Hit And Run (Our Maker's Acres Edition)

Belle is our dog.  She's a good dog, no doubt.  Look at those eyes.  It's like she can do not wrong, right?

Wrong.  Having Belle is like owning a excavator or a backhoe, or a bulldozer that turns itself on by itself and digs up the property at will.  She's done this in the last few days:

What a mess!  That was after getting bored digging this.

She digs the holes and then we fill them.  She's recently dug up a bed full of lilies that encircled a pecan tree.  I don't know what we're going to do with her.  

But recently evidence of additional digging has been found that is not from Belle.  It appears to be damage from an armadillo.  Several weeks ago, Tricia and I ran around at night with a spot light and a rifle and killed an armadillo that was digging in the front yard.  But now another one?  It has dug some holes underneath the smoker and various other spots in the yard.  Not that we've ever been concerned with having a manicured lawn, but this is ridiculous between Belle and the armadillos.

Country living is great, but there's always another item to put on the to do list that probably most people don't have.  Anyhow, I made a mental note to add "Kill armadillo" on the to do list.  Friday morning started out like any other Friday morning.  I woke up, showered, poured coffee and headed out the door at 5:18 am.  I started the car and backed out of the garage, turned on the headlights, put the car in drive and began driving down the driveway.

That's when I spotted the perp.  There was a beady eyed armadillo about 10 yards in front of me on the driveway.  Like a madman, I gunned the motor and, with a wicked gleam in my eye, sped toward the armored villain.  I could hear the animal hit the underneath of my car, possibly the oil pan.  Then, I felt a pleasing "thwunck" noise as my back tire passed over the body of the offending animal.  Three hours later, I called Tricia to see if she could walk out in the yard and located the prey.  She found it!  I was successful in my hit & run event.

When I got home later, I was in charge of disposing of the remains.  Here is the flat dude right here.  His digging days are done.

An autopsy was not performed; I know how he died.  However, you can see those powerful claws he uses for digging.

I got a pitchfork and carried him across the road and pitched him into the middle of a field.  I didn't even give him a proper burial.  I will save my energy with the shovel for filling in the holes he dug.

Starting our Barn Expansion

We didn't exactly plan out the location of our barn in wise fashion when we built it ten years ago.  We didn't consider elevation and as you might imagine, we happened to build it on the lowest part of the property.  When it rains (and it rains a lot here), the mud is ankle deep and it is an absolute pain to walk out to the barn.  You can tell the cows are not happy about it either.  Goats don't like to get their feet wet, so you can be sure they hate all the mud around the barn. 

We are going to attack this problem in two ways.  First, we are going to build a 12 foot roof extension off of each side of our barn.  This will give 12 additional feet on either side of the barn for the cows, goats and chickens to get out of the weather.  We milk IN our barn and like to keep it clean.  We don't like to leave animals inside the barn after milking as they are NOT good housekeepers.

We are going to put four 4 x 4's exactly 10 feet out to allow for a 2 foot overhang.  The first thing you want to do is ensure that your building will be square.  We verified this by using the 3, 4, 5 method.  This method is used to find a 90 degree angle and is based off of the Pythagorean Theorem.  This simply states that if you create a triangle by measuring 3 feet out and 4 feet down, when you connect the long side of the triangle and is measures exactly 5 feet, you have a right angle.  ( I should have paid better attention in Geometry class!)

Therefore, we got stakes, string, and a tape measure and staked out where the posts are going to go.  Tricia helped me (as my strong point is NOT math) and we got things squared up and marked.  We marked where the corner posts will go as well as the ones in the middle.

Although I am not a math whiz, I am a PhD. In this case that stands for "post hole digger."  I began digging with the post hole digger until they were buried 2 feet deep in the ground.  My neighbor showed me once how to use a Sharpie and tape measure to put markings on the post hole digger so that you don't have to stop and put your tape measure down the hole to see how deep you are.  This a a good 'hack' that saves lots of time.

It didn't take long.  Once the posts were in the ground, I used a level to make sure it was true and then put cement in the hole to anchor it.  One by one, we got them done.

The real tricky part is keeping the posts true until the cement dries.  Cows love to scratch on posts and I didn't want them to scratch against the posts and knock them all out of whack.  We remedied this by locking the corral and leading the cows in one at a time.  By baby-sitting them like this, they don't have an opportunity to get into mischief.

Now that the posts are in on both sides of the barn, it is time to move forward to the next step.  That step is fastening a header to the barn.  That header will support the rafters.  We may be on hold, though, as more rain is forecast for tomorrow.    We will keep you posted on progress.

Big Boy Does Not Like the Dog Days of Summer

We never quite get acclimated to July and August in South Louisiana.  It is hot and humid and those are just the facts.  We deal with it as best we can, often asking each other, "When do you think the first cold front will blow through?"  While we can go inside in the nice air conditioning and sit under a fan to cool off, the animals don't have that luxury.  Big Boy, our Great Pyrenees dog, loathes the summer.  With his big furry coat, he is not exactly cut out for this climate.  Great Pyrenees dogs come from a mountainous region bordering Spain and France.  Needless to say, the climate is a bit different in our lowland, swampy locale.

Big boy, however, has ways of trying to stay cool that doesn't include air conditioners or fans.  He digs holes.  Did I say holes?  I meant to say craters.  Although he has plenty of shade in his hangout in 'the grove' underneath the trampoline, Big Boy still seeks cooler temps.  Where does he find it?  In the cool dirt, of course.  A freshly dug hole unearths soft dirt untouched by the summer sun and heat.  I know it is hot and don't really begrudge his excavations as I know it cools him off.  He's a dog.  A Hot Dog.

It's just that it s never just one hole.  You see, that dirt he lays in doesn't stay cool.  It warms up due to Big Boy's body heat and the ambient temperature.  This provokes him to dig another hole...  And another and another.  I've gotten to the point where I have placed cinder blocks, ladders, wagons and all sorts of items around the base of a tangerine tree so he doesn't dig around it, expose its roots, and kill it.  This eyesore of a random assortment of digging barriers I've laid out would get us kicked out of a subdivision, if we lived in one.

The constant digging has loosened dirt and this is causing erosion problems during big rains.  This has caused me to use cinder blocks to build a retaining wall to keep Big Boy's dirt from washing down the ditch during big rains.  This was a lot of work and I'd be lying if I told you that I didn't look over indignantly at Big Boy while installing the erosion-slowing wall.

I just wish Big Boy would listen to the wise words of Will Rogers, who once said,

"If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging."

Where in the World Did Big Boy Go?

Big Boy is our Great Pyrenees livestock guardian dog.  That is a misnomer because we found out the hard way that Big Boy liked to eat our chickens rather than protect them.  As a result, Big Boy now roams free outside of the pasture.  We have a large 30' cable that we clip him to from time to time as he has a penchant for roaming all over the countryside and neighbors bring him back.  Several times we've had to drive down the road and pick him up.

He still has all of his male (ahem) equipment, so I would assume that he is seeking lady friends, but he is a free spirit and likes to roam.  One day I was approached in my front yard by a neighbor who, as politely as he could, mentioned to me that Big Boy had marked his territory at his house by peeing on his chrome Harley Davidson motorcycle.  Being a free spirit can get you in trouble with the neighbors! But for all intents and purposes, he is a good dog.  He barks at strangers that drive up in the yard until he gets to know them.  He catches and kills possums and other varmints.  He is protective of us and I appreciate that.

He has some bad habits other than chicken killing, though.  Big Boy digs holes.  Big holes. Everywhere.  You would think that he would stick to one hole, but no, he doesn't.  He digs a crater, lays in it for a while, and then digs another crater elsewhere.  It drives me nuts.  When a good rain comes, all the loose dirt from his digging washes away, leaving us with an erosion problem.  In the photo below, you can see his replica of the Grand Canyon underneath the trampoline and to the right of the trampoline, in the center of the photo and then in the bottom left of the photo. When we walk out to milk the cows, we have to exercise caution to not fall in the holes and twist an ankle.

Big Boy's holes are exceedingly annoying to me, but we still like him.  He's almost like one of the family. We all have our warts and "issues," don't we?  Saturday morning when we all left for the livestock show in Lake Charles, we saw Big Boy laying in a fresh-dug hole in a new place.  I shook my head.

When we returned Saturday night, Big Boy was nowhere to be found.  I didn't think much of it.  He was probably out on "maneuvers."  But Sunday morning when he wasn't home, Tricia and I became concerned. Did he get hit by a car?  I didn't see a big white carcass anywhere in the road.  Did someone steal him?  Well, they'd return him once he commenced to digging up their yard.  When we got back home from church - still no Big Boy.  Although we didn't verbally express it, we were all worried.  It was quiet and different around the house without the big guy.  We were sad, but kept a stiff upper lip.

Sunday evening we were driving back from Evening Services at church.  Our church is about a mile away from our home.  I was driving and Tricia was in the passenger seat with Benjamin in the back.  Suddenly, Tricia yelled, "LOOK!  THERE'S BIG BOY!"  I'm not exaggerating when I tell you that I almost ran off the road.  She scared me with the yelling.  Sure enough, walking in the ditch on the west side of State Highway 26 was the big old white hole digger himself.  I honked the horn and he recognized us and quickened his pace.

We drove on home and got out of the car and clapped and called him.  Pretty soon he came trotting up to us.  He was dirty.  It looked like he had walked through mud. And he was tired.  Exhausted, even. For the next day and a half, he wasn't the same. He laid around and rested.  Why, he didn't even have the energy to dig any holes.

Tired Boy

Tricia theorizes that he missed us, thought we were in trouble, and set off to find us and rescue 'his people'.  He may have followed us to Lake Charles (41 miles away) for all we know.  While I was happy that our erosion problem slowed down for a few days, it was sure nice to have Big Boy back home.  Welcome Home, Big Boy!

Higher Ground

Lord, lift me up and let me stand,

By faith, on Heaven’s tableland,

A higher plane than I have found;

Lord, plant my feet on higher ground. 

That is the refrain from one of the hymns we sing at church.  It certainly rings true in the spiritual realm, but at Our Maker's Acres Family Farm this past week, it has been true in the natural as well.  Recent rains, coupled with overcast skies and cooler weather have contributed to a mucky, miry mess out on the pasture and around the barnyard.  We are all tired of the mud, man and beast alike.  

Where's the Higher Ground?

We always wear rubber boots out to the barn and slogging through six inch deep mud is a real workout. Yep, that is a view looking down at my feet in the mud.  To add insult to injury, sometimes the cows will lie down in the mud to sleep and I'll have to give them a bath before milkingthem.  Rosie is notorious for doing this and she and I had a long and animated discussion about this just this past week at about 4:30 in the morning.  I'm not sure she understood what I was trying to say.

Lord plant my feet on Higher Ground!

In another area of the pasture, though, things are looking better.  If you look below you can see some of the grass in the pasture is beginning to show a tinge of green amongst the mostly dull, brown, frost-killed landscape.  This is what I push the chicken tractor over so that the chickens can clip some of the new, green growth.

Green grass is coming on!

Here is a picture of the meat birds in the chicken tractor.  I have to push them one chicken tractor length every day, because their poop covers the green grass that I want them to eat.  That poop, however, will fertilize the pasture and cause lush, green grass to grow in this spot in a few weeks.  Even though it looks bad, the chickens do eat some of the grass, though, and we'll see evidence of that grass in their crops and gizzards next weekend when we butcher them.

Poop filled landscape after just a short time

The theme of today's post was about the ground in and around the pasture and I've got one more thing to mention.  Down below, you'll see Big Boy, our Great Pyrenees livestock guard dog manning his post in the pasture.

Big Boy

He is such a good dog, barking at varmints and taking very seriously his job of livestock protector.  We haven't lost a single bird to a predator since Big Boy has been on the farm.  We like having him around.

No varmint is getting by me, chief!

Every rose has its thorns, though.  Big Boy has a bad habit.  The photo below is not a crater left from an incoming mortar round.  It is one of Big Boy's many holes.  He likes to dig and I don't know how to make him stop.  Holes like this are not conducive for pushing a chicken tractor or walking in the pasture.

Pot holes in the pasture

I'll have to get these filled in come Spring.  If I could get Big Boy to stop digging holes, Rosie to stop laying down in the mud and the sun to shine and dry the rain saturated landscape, it sure would be nice, but those are all nuisances, not big problems to worry about.