The Surveillance State

To say I don't like modernity is an understatement.  Oh, for sure I like the ease and efficiency that certain technological advancements have afforded us, but I wonder if it's all worth it for what you lose.  I don't think it is worth it at all.  I don't like the fact that information about us is being gathered and sold.  If you google search a product or ask a question, pop up ads appear on your computer and phone.  If you talk about something, your phone is listening and you will receive ads for the topic of your conversation.  It is really just too much!  The genie, it appears, is out of the bottle, and I don't see any way of getting her back in.

But now I am going to contradict myself.  With the predation we've seen on our chicken flock, it is high time to get Belle, our Great Pyrenees guardian dog out protecting her charge.  Our problem is that Great Pyrenees LOVE to roam.  They don't stay where you want them to stay.  Highway 26 is just east of us and it is a very busy road.  Belle has gone across the road, and I don't think she understands the danger.

For that reason, we have a collar on her with a long tie-out cable to keep her from roaming.  We allow her to roam supervised each day and take her on walks with a lead rope.  But like us, she desires FREEDOM!  We looked into some GPS collars, but they are doggone (pardon the pun) expensive.  Finally we settled on one that allows you to set a radius.  It is not the Cadillac of dog collars.  It is more the Nissan Sentra.  This one costs $99.  We worked on setting it up, playing with the dimensions of the zone and calibrating the center.  This took some trial and error and walking around, holding the collar, listening for the buzzing.

The way it works is that you charge up this collar.  It will hold a charge for 12 hours.  Belle roams free, but when she gets to the edge of the boundary, the collar beeps, vibrates, and administers a shock.  Now, I know that may sound cruel, but if it works it is less cruel than being on a tie-out or running the risk of getting hit by a car.  The beeping, vibrating, shocking is designed to keep Belle within a big range of acceptable roaming.  At least that is the idea.  It has a 90 day money-back guarantee return policy.

We have been trying it out as time allows.  We put the collar on:

It takes a minute or two for the collar to link up and find the GPS coordinates.

The flashing light lets you know it is linked up and ready.  Time to test out the fence without a fence.  A virtual fence, you might say.

And then...  You let her go.  Belle immediately ran around like she always does.  We watched her as she went way out into the pasture and noticed that when she got near the set boundary, she acted funny, no doubt noticing the buzzing.  She changed directions and walked back into the safe zone.  For the rest of the day she wandered around... FREE!

At one point I went looking for her as I couldn't find her in the pasture, but I soon found her.  Can you see her hiding place?

She has a nice hole that she has dug under a log.  We call her the "log dog."  It's a good spot.  If I was a dog, I think I'd hang out there as well.

No sir, I am not breaking any laws that I know of, but I don't like being tracked, surveilled, spied on, controlled, or watched.  But if this thing works, it will be a win-win for Belle.  I will admit that a part of me thought this collar would have been great to put on the kids when they were teenagers.  Just joking, of course.  Or am I?

We sing an old hymn at church called "Come Thy Fount of Every Blessing."  It was written before the Revolutionary War.  I thought of the words to the third verse, as I was watching Belle with her new GPS collar:

O to grace how great a debtor

daily I’m constrained to be!

Let that grace now, like a fetter,

bind my wandering heart to thee.

Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,

prone to leave the God I love;

here’s my heart; O take and seal it;

seal it for thy courts above.

We are all prone to wander, aren't we?  We're different than the animal kingdom, though.  We have a soul and we have free will.  While we have a sinful nature that we constantly battle with, if we are believers, the Holy Spirit prompts us and convicts us, (much like Belle's collar) to remind us to stay within a boundary that would bring glory to God.  Because we have free will, we can ignore the conviction and do things our own way.  In so doing, like Belle, we put ourselves in danger.  

We will continue to test out the collar on Belle.  She did great the first full day.  Like me, she's prone to wander.  May the Good Lord take care of us both!  If it works, Belle can take care of our flock.

33 Years!

On October 20, 1990 my bride and I were wed in Corpus Christi, Texas.  It seems like such a long time ago.  We were both 24 years old.  We had no idea of what lay before us - both the good and the bad.  We just knew we loved each other and that was enough.  33 years later and here we are - still happily married.  

We're simple people and decided that we would do what we did two years ago.  I took a Friday off and we drove to Lafayette.  It's a 40 minute drive east on Interstate 10.  It was a gorgeous day.  We stopped at CC's Coffee and had coffee and lunch and a scone.  Then, I went shopping at Marshall's with Tricia.  She rarely is able to get me in a (clothing) store, but she did it.  We went to Natural Grocers for some specialty items we can't get in Jennings and then...

We did our new anniversary custom.  We went to Fresh Market and picked out some delicious gourmet picnic items to put in our "Dorothy from Wizard of Oz picnic basket" and went to a nice park in Lafayette called Moncus Park where we laid out a blanket and relaxed.

We visited and slowly ate while soaking in the sun and watching the ripples in the pond.

Tricia had picked out the dessert that we got last time.  It is called a Tuxedo Napoleon Cake.  We split it in half and watched it quickly disappear.

Russ was staying with Benjamin while we celebrated, so we wanted to get home before too long, so we packed up our belongings and walked back to the car.

After 33 years, a lot of things in our world has changed, but my love for this woman has not.  I love you, Tricia!

Update on Benjamin - 10/26/2023

Thumbs Up!

Our family wants to thank you for your faithful prayers!  The patient, Benjamin, continues to improve.  On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday he goes to outpatient rehabilitation locally.  We know the physical therapist and feel like our guy is heading in the right direction.  On his "off" days, he works from home, doing everything he's learned to do to continue to get better.  He's not load-bearing on his right leg until November 14th, but he IS able to stand on his walker and walk (sort of hop) around on his left leg.  Several times a day he gets out of his wheelchair and makes several laps around the den.  He sits out on the patio in the sunshine for an hour or so in the afternoon to get some Vitamin D.  We are loading him up with protein, fruit juices and a plethora of supplements to aid in healing.

His right foot, through hard work, has finally gotten to the 90 degree angle.  That will be beneficial when load-bearing and able to begin trying to walk.  He was fitted out with a new apparatus that he wears 2 hours a day.  It is a vest that somehow electrically stimulates bone growth to speed fusion/healing in his spine.

It has been about a week since he has had any kind of sleeping pill to assist in sleep.  It has been weeks and weeks since he's had any pain medication.  He is still on neurontin (gabapentin) for nerve pain.  If he tries to get off of that, he has lots of nerve pain in his right leg and foot.  Strength in his right (dominant) hand is half that of his left hand and there is still numbness/tingling in his right foot, thigh, right fingers up to his elbow and left forearm.  All those are prayer concerns, without a doubt.

His employment is another.  Benjamin talked to his boss.  She has gotten approval from HR for him to begin part time work whenever he is released by his doctor.  Originally, the doctor had said RTW was sometime after the first of the year.  With the news from his boss, he called his doctor and the doctor will be flexible.  Benjamin's goal is to continue to work hard.  He has an appointment with his neurosurgeon and another with his orthopedic surgeon in early December.  Benjamin has proposed to his boss that he could try to return to work on December 6th, but has not heard back from her yet.  That is a good goal to work toward.

As I survey where we are today versus where we were seven and a half weeks ago, well, I get a little choked up thinking about it.  God is indeed our refuge and strength.  The third verse in the old hymn, "Great is Thy Faithfulness" says it best.  No matter what besets us, He gives us strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow:

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth,

Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide,

Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow—

Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!

Great is Thy faithfulness!

Great is Thy faithfulness!

Morning by morning new mercies I see:

All I have needed Thy hand hath provided—

Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

Will They Survive The Winter?

We recently re-watched one of my favorite movies, Gladiator.  There are numerous quotes in that movie that are inspiring and motivational.  In the beginning scene of the movie, Maximus is victorious in battle and is having a sober discussion with the emperor regarding the emperor's health, his legacy, and the future of Rome.  Here is an excerpt from that talk:

Maximus: They fought for you and for Rome.

Marcus Aurelius: And what is Rome, Maximus?

Maximus: I’ve seen much of the rest of the world. It is brutal and cruel and dark, Rome is the light.

Marcus Aurelius: Yet you have never been there. You have not seen what it has become. I am dying, Maximus. When a man sees his end… he wants to know there was some purpose to his life. How will the world speak my name in years to come? Will I be known as the philosopher? The warrior? The tyrant…? Or will I be the emperor who gave Rome back her true self? There was once a dream that was Rome. You could only whisper it. Anything more than a whisper and it would vanish… it was so fragile. And I fear that it will not survive the winter.

Dramatic?  Yes.  Sometimes in our pasture, it can be brutal and cruel and dark, too.  There can be epic battles and bloodshed that can leave bodies strewn across the landscape in macabre fashion.  I'm getting ahead of myself.

I came in from work and Tricia said, "It was a bad day on the farm."  "Oh? I said, "tell me about it."  She explained a harrowing melee that took place out back in the pasture that morning.  I walked out over the "coliseum" where the murderous rampage took place.  

Feathers filled the ground as the wind gently blew them.

A ghoulish massacre had taken place!  It wasn't just feathers.  Why, body parts and other detritus littered our once happy, pastoral land.  

Oh, woe is me!  Whoever did this - a pox on your house!  The deceased that fell on that rueful day include a rooster and three laying hens.  The slain were gathered and placed ceremoniously in the compost pile in the garden where they were mourned and then covered with wood chips.

Who did this and what shall be done?  We thought Ricky Raccoon had been dealt with.  Tricia explained the battle.  A dog with no collar had come underneath the perimeter fence and onto the property.  Bloodlust led the canine to commit wanton murder upon our flock of feckless fowl.  Tricia let Belle loose to chase the dog off of the property, but not before four fowl fell in foul fashion.  

But how did this happen?  Border security had let us down.  The strong fence that had once protected us had fallen into disrepair.  Fences DO work!  But our fence over time had rusted out at the bottom, leaving us vulnerable and unprotected.  The thick wire the anchors the fence rusted, allowing a foreign invader to shimmy right underneath.  Innocent lives were lost.  The rightful inhabitants of the land must be protected or we are poor stewards and not worthy of our position.  

But we learn and move forward.  We repair the breaches.  To work we go.  The rest of the fence is still good.  It's just the bottom wire.  I'll try to replace the bottom wire, so to speak, by replacing it with some barbed wire.  I wrapped the wire around the corner post and stapled it.  Then I got my come-along and a chain and pulled the barbed wire tighter than a Victorian corset.

Then I used wire to wrap the barbed wire into the bottom of the existing hog-wire fence.  That lifted the bottom of the fence off the ground a little, exposing an inch or two of space between the ground and the bottom of the fence, so I'll come back and stake it down between t-posts.  That patch job should keep marauding murderous hordes off the farm.

"Are you not entertained?" Maximus might say.  Hopefully with the integrity of the fence restored, perhaps the remaining twenty-something odd hens might survive the winter.  The jury is still out on the republic.

The Masked Bandit

I'm tell you what.  Our flock of chickens is dwindling.  Tricia counted the birds the other day when she was feeding them and only counted 26.  It is very hard to count them.  They won't stand still when you're counting!  That's not counting the ones that are in the chicken tractor in the back yard.  I counted 32 of them a couple of months ago.  It wasn't that long ago that we had more than double that.  Some died of old age, but many are killed by predators - hawks, possums, minks, owls, raccoons.

In the past it would upset me, but it is just part of having chickens.  You do the very best you can to protect them.  That's all you can do.  I routinely have traps set along the back fence baited up with dog food.  I've caught more possums than you could shake a stick at.  I've even caught the neighbor's cat, which I promptly let loose.  But one morning last week, I caught a critter I had never caught before.

Ricky Raccoon.  He was a young one, but this dude was old enough to be scoping out the flock and plotting to further reduce its size.  He made a fatal mistake, stumbling into the trap.  He's a cute fellow, but he had to be dispatched.  It costs a lot of money to raise a hen to laying size.  Plus, eggs are expensive.  Once the hens are laying eggs, it is quite a loss of revenue and food for the table to have Ricky Raccoon kill them.  This time, the predator became the prey.

I was listening to a very interesting series on Davy Crockett.  As I looked at the coon, I thought seriously about skinning him out and trying to make a coonskin cap like Davy Crockett.  Trouble is, I have a lot of things I need to catch up on.  I'm researching to see if it is worth the time and money to purchase the materials to do my own chimney-sweeping on top of everything else.  Coonskin cap making just didn't fit into the to do list.  I did get the tail, though.  I'll tie it around a walking stick, maybe.  Or put it on the antenna of the truck.  That would add some panache to my travels.

I've got a long history with the masked bandit, Ricky Raccoon.  When I was crawfishing, these bandits would go through my ponds at night and wreak havoc.  They would reach their little hands in the trap, pull out a crawfish, eat the meat in the tail and put the head back in the trap!  The next day I would run my traps and there would be rows with nothing but crawfish heads in them.  Worse than that, they would turn the traps over.  I wouldn't be able to see the traps and inevitably would run over the trap.  Each trap cost $8.75.  Those coons cost me some money.

Pretty soon, I'd had enough.  I would get my Marlin .22 lever action rifle and walk to the woods near the pond.  I figured that the coons would be hiding out there.  Sure enough, I had some minor success when they would climb a tree, full from their night's crawfish platter, and fall asleep in the crook of an oak.  I was able to shoot one or two down.  They are very hard, however, to catch in traps.  They are smart rascals.  I caught a couple in a "bear" trap.  They are curious.  Someone told me that shiny things attract them.  I wrapped aluminum foil around the 'trigger' of the trap.  They saw the shiny stuff, reached their hand to touch it and SNAP!  Curiosity killed the cat raccoon.  You have to act fast, though.  Raccoons will chew their foot off to get out of the trap.

All in all, it is hard trying to raise animals in the midst of predators.  Predators have to eat, too.  I get it.  I just don't want them eating our laying hens.  

Sorry for the Silence

I'll be back with a post Monday night!  All is well. 

Long-lingering Effects of the Drought

The Drought of 2023.  I still think about it even though we got 2.6 inches of rainfall in September.  That helped, but the signs of the lack of rain are everywhere.  I think we lost two magnolia trees and azaleas and other landscaping.  The production in the garden took a big hit.  Our water bills were a lot higher than normal just trying to keep a few things alive.  Some of the things that lived, like our sweet potatoes are stunted.  Normally we would have harvested by now, but I'm going to let them continue growing until the first frost kills them.  Then I'll dig them up.

Enough belly-aching, though.  All in all, things are good.  Our friends to the north and west saw massive forest fires that swept through and burned 30,000 acres of southern yellow pine.  That put a hurting on the timber industry.  Just the other day I drove between DeQuincy and Merryville and observed the burned timber.

The wind pushed the wildfires through acres and acres.  People scrambled to plow fire breaks to stop or slow the fires.  In some areas it helped.  In others, not so much.  I wonder if that timber was covered by some sort of crop insurance?  

As far as the eye can see, things are burned up.  

We weren't affected by forest fires near where we live, but the biggest issue we have plaguing us is the lack of grass.  The lack of rain meant the grass didn't grow.  If the grass doesn't grow, you can't make hay.  If you are grazing cows, goats and chickens on just a few acres like we are, you depend on hay to make it through the winter.  Fortunately, we have 75 square bales up in the loft.  

Unfortunately, we had to start feeding hay in August.  Normally, we don't begin haying the cows until around Thanksgiving.  We supplement with round bales and the animals will normally eat up a round bale in a week.  I called up the friend that sells us the round bales and he said he still has some to sell and will deliver 10 bales to us.  That was a relief.  I think hay will be in short supply this winter and I hope we can make the hay last.  Although, not for us, I noticed the fellow that purchased the land across from us was making hay last week.  You can see his baler going in the background while I had the cows out eating in the front yard.

Once he finished baling and the sun was starting to set, I walked over to look at the bales of hay.

He had stacked them up in long, straight rows.  The grass was trimmed neatly across the field.  Everything was neat and tidy.  The hay smelled nice and you could sense autumn in the air.  The sun was setting and a haze was drifting across the landscape.

As I looked over the hay bales, it brought back memories of being a kid and I had a hankering to do what we used to do - jump up on top of the bales and run across the top of them all the way down!

Fall Garden Progress

Due to the summer-long drought and then Benjamin's accident in which we lost all of September, we didn't thing we would be able to get a Fall Garden in this year.  Well, we got it done.  There was one crop we didn't get planted in time.  Potatoes.  It was just too late to plant them.  Everything else was planted by the fall deadline.  As of right now, there's only one additional thing I'll plant.  Turnips.  I don't like turnips, but I like turnip greens.  Nothing goes to waste, though.  The cows love turnips.  I eat the greens and I cube up the turnips and feed them to the cows.

Last year we got an early hard freeze that wiped out a lot of our seedlings like carrots and beets.  That's why it is so important to get the plants up and growing.  Let's check in on a few of them.  Here's a small bed of Red Romaine Lettuce:

And here is some Black Seeded Simpson leaf lettuce.  We like lots of salads, even in the cooler temperatures.  It gets hot so fast in the spring that the lettuce bolts to flower and gets bitter.  In the fall we can grow all we can eat and give away.

This is a miracle tomato. I don't know what the variety is, but somehow this tomato plant came up volunteer from seed and made it through the drought.  I noticed it and would give it water.  It has flourished like a champ.  It stands about 3 feet tall right now and has a tomato on it and lots of blooms.

Here is some Russian Red Kale.  I also planted some Siberian Kale that is just starting to come up in the next row.

I have three varieties of carrots that are popping up.  They are slow to germinate, but when they come, they really come.  I'll have to thin them out once they get a little bigger.  I've got orange carrots, purple carrots, and red carrots.

The two rows of snap beans ought to be blooming soon.  We have Contenders, Romas, and Purple Teepee beans.  Just to the left of those rows are three varieties of beets: Detroit Red, Bull's Blood, and Chioggia beets.  To the right are two varieties of Sweet Potatoes: Golden Wonder and Beauregard.  I normally harvest those in October, but I think I'll wait until December (or the first frost) to harvest them as they didn't grow a bit during the drought.

On the trellis where the spring cucumbers grew, I have Sugar Snap peas growing.

They'll climb up the trellis, clinging tightly by their tendrils to the panels that they climb on.

We also have garlic, kohlrabi, brussel sprouts, buckwheat, two varieties of spinach (Galilee & Monstrieu de Viloflay), and finally, radishes.  I did plant some parsley from some seed I saved, but I think the germination is bad.  I'll have to buy some plants.

We also planted broccoli, cabbage and cauliflower from seed.  As soon as they get a little bigger, I'll transplant into the garden.  The okra is still producing as is the eggplant and peppers.  As soon as all that plays out, I'll plant something else in their place, even if it's only a cover crop.  So happy to be able to get the garden in!

Bayou Beekeepers

On the second Thursday of every month, the Bayou Beekeepers Club meets at a local diner in Jennings called Green's Café.  From 6 to 7 pm we order food.  I generally get fried shrimp or catfish, but this week I had a homemade burger and a root beer.  While we eat, we visit with other beekeepers.  It's usually between 15 and 25 people in attendance.  At 7 pm, the meeting is called to order.  We all rise, and with Old Glory in the corner, we place our hands over our hearts and recite the Pledge of Allegiance.  Then the meeting is opened with prayer.

There are always commercial beekeepers as well as homesteaders and hobbyists in attendance.  The meeting begins with general topics and questions and answers.  We talk about what's going on right now and what you should be doing in your beehives.  Lots of advice is given and people freely talk about what works for them and, also, what doesn't work for them.  We ALWAYS learn something.

Let me tell you a simple, but effective thing we learned at the meeting.  As mentioned in a post back in August, our bees have been making a beeline for the rain barrel on our patio.  They drink the water and bring it back to the hive where they arrive and give the water to the house bees who then spit it on the comb, turn around, and use their wings to 'air condition' the colony via evaporative cooling.  Amazing!

One problem with the bees' air conditioning, however.  Bees aren't proficient swimmers.  They inevitably fall in the water in the process of drinking water and drown.  We go out and rescue them when we see them, but we can't save 'em all.  Numerous bees drown.  The life cycle of a bee is 45 days.  Each bee lost could be making honey, building comb, and doing all the work that busy bees like to do and it takes time for the queen to make replacement bees.  We hate to see them die.

We learned a simple, and cheap, trick at the meeting that alleviates the drowning bee problem.  Simply get pine straw and throw a light layer on top of the water like this:

The honeybees still fly in, crawl down, and drink water.

But if they fall in, now there is a life preserver of sorts for them.  They simply climb atop the pine straw, drink their water and go on about their business.

At the meeting this week, there was a presentation on making candles with the beeswax accumulated while pulling honey.  It was very interesting, showing us how to "wash" the wax, melt it and pour it into molds, keeping the wick in the middle of the candle.  They also talked about making lip balm and chap stick with beeswax.

Always at the end there are door prizes that consist of bee-related items or homesteading gifts.  At this meeting, Tricia won an uncapping fork to use during honey extraction.  We enjoy the Bayou Beekeeping Club.  There's plenty of helpful, friendly folks that are excited about sharing information they've learned over the years.

An Update on Benjamin (After Orthopedic Surgeon Visit)

This morning at 9:45 am Benjamin had a visit with his orthopedic surgeon in Lafayette.  This was an important visit as we were praying for a good report and one that would result in him telling us that Benjamin could now be 'load-bearing' on his right foot.  With that news, he could begin immediately to learn to walk again, and that would mark another milestone and move forward in his recovery.

It was not to be.  As much as we wanted, the surgeon reported that there was bone loss and the tibia is a slow healing bone.  He wants Benjamin to remain off of the RT leg until November 13th.  He instructed us to give him Vitamin D and plenty of protein to encourage healing.  The x-rays show all the hardware in his right lower leg and ankle.  This is the first time we'd seen x-rays of the work done on his legs.

The surgeon mentioned that there is a 50-50 chance that things will heal without resorting to other measures, such as bone-growth stimulation and additional surgery.  He did give Benjamin a boot to wear on the right foot that encourages the foot to be pulled up at a right angle.  He also wrote new physical therapy orders.  Benjamin will continue out-patient rehab three times a week.

So it wasn't exactly the news that we were praying for.  I would not be truthful with you if I told you we weren't disappointed.  However, we progress forward.  We continue to work hard in rehab and doing everything we can to heal.  We remain optimistic and continue praying and having faith that our Lord will answer our prayers in His time.  On a good note, his incisions/scarring has healed remarkably well.  He has also been told by the surgeon that he is now able to put weight on his left foot, not merely using it to pivot.  That is a move in the right direction.  We also don't lose sight of the fact that he is alive, he is not brain-injured, and he is not paralyzed.  To God be the Glory!

Continued specific prayer requests:

1. Healing of the bones in the right lower leg,

2. A return of feeling and strength in his right (dominant) hand,

3. A diminishment in the nerve pain in his right foot, along with return of feeling.

Thank you all for your concern, your prayers, and your friendship!

One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

Have you ever felt like no matter what you do, you feel like you're going backwards?  When you find yourself in that place, sometimes it's best to have a 'glass half full' approach and look at things from a positive perspective.  Sometimes going backwards has benefits.  But other times, by sheer will, you have to say, "I'm not going backwards any more!"  Today I have a story for you that illustrates this.  

Back in 2001 I had a pickup truck.  It was the pickup truck of my dreams.  I loved that truck!  I purchased it used from a gentleman that ran the Texaco bulk plant in my hometown.  It was a 1995 GMC 4x4 with dual exhausts.  The old gal sounded great when you'd rev her up.  It was (to me anyway) a good looking truck and it had all the power I needed to get the work done.  I was farming and I transported many tons of crawfish to market in that old truck.  One bad thing about it was the gas mileage.  I got around 12 miles to the gallon.  The farm was 30 miles away from home so I spent a lot of money filling up this thirsty truck.  She looked very much like this:

Image Credit

Farming was tough.  I absolutely LOVED farming, but it was very hard to make ends meet.  The price that you could get for your rice and the cost of inputs to grow it were inversely proportional.  When you needed rain, it didn't come and when you needed it to dry up, it would rain every day.  I tried to diversify with crawfish and the price of crawfish would drop.  Seems like you couldn't win for losing!  

Long about that time, my beloved pickup truck started acting up.  The transmission would slip.  It would make funny noises.  I was hoping for an easy fix, but there was plenty of transmission fluid in the transmission.  Pro Tip: I learned that if you ignore things like this, the problem just doesn't go away. 

Pretty soon, I could not go into reverse.  Oh, I could shift it into "R," but it did absolutely nothing.  I drove it to a transmission shop and they diagnosed the problem - my truck had a burnt reverse band in the transmission.  I would need a new transmission.  The cost of a new one was $1,800.  That's a lot of rice and crawfish>  Needless to say, I had sticker shock.  I needed to think about it.  I didn't want to make a hasty decision.

I drove off and thought about it.  My first thought was this:  "I'm still driving, aren't I?  Who needs reverse anyway?"  My wife will attest to the fact that I can be pretty hard-headed at times.  This was one of those times.  My mind was made.  I drove that pickup truck every single day for the next 6 months with no reverse while I saved money to fund a the purchase of a transmission!  Seriously.

Driving Ol' Whitey became like a game or a puzzle and required fore-thought and planning at all times.  No more flying by the seat of your pants.  Every driving decision had to be made with keen mental acuity.  I no longer parked in the garage.  That wouldn't do.  I parked on the horseshoe drive.  When shopping, I never pulled up to the parking bumpers.  I always parked far out in the parking lot where I could just drive forward, make a loop, and head out.  Driving became a strategic exercise.

I only got myself in trouble one or two times when I either forgot about my truck's disability or someone pulled in front of me and left me no means of egress.  But that was not a problem without a solution.  I merely cranked the truck, put it in neutral, jumped out and pushed the truck backwards enough to allow me to turn around, and boom - I was good to go.  I smile when I look backward at the time when I couldn't drive that way!

"Never look back unless you're planning to go that way." - Henry David Thoreau

  

Fall At Last

September 23 marked the first day of Fall, but as that day came and went, it sure didn't feel like Fall.  It didn't feel like Fall two weeks after that date.  But on October 7th, we woke up to a north breeze blowing.  You can see the little garden flag by the live oak tree whipping in the wind. This morning, we had a low temperature of 58 and as far out as I can see in the forecast, I see no more 90 degree weather.  Hallelujah!

The heat was stifling this summer, but more than that, the drought really took its toll on us and the animals as well.  This drought decimated the grass in the yard.  It is starting to come back now after the 1 1/4 inch rainfall we were beneficiaries of last week.  I fear, though, that we lost two azaleas, two magnolia trees, and most of the monkey grass in the landscaping.  The lack of rainfall also meant that there's no grass in the pasture.  We've had to resort to feeding hay WAYYYY earlier than we normally do.  The condition of the cows and goats is poor going into the winter compared to other years. 

But Fall is here.  We can rejoice in that.  The live oak trees have produced a bumper crop of acorns and they are falling all over the ground.

This afternoon I watched two fox squirrels jump from tree to tree, with their bushy tails flashing in the wind.  They're no-doubt fat on this diet of acorns.  Squirrel season opened Oct 7th and runs through Feb 29th.  There's a daily bag limit of 8.  I think I could sit in the front yard with my 12 gauge and thin out the population.  I'll put some in the freezer for sure.

Because the grass is non-existent in the pasture, I've been stringing up the temporary electric fencing powered by the solar charger and rotating the cows through the yard again.  The crazy thing is, I only mowed the yard (by machine) two times this year!  That's good on the gas bill, but I'll need to crank it and run it.  Pretty soon the pecan trees will drop their leaves and it will be time to pick up pecans.

Now that it has rained, I've been working hard to get the Fall garden planted.  I'll show the progress in a future posting.  October 1 marks the date that you can plant garlic in our zone.  I ordered some and it came in the mail.

I opened the bag.  We're hoping to have a good crop.  I had given up on garlic as the past several times we planted it, we had large harvests, but it was hot and humid and the garlic wouldn't cure.  It all got soft and rotted - even though we had it on racks drying by a fan.  This year I decided we'd give it another shot.

I broke the cloves up into individual pieces.

In the garden, I pulled back the wood chip mulch away, exposing the soil and then gently worked the soil with a garden hoe.  It worked up nicely.  I used a planting knife to dig 2" holes and planted the garlic (root side down) in the hole.  I spaced them 4-6 inches apart and watered them in.  When they sprout, I'll mulch around them.

Fall is nice time of year.  The mosquitoes are still pretty bad, but the mosquito plane was flying tonight.  Hopefully, that will diminish the population.  Looking forward to cooler temps!

The Headless Hen

 

"That's it. I've had it with this dump! We've got no food, we got no jobs,... our pets' HEADS ARE FALLIN' OFF!!!"  Quote from the movie Dumb and Dumber

Why am I thinking about a quote from Dumb and Dumber?  Well, I walked out to the barn this morning to do as we always do - morning chores.  It's always a pretty sight in the morning.  The sun is just coming up in the east and the sun's rays are filtering through the live oak and pecan trees, casting long shadows westward across the pasture.  I stopped to just soak in the view and stillness of the morning.  The roosters suddenly break the silence with loud crows that echo across the property.  Sometimes I feel like screaming in the morning, too, but not today.  It is a nice day.

But then, I notice that something isn't right.   Just to the west of the barn and south of the garden, I spot a Barred Rock hen.  She's laying down like chickens do when they are taking a dust bath.  Except, she's not taking a dust bath.  She's got no head.

Overnight, some critter killed her, leaving her body intact, but taking her head.  From past experience, I'm guessing that the predator is either a raccoon or an owl.  They are both notorious for this.  This was a big, fat hen.  You can see that dark yellow fat lining her breast on the just-killed carcass.  She was healthy and would have laid many more eggs for us.  But her egg-laying days are done.

Driving to church today, there was a huge raccoon dead on Louisiana Highway 26, not far, as the crow flies, from the pasture where the headless hen lays.  I hope the bandit that killed our hen is the one that's in the middle of the road.  An eye for an eye, as the Good Book says.  But if an owl is the culprit, and you'll remember that I posted a photo of a big barn owl in our front yard last month, then we've got big problems.  It is illegal to kill an owl.  What to do?  I did catch yet ANOTHER possum in my cage trap last night, but I don't think its possums that are doing the killing this time.

Well, that's where Belle, our livestock guardian dog, a Great Pyrenees, comes in. 

We've tried several times to let her free in the pasture to guard the cows, chickens and goats.  At first, she didn't quite understand her job description and would kill the chickens.  This wasn't working.  Then, when we think she had that worked out of her system, she'd jump over the perimeter fence and would roam all over the place.  There's several problems with that.  The neighbors aren't keen with the idea of a big dog roaming through their property.  Then, she doesn't understand the busy road.  She crosses it with reckless abandon.  We don't want her to get hit like the raccoon we talked about earlier.

I am going to start researching one of those collars that allows you to roam so many feet before a light shock is administered to hopefully keep her at home.  I'll report back with what I learn.  One way or another, we've got to solve our predation dilemma.