. I want to be able to do it. I am really enjoying the hand tool odyssey. It is far less violent than power tools, and it is a lot quieter. It is helpful to make mistakes at a much slower pace, too. I buggered up my first dovetail, and fixed it because I did not want to redo all the other ones as well as it. All good lessons.

The drawer I am making will probably be used in the kitchen where we will soon be putting in a new oven, and I will reset the microwave box above it, leaving a space for a drawer above, below, or between them, which I figure will be great for holding the hot mitts and such, handy for the cooking appliances! There may be enough space when finalized for a second drawer, too, which might be good for stirring utensils and such. I will know for sure when Home Depot bothers to send me a notification to tell me the oven is in.

It was cold again this morning. We bottomed out at 28 degrees! And no, that is not Celsius! I have a fire going in the wood stove, and it is clear that it is time to replace the gasket around the door! I should probably pick that up when I am getting the oven and the wood to finish around it.

Autumn begins tomorrow at 1:20 PM. It is time to get serious about getting the firewood cut and stacked! Lucky I got dry wood in the spring when I was hunting it. It will be ready and fine to burn in a few weeks when we are really needing it to stay warm. The propane tank was filled yesterday. That was a costly thig to do! They charged over $400 for it! We only have a 360 gallon tank! Still, I would like to get both furnaces serviced this year, and running. That would probably be good for time to sell the house!

Bye Big Pig

Big Pig was dead in her pen this morning. She is going to be missed quite a lot around here. She was a big, 400 pound puppy, loveable and trusting. She leaves a letteral and figurative hole in our farm, and we will never be the same without her.

Make It Five

The little sickie of the half dozen chicks we bought today was lay down and breathing hard when I went out to check on it. I held it and tried to see if some water and feed would help it along, but to no avail. It finally looked up at me and its leg stretched out, and its eyes lost their life. It was so small, it only took about five minutes for the rigor to set in, and I was sure then that had definitely passed.

Silver Laced Polish chicks resting in their brooder.

It is sad to have such a frail little life go right in the hand like that. I had hoped for these chicks to be pets. I was hopeful it would recover and live out a long life here, but alas, it was not to be.

So we will carry on with the five which remain, all seeming quite energetic and strong. I had predicted this one would die while we were on the way home with it. But the others give no sign they are on such a path. They appear well. The one that died bent its neck back a couple of times before it went. I don’t think it was a sign of rye neck, but it may have been, so I will be watching the others for symptoms of it.

Our Brooder in right in the egg layers coop, along with peacocks and a Chucker Partridge.
The Chucker Partridge.
One of the Peacocks and a Cayuga duck in the chicken run in the background.

Farm Kids Amaze Me

I grew up living the city life. Roadkill was something one would call the city to remove, unless one was brave, and in posession of a shovel, or the animal was a beloved pet.

Our second son came by today to pick up his son from a night over. As I walked him, his wife, and their son out to their car, he noticed that one of our cats had been hit by a car across the street. Damn! Second one this week! I said I’d get my pitchfork since I knew it was close, and my twelve year old daughter said she would go check which cat it was. I got the fork, turned around, and saw a look of absolute horror on our son’s face.

My twelve year old daughter prodded the cat with her hand, then picked it up and casually took it to the garbage bin and tossed it in. Son’s wife says, “She is badass.”

Yes. Yes she is.